by Jo Holloway
Her phone chimed from her desk, where a neater and much smaller pile of things she wanted to pack for school rested.
(Wes V.) Rhys wants us to meet him at the hospital.
WHY? Did something happen?
(Wes V.) No. He just said to meet him. 2 p.m.
(Jory M.) OK.
See you soon.
The moment of panic from the first message passed. Curiosity bloomed in its place. She checked her dad’s watch on her wrist. If she hurried, she had time for a quick shower so she could do her hair before she had to go.
The heat wave had finally broken, and the walk gave her a chance to break in her new running shoes. Her uncle had come through with an early birthday present for her so she could have them for the start of school. She left Jenner at home again, not sure what Rhys had planned, and headed out, feeling refreshed but anxious.
Jory’s blond crown caught her eye, glowing in the sun at the entrance. Before she reached him, Wes emerged through the automatic sliding doors from the lobby inside.
He waved a hand, and Jory turned and spotted her.
“Hey. Am I late?” She joined them.
“No. I just got here too,” said Jory.
“Right on time. Rhys is meeting us upstairs. And, um, Cara—he told me to tell you you’re not banned anymore.” Wes gave her a curious look.
“Oh. Good, I guess.”
She wiped a scuff from her new shoes and walked to the sliding doors, which obediently opened to admit her. At the elevator, she turned back to them.
“Are we going to see Liv?” Her stomach squeezed around the little knot. Wes nodded, and she hit the button for the eleventh floor.
He reached past her and hit the button for ten. “She was moved.” He didn’t answer her inquiring look.
“Why did he want us all to come see her?” Jory asked.
Wes didn’t bother to answer him, either. She wasn’t sure how much he’d communicated with Rhys since they’d exchanged numbers. She was about to ask, but the elevator chimed, the doors slid open, and he was there. That silly spot in the middle of her chest did the little flip again. She hadn’t seen him in over a week, and it was like her body forgot she was just riding out this crush until it passed. It wasn’t supposed to embarrass her with a hammering pulse that had to be visible. She smoothed out her hair so it draped over both shoulders and covered the sides of her neck.
“Thank you for coming.” His smooth voice did nothing to slow her pulse. “I know Cara has met Liv, but I thought it best if you guys did too. And we should all be familiar with her room so we know what we’re dealing with when we plan how to do this.”
“Makes sense,” Jory said.
The first couple days after the trip to the mansion, and their conversation, Jory had been a bit awkward with her. Since then, though, he was back to being Sunshine, and they’d run together and hung out like friends again, more comfortable each day than the last. She had a sense Wes had been right about Jory’s feelings not being as strong as he’d believed, but mostly she was happy to have her friend back.
Apparently Jory was going to be on his best behavior with Rhys today too. Maybe the seriousness of the situation was sinking in with the sweet antiseptic hospital smell surrounding them.
“Cara, I guess Wes told you you’re not banned anymore. Neither is Jenner. You can come back to volunteer anytime, and, um, I’m sorry.” Rhys shuffled his feet, looking down with his lips pursed together. It was unbelievably cute.
So not helping, Cara.
“That’s okay. And thank you. We might actually come back to volunteer at some point. Maybe next summer.”
Good save.
Rhys nodded and spun around, moving quickly to the double doors leading into the unit where his sister awaited them. This was a new unit, and Cara wanted to ask why Liv had been moved, but Rhys turned down a side corridor and kept going. He stopped at a door at the end and waited for them. That was lucky. There’d be little chance of someone stumbling into the room while they were doing . . . whatever they were going to end up having to do.
“She looks a little worse than she did last time you saw her,” Rhys practically whispered to her.
Her face pinched at the pain in his eyes, and at the image of the girl on the other side of the door. Already the awful feeling started to creep through her chest. Wes came up beside her, and they went through the door together. He kept glancing at her face.
She gasped out loud. Liv’s eyes were sunken in her face, and her skin was an ashen grey Cara didn’t remember from before. Rhys tensed beside her, and she regretted the gasp, but she really hadn’t meant to do it. At the same time, her chest constricted, and breathing grew more difficult. Her gut twisted with hot acid at the damage Livyx had done to the girl Cara had seen in the photos in Liv’s bedroom—to the girl who wore bikinis in every color of the rainbow. This girl, the one in front of her now, was dying.
An IV now snaked into her arm, and a tube extended from her nose. Her eyes didn’t move when they entered the room. A steady hand rested on Cara’s back, and she forced herself to stay put. She wanted nothing more than to turn into Wes’s comforting shoulder, or maybe to run from this room and never look back. But she couldn’t. She wouldn’t.
She did turn to murmur a quick thanks to her friend for his silent support, and caught sight of Jory standing behind Wes. He’d frozen just a step inside the door and was staring at the girl in the bed, wearing an expression she’d never seen on him before. Confusion? Horror? She honestly couldn’t tell. Wes saw her face change and turned too. He looked as surprised as she felt. His hand dropped from her back.
“Go,” she whispered. “I’m fine.”
Wes shuffled back a few steps and then walked over to Jory. He spoke in quiet murmurs, and she couldn’t hear the words, but Jory didn’t react. He didn’t even look at Wes.
She could only deal with one crisis at a time, and whatever Jory was struggling with at the sight of the sick girl in the room, Wes would have to handle it. Rhys had moved beside his sister and picked up one of her hands.
“Liv, you remember Cara? And these are her friends I told you about.” He looked up and frowned.
Wes was now physically pushing Jory back out the door. Jory’s feet moved automatically, but his face stayed in the mask Cara couldn’t read as he stared at Liv. Rhys made a sound beside her. She hoped it wasn’t a growl, but Jory honestly was not making a good impression right now. Had he seen someone he knew in a hospital like this before? Was he having some kind of bad memory? She’d have to find out later.
“Do you think she’ll flip out again if I talk to her?” she whispered to Rhys.
His hand tightened around his sister’s, and his mouth curved into a sweet smile. “I don’t think so. I’m guessing that was the Pyx last time, and Liv’s shut down even more since then. I’m sorry. I should have warned you about the NG tube and the IV. She stopped taking enough food or water and needs a little more support now. That’s why she had to be moved.”
Cara’s heart squeezed again, but it wasn’t from Livyx and the trapped feeling this time. This poor family. She wanted to throw her arms around this strong, tall guy and let him cry on her shoulder the way she wanted to cry on her friend’s shoulder. She would do whatever it took to help Liv and her brother.
“I’m sorry, Liv. And sorry about the last time I saw you.” She rested a hand on the girl’s leg, but Rhys was right. She didn’t react. “I know you don’t know me, but we’re going to help you. I promise.” Her voice started to shake, and she couldn’t say anything more. Rhys watched her from the corner of his eye.
Movement from the doorway made them both look up. Cara expected to see Wes and maybe Jory coming back. Instead, a tall figure walked in.
“Rhys? Are those friends of yours in the hall—oh, hello.” Randall Whalton entered his daughter’s hospital room and spotted Cara standing beside the bed next to his son. His head tilted. “We’ve met, haven’t we?”
“Dad, you re
member Cara Ransome. You met at this year’s summer gala.”
“Oh, of course. Josh is your uncle, right?”
“Yes, that’s right,” she replied. “Hello, Dr. Whalton.”
The grey at his temples was more pronounced in the harsh lighting of the hospital room. The lines around his eyes were a little deeper too. He shared Rhys’s chin, and the grey of his eyes, minus the gold, but nothing stood out to her as much as the dark circles under them. He might not have slept since she’d last seen him.
His eyes went straight to the bed, and he approached the other side, taking up Liv’s other hand. She couldn’t stand there. Not with the looks on both men’s faces. She couldn’t intrude on the family moment any longer.
She found Jory and Wes out in the hall. Jory had somewhat recovered and stood with one foot up behind him on the wall he leaned against, but his head hung down. Wes was beside him, his brow still pinched in the middle. She gave him a look, but he shook his head. If Wes didn’t know what the problem was, then this was seriously weird.
“You okay?” she asked. “What happened in there?”
Jory’s head lifted, and his wide eyes found her face. “Cares, we can’t do this,” he whispered.
“What are you talking about?”
“This. We can’t do this.” His mouth hung open, and there was a haunted look in his bright-blue eyes. No trace of a grin anywhere.
“Hey, Sunshine”—she tapped him on the shoulder with her fist—“come on. You’ve been in on this since the start. I thought you were with us.”
“I was. But seeing her . . . We need to find another way.”
“We’ve gone over all the other ways. You were there.” Why was he freaking out about this now? It wasn’t like they were taking this lightly. He knew this was the only chance Liv had to survive this, especially now. The girl’s sunken eyes floated in Cara’s vision, and she shivered. Maybe he hadn’t taken it seriously before. But they had to do this.
Wes shuffled his feet and raised his head. “The room is good. End of the hall.”
“Yeah, I noticed that too.”
Jory shook his head. “You guys aren’t listening. Find another way.” He shoved himself off the wall with his foot and retraced their steps back up the corridor.
Rhys came out of the room. His eyes darted back over his shoulder to check on his dad, and then he guided them down the hall after Jory. “What’s his problem?”
“Second thoughts,” Wes said.
Cara wasn’t sure that was all it was, but of course Wes would defend him. Rhys’s frustration slipped, and his face went back to normal, which, for him, was tight with worry.
“I’m having those too. There’s no other way, though, and you saw her. She’s stable and everything. She just . . . she’s lost, and she’d die without the support she’s getting now. I can’t leave her like that forever.”
“We know. You’re her family. You’re the one who loves her. It’s your decision.” Cara started to reach out a hand to rest on his shoulder but caught herself. She let it fall back to her side. “We’ll talk to Jory. He’ll still help. Don’t worry.” She hoped it was true.
Rhys walked them to the double doors, holding them open to let them through. She caught sight of Jory waiting for them near the elevators. He hadn’t gone far.
A cough behind her made her turn back to Rhys.
“I’ve decided to come back to school.” He was looking down at his shoes again as he spoke. “I hate to leave her, but I want to be there to plan and help. We can use the manor to prepare the stuff, assuming you guys are okay with sneaking off school grounds. I can cover for you with Dr. Flanagan if anything happens.”
She didn’t feel it necessary to point out how often she’d snuck off school property in the last year. Even if she wanted to, she didn’t trust herself to speak right now. The butterflies had started up their rhumba in her stomach again, swirling and dancing about. It was ridiculous. Him being at school changed nothing. He was still older than her, not to mention totally uninterested. He was still only working with them out of necessity. This was all about Liv.
Jory had come closer and stepped right up to Rhys. “So you’re going ahead with this. You’re actually going to do this?”
“Lower your voice. And yes. I am.” Rhys squared up to Jory, pulling himself up to his full height so he looked down on the tall blond.
“How can you be okay with it? There’s so much that could go wrong.” Far from red-faced anger, Jory’s face was ashen and etched with fear.
Rhys turned his head, giving Jory a suspicious look with narrowed eyes. Then he stepped back and his shoulders relaxed. “You care now?”
Jory didn’t answer.
“I guess I’m glad,” Rhys said. “Look, we’re in the hospital. The code team will be there in minutes and I know CPR, so I’ll start right away. I’ve already decided to come clean to my dad as soon as he comes into the room, which will be fast. He’s always here these days, and he’ll get her the right help.”
“What do you mean come clean?” Fear stabbed through Cara at this new part of the plan. They hadn’t gotten this far.
“I mean I’m going to tell him I overdosed her with digoxin so he can get her the antidote. I just have to make him believe me, and then he can ask whoever is in the room to administer it while they work to save her. He’ll get them to do what he says.”
“But . . . then he’ll know.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll take all the blame. I’ll leave you out of it.”
He misunderstood her fear. “No, I don’t care about that. I meant he’ll know what you did. Won’t he be mad? You could be arrested.”
He nodded. “It just has to work. If it works, he might not understand, and he might not trust me anymore, but he’ll make it go away if Liv wakes up. If it doesn’t work, yeah . . . no matter what he wants, there will be an investigation. It won’t matter how many wings of the hospital our family foundation has donated. But if it doesn’t work, I won’t care what happens to me, anyway.”
She swallowed. She would care. Jory’s face was clearing up from the clouded look he’d had since he’d left Liv’s room.
His eyes searched Rhys’s face. He nodded. “Good. It still sucks, but that’s good.”
Rhys held Jory’s gaze until he nodded too. “It does still suck.”
CHAPTER 22
That Was Mad?
DÉJÀ VU CAME KNOCKING at Cara’s memory at the sight of the meadow crowded with cars and the sounds of old friends greeting each other after summer. Her mom even parked facing the huge stone administration building towering over campus like a castle, exactly as she had the previous year. The end of summer had brought fall air, and the pine smell of forest carried to her on a light autumn breeze. She could have been reliving her first day at Scovell Academy last year, with one significant difference—this time, it felt like coming home.
She opened the back door, and Jenner bounded out into the long grass. He bolted down to the forest edge where he crouched to water the foliage, and then proceeded to sniff all along the edge. It was home for him too. She reached into the backseat to start pulling out bags and jumped when a voice called out close by.
“Hey, shorty.” A very tall figure was happily trotting toward her. Her insides jumped. But this guy was actually too tall. He was also too dark, even for a silhouette backlit by the sun. Wes’s brother, Mak, stopped beside her and patted the top of her head like a pet.
Wes was right. He wasn’t very original. And she wasn’t that short.
“Hey, Mak. How was the rest of your summer?”
“Great. Barely saw Wolfie at all. It was so nice and quiet at home without him.” He’d let his hair grow over the summer, and the silky black ends framed his sarcastic grin.
Cara snorted. “Yeah, I bet.”
“Anyway, just here to pick up some bags. I have my orders.” He jerked his head over his shoulder to his mom’s SUV parked a little closer to the castle-like structure.
&nb
sp; Elena waved from her car. Wes and Jory were visible, pulling luggage out of the vehicle.
Cara’s mom brought the bags from the trunk up to the pile. “That’s all of it.”
They picked up the last of her light packing and crossed the meadow to the Vanneau family car. Wes nodded a greeting. Cara gave Jory a quick hello, and he grinned back, but it didn’t quite transform his face the way it always used to. Something had changed with him again since the hospital visit. He wasn’t moody with her the way he had been over much of the summer, but he also wasn’t back to normal the way he’d been headed after their friend-zone chat. In fact, she was almost certain that had nothing to do with it. It was more like seeing Liv for the first time, in such a terrible state, had affected him. He’d been quiet about it the few times she’d tried to bring it up. She’d have to find another chance now that they were back at school.
Arms laden with bags, she jogged a few steps to join Jory and Wes walking behind the two moms. Small talk sustained the group as they crossed the campus to the dorms. They couldn’t manage everything in one trip, but with Mak’s help, all of Cara’s stuff was in the first load.
They split up at the fork in the path after passing between the two front-most dorms. Jory, Wes, and Elena carried their stuff over to the Lodgepole Pine dorm, or the Lodge for short, which would house the sophomore and senior boys this year. Cara and her mom followed Mak up to the Red Cedar dorm, affectionately known as the Cedars. The room chart for sophomore and senior girls inside the doors told her she and Delaney had the same room as last year. The grin almost reached her ears. It got even bigger when she spotted the door to her room standing open.
She rushed ahead. She chucked her bags on the bare mattress and threw her arms around the shoulders of her roommate, who didn’t even turn all the way around in time to be smothered.
