Page 77 of Steal My Breath Away

My moment of amusement disappeared in a heartbeat. “We’re not—”

“Then you need to haul ass back to Chicago and fix whatever you broke,” he interjected. “And I’m saying this as a friend to both of you.”

My stomach tightened in a knot. “I’ve got a new assignment. But if there’s any chance Haley is in danger…”

“I’ll let you know.”

CHAPTER 32Haley

A few days after the gig with Dante’s Inferno at the Backstop Bar, Paige got the call. Her mother had been accepted for her clinical trial and she needed Paige to help her through what was expected to be a very rough first week.

I met Paige in the downstairs hallway just before the cab was due to arrive to take her to the airport. She took one look at my suitcase and frowned. “Where are you going?”

“I’m coming with you.” I pulled my warmest jacket from the closet. Riverstone had already had their first few snowfalls of the season.

“You already missed a week of classes. You can’t miss any more.”

“I talked to my profs. Three of them post their lectures online, and I have friends in the other two classes who can give me their notes. My profs are going to waive the assignments for the week I missed so I don’t have to play catchup, and I’m only going to miss one test, which I can make up afterwards.”

Her mouth opened and closed again. “But…”

“Mom checked with the FBI and they didn’t think I needed any more protection,” I assured her. “The election is in a few days and then all the political drama will blow over. No one is after me, so I don’t have to worry about grumpy bodyguards telling me what to do.”

“What about your music?” she protested. “You need to get back out there. You haven’t done an open mic in forever, and what about Stefan? Or other record execs? You might miss a chance to be discovered.”

“One week isn’t going to make a difference, and I still haven’t figured out how to draw out the emotion Stefan was talking about,” I said. “It will be good for me to get away.”

Paige bit her lower lip, considering. We both knew it was all for show. If it had been my mom in the hospital, she’d have done the exact same thing.

“Work?” she asked.

“I’ve got people covering my shifts.”

“Your show,” she said firmly. “You already missed a show. You can’t miss another.”

I pulled open the front door. “I taped a show in advance and Chad is going to put it on for me. If you don’t want to accept that I just want to be there for you, then tell yourself I’m coming because I really need to get out of Chicago and visit home to ground myself. Anything else?”

Paige dropped her bag and wrapped her arms around me. “Thank you.”

I gave her a squeeze. “Someone has to be there to line up the medical staff. You set a high bar when I was in the hospital.”

We cabbed it to O’Hare and then flew into Charleston where we rented a car for the two-hour drive to Riverstone. I hadn’t been back since Matt’s funeral, but nothing had changed. The sign on the highway was still slightly crooked, and no one had cleaned off the yellow spray-painted happy face over thea. Winter had arrived early and a blanket of snow covered the fields and forests, turning the town into a winter wonderland. From festive gardens to a magical open-air market and a decorative walking trail lit up from early November until early January revealing whimsical holiday decorations and themes, Riverstone was unparalleled for spirit at Christmas.

We drove straight to the hospital and were able to meet with her mom’s doctor right away. “Everything is looking good,” the doctor said to Paige. “We’re just finalizing the paperwork and your mom should be able to start tomorrow. I’m glad she won’t be alone. The side effects are significant for the first week, until the body adjusts.”

“She’ll be well looked after,” I said. “And if anyone messes with her, Paige will whack them with an amp, or wrangle them into submission. I was in the hospital the other week and she had people lined up outside my door to treat me.”

“She’s exaggerating.” Paige blushed. “I just wanted to make sure she had water and warm blankets and pillows, and she wasn’t in any pain and they’d checked everything that should be checked and—”

“You’re scaring her, babe,” I said, laughing. “I think she gets it.”

When I had Paige settled in her mom’s room with candy, soda, and snacks, I drove across town to our family home. Mom had mentioned that she’d started paying someone to look after the house because she wasn’t able to visit as often, and our sprawling two-story Arts and Crafts–style house looked tidy and well-kept. Even the Christmas lights that Matt and Ace had put up one winter were turned on, giving the house a festive glow.

I took a quick walk through the main level—dining room, living room, den, and bar all with warm hardwood floors and the same comfortable mismatched furniture that had been there forever. Mom had never been into decorating and Dad had an eclectic sense of style, except when it came to the kitchen, where everything was big, bold, and modern with granite countertops, stainless steel industrial appliances, and custom black-walnut cabinets. We never used his specialty equipment after he passed. Even Ace, who often came over to help with dinner, only used the basic kitchen supplies. It was a full year before I could even sit at the kitchen counter, much less attempt to make something more complicated than mac ’n’ cheese.

Upstairs, I passed Mom’s tidy bedroom and our shared family bathroom, bracing myself to pass Matt’s room, when I saw the open door. I should have expected Mom to do to Matt’s belongings what she’d done to Dad’s, but it was still a shock when I saw that she’d stripped Matt’s room bare. She hadn’t left a stitch of clothing or even a pair of shoes. His model planes, books, and old toys were gone from the shelves, and she’d taken down his posters and eventhe covers from his bed. The only reason I knew he really existed was because one Christmas he’d carved his name into the wooden floor.

I dumped my bag in my bedroom. Over the years we’d redecorated as my interests had changed. Pink walls had become blue when I’d moved on from princesses to sea creatures. Posters of unicorns had given way to pictures of boy bands and inspirational sayings, and my final year of high school, I’d finally packed away the cheerful cotton candy bedspread on my white four-poster bed and replaced it with white and teal.

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