Ever Lost (Secret Affinity Book 2)

by Melissa MacVicar

  I nod and follow him. We walk down the driveway to the house and ascend the porch steps. The headmaster knocks on the door.

  “Who is it?” Fraser calls.

  He sounds as though he’s just on the other side of the door. I’m guessing he was watching us the whole time. Very creepy.

  “Dad.”

  The door opens slowly. Mr. Fraser glares out at us.

  The headmaster says, “Clarke, Jade Irving is missing, and for some reason, her family thinks you are involved.”

  Fraser puts his hands on his hips. “Well, that’s insane. Why would I be involved? How do you know she’s even missing?”

  The headmaster shakes his head. “We don’t really. Can we come in while we wait for the police?”

  “Police?” Fraser’s eyes widen. “Who called the police?”

  The headmaster takes a step forward. “I’m not sure. But let us in, please.”

  I can tell Fraser doesn’t want to do it. He’s clearly wondering if he actually has to allow us to come inside, but he finally opens the door. I follow the headmaster into the foyer.

  The house is simple but nice—sleek furniture with no frills, kind of manly chic. I go over and stand near the sofa, but I don’t sit. Nothing seems out place except the mess on the dining table. I don’t know what I expected—overturned furniture, bloodstains, rope, handcuffs, Jade tied up in a corner? But there’s no sign that anyone else is here.

  Fraser directs his attention to me. “Did you call the police?” His face scrunches up in a sneer.

  “No, sir.” Maybe if I sir them, I’ll get out of this situation and still be a student at this school. My head is spinning. Maybe it really is all a big misunderstanding.

  The headmaster waits by the door, keeping it ajar to see when the police arrive. “Clarke, leave the boy alone. We’ll get this all sorted out when the police get here.”

  “Dad, this is ridiculous,” Fraser says. “You—”

  Fraser’s dad holds up his hand the same way my dad does when he wants me to shut up. I almost snicker when Fraser obeys.

  A police car pulls up a few minutes later. The officer takes his time getting out and walking up to the house. He obviously doesn’t think this is an emergency. I’m kind of worried that this officer looks too young and too cool, maybe not experienced enough or smart enough to get to the bottom of this situation.

  The headmaster looks over at Fraser. “Just cooperate and it will sort itself out.” He sounds calm, as though he’s used to having to soothe his hothead son.

  The two Frasers walk out onto the porch to greet the officer, and I follow them. I don’t want to miss anything.

  The headmaster takes control immediately. “Hello, I’m Brigham Fraser, headmaster at Layton. This is my son, Clarke, and this is Mateo Fernandez, a student.”

  The cop nods. “Officer Smith. Was one of you the original caller?”

  Headmaster Fraser says, “No. I think it was the young woman’s father or boyfriend. This is all just a misunderstanding, I’m sure. I have the custodians searching the school for her now.”

  “Okay.” Smith exhales a big breath and looks as if he’s thinking hard. His hair is so short he might cut it himself every morning with no guard on the trimmer. He pulls out a cell phone and starts tapping the screen. After a minute of tense silence, he speaks again. “So the girl’s phone was found in the library, and her father reports that she suspected someone here of murder. In that suicide case. Avery.” He looks up from his phone and fixes Fraser with a stare. “He was your roommate, right? I remember searching all around here for any evidence last spring.”

  Fraser nods. “Yes. He killed himself, but that had nothing to do with me. He wasn’t murdered, so I’m not sure how this relates to Jade.”

  Smith takes a step toward the house. “Okay, well, can I just look around here for her so I can assure her father that she’s not here?”

  “Absolutely not,” Fraser says at the exact moment his father says, “Yes.”

  “Clarke!” the headmaster says. “Let him look around, and then this will be over.”

  Fraser shakes his head. “I don’t have to let anyone search my house, Dad.”

  Smith’s eyes widen. “Well, I can get a warrant, but surely that’s not necessary. I’m not going to go rifling through your things. Just a quick check of the house and I’ll be on my way.”

  The headmaster puts a hand on Fraser’s arm. “Yes, Clarke. Really, don’t be ridiculous.”

  Before Fraser can answer, a car comes careering around the corner. It stops on the grass in front of the house, half blocking the road.

  “That’s Jade’s dad,” I say.

  Mr. Irving jumps out and runs up to the porch. “Did you find her?” His eyes are darting all around, and he looks super upset.

  A new feeling of trepidation hits me. Mr. Irving really thinks she’s in danger. I cross my arms, pressing my hands into my armpits.

  The cop puts a hand on Mr. Irving’s arm. “I’m Officer Smith. We haven’t found her yet, sir. I’ll speak to you over here, please.” He directs Mr. Irving away from the house, toward the police car.

  Headmaster Fraser spins around to face his son. “Clarke, what the hell is wrong with you?”

  “I’m not letting some stupid cop search my house. It’s ludicrous!”

  I think they’ve forgotten I’m here, so I slink down the steps to listen to the cop and Jade’s father.

  Mr. Irving is talking. “I can’t tell you how she knows because you probably won’t believe it, but you have to search this man’s house. If he’s a murderer like Jade said, he could have already harmed her.”

  “He wants me to get a warrant,” Smith says, sounding surprised by that.

  “Well, that should tell you something right there,” Mr. Irving answers.

  Smith sighs. “I’ll call my sergeant and see what he says. You wait here, please.” He steps away, already dialing his phone.

  Mr. Irving looks back toward the house and spots me. “Can I see her phone?”

  I walk over and hand it to him. “Thank you so much for calling Charlie. That teacher has definitely done something with her. I can’t believe she didn’t tell me.”

  Mr. Irving looks at the messages from Charlie. Then he suddenly storms back to the house and up the porch steps. He grabs Mr. Fraser by the arms and shoves him up against the side of the house. “Where is she?” he screams.

  Officer Smith charges up the steps. “Step apart! Now!”

  Mr. Irving releases Fraser and holds up his hands in a surrendering gesture. Fraser moves away from him, looking scared.

  Smith keys the radio handset clipped to his shirt. “I need backup at this location.” He nods at Mr. Irving. “Wait down by your car, sir.” He points in that direction.

  Once Mr. Irving steps off the porch, Smith asks the headmaster, “Who owns this building?”

  “Layton Academy,” the headmaster says.

  “Then do I have your permission, as the headmaster, to search it for the missing girl?”

  “No, Dad!” Mr. Fraser yells.

  Headmaster Fraser looks at his son with a strange mixture of fear and disbelief. He closes his eyes and exhales a long breath before speaking. “Yes, you may. I’m sorry, Clarke.”

  Fraser stomps down the steps and over to his car. He places both hands on the driver’s side door, bent over at the waist as if he may be ill. A second police cruiser comes whipping into the driveway. A smaller, leaner cop jumps out and jogs up to the porch.

  “We have permission from the headmaster to search, but I’m not sure that’s enough.” Smith tells him.

  The new cop says, “We don’t need permission if we think someone inside is in danger. Is that what you believe?”

  “Yes,” Smith
replies, nodding. “I do.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  The two cops both disappear inside, walking right past the headmaster without a word. I can hear them calling her name as they move around in there. Fraser runs back up the steps and into the house. Mr. Irving and the headmaster look as though they’re about to follow, but Fraser dashes back out almost immediately. He’s holding a set of keys and heading for his car.

  “Where are you going, Clarke?” Headmaster Fraser shouts.

  Mr. Irving manages to snag Fraser’s coat and yank him back. “You are not leaving!”

  Then, from inside, one of the cops shouts, “Found her! Found her! I need medical!”

  Mr. Irving hauls back and slugs Fraser, knocking him to the porch floor. I run inside and follow Smith’s voice down a hallway. My pulse feels as though it may pop my eardrums.

  I reach the door to a bedroom and see Smith hovering over Jade’s body, his ear to her lips. Jade appears to be unconscious. Her mouth is covered with a strip of duct tape, and her arms and legs are bound with it, too.

  Smith looks up at me with a horrified expression, as if he never expected to see an unconscious duct-taped girl in his whole small-town-cop career. “She’s breathing, but her pulse is weak.”

  “Get the tape off!” I shout. I run to them and drop to my knees beside her, forgetting about my own injury until I feel the shooting pain when I land.

  Tears form in my eyes. They’re burning so bad I won’t be able to hold them back. The cop starts picking at the tape on her face but stops when I take her head in my hands.

  “Jade?” I say, willing her to wake up. I wish she’d just open her eyes, give me some sign that she’s okay.

  She doesn’t, though. She’s out cold, but at least she’s breathing. I gently set her head back down on the carpet. Mr. Irving and the headmaster run into the room.

  “Oh my God!” her father says. He falls to his knees beside me. “Is she okay?” He scans her body, looking for signs of trauma.

  I rub my fingers over the edges of the duct tape on her face, wanting to pull it off but afraid of hurting her. Smith uses some kind of tool from his pocket to cut away the tape binding her ankles.

  The radio squawks, and someone says, “Suspect in custody. Ambulance dispatched.”

  Tears stream down my face, and I don’t care. I’m praying that Jade will be all right, that she isn’t going to die.

  “It’s okay, Jade. It’s okay,” her dad says, smoothing back her hair.

  My gentle pulling on the tape finally pays off, and her lips part as she exhales. Her dad is crying, too—choked up and losing it.

  “Let me check her airway,” Smith says, finally seeming to have recovered his composure. He opens her mouth and shines a flashlight into it. “Clear,” he says then turns his face to speak into his radio. “Ask him what he gave her. We need to know.”

  “Should I get ipecac from the infirmary?” the headmaster asks. “I can go…”

  I glance up at him. He’s as pale as a ghost, his jaw slack. He can’t believe what he’s seeing either—a duct-taped girl who just fell out of his son’s closet.

  By the time the ambulance arrives, we have all the tape off, and Jade’s head rests in her father’s lap. She even moaned when we moved her, which I think is a good sign.

  The EMTs come in like a crew in the pit at a NASCAR race. They make us get back, and the relative calm of watching Jade with her father is shattered. They go to work on Jade, and their aggressiveness both bothers and reassures me. An IV line, an oxygen mask, and onto the stretcher she flops.

  “They have to hurry if they’re going to pump her stomach,” Smith explains to us.

  The other cop comes rushing in, carrying some pill bottles. “This is everything from his medicine drawer. He won’t tell us anything, but there’s some pretty heavy-duty stuff here.”

  One of the paramedics takes the drugs, then they carry Jade out on a stretcher. Apparently, Mr. Irving is going in the ambulance, too. I watch her being loaded into the ambulance. It leaves with the sirens blaring as soon as the door is shut.

  Smith stands beside me. “They’re going to North Shore Medical Center in Salem. It’s close by, and they have a children’s hospital.”

  I glance over at Smith’s car, where Fraser sits in the backseat. More police cars here have shown up, including a couple of state police. Yellow crime scene tape has been strung around the whole area. Some kids and teachers are gathered at the perimeter, gawking at the scene. Mrs. Strickland tries to shoo them away into the growing darkness.

  “I’ll see you at the hospital,” Smith says, eyeing me as he backs away.

  I nod. “Okay.” And even though I’m starving and scared and sick all at the same time, I sprint back to the school where my car is still parked in the lot. Please let her be okay. She has to be okay. She just has to be.

  Jade

  Chapter 28

  The light is blinding. I try to open my eyes, but I can’t make the lids work. I want to call for help, but my throat burns.

  The closet. I have to get out of this closet.

  Gradually, I realize other people are here with me. They touch me and talk to me in soothing whispers. I wonder if they’re ghosts. Maybe I’m already dead. I jump a little, as if I’ve just woken from one of those dreams where I’m suddenly falling.

  “It’s okay, Jade. You’re okay,” a woman’s says in a soft and soothing voice.

  I’m not sure where I am or how I got here. The last thing I remember is being in Fraser’s closet. I try to roll onto my side.

  “Careful of the line,” someone says.

  My head throbs. I wish I could see who’s here with me. Angels. I think maybe angels are taking care of me.

  “Jade, try to open your eyes.”

  I blink and see a lady in hospital scrubs. I’m in the hospital. Tears spring to my eyes. I’ve been saved! Someone saved me from Fraser, and I’m alive. Relief fills me, even through all the pain.

  “Does something hurt?” She wipes my tears with her thumb. She’s middle-aged with curly hair and a wide face.

  “You found me,” I whisper hoarsely.

  She smiles. “No. I didn’t. The police and your boyfriend and your father did. Now let’s get you cleaned up so they can come in and see you.”

  I’m shocked that Charlie’s here and wonder how long I’ve been unconscious. I can’t get it all straight in my head. The nurse wipes down my face, arms, and neck with a warm washcloth. She even tries to fix my hair, which must be a complete disaster.

  She smiles. “Okay, I’ll go get them.” She’s how I imagine my mother would be with one of her patients who has been through a terrifying ordeal with a psycho. She steps out of the room.

  Seconds later, Dad comes in, his face fallen, his shoulder hunched. When his eyes meet mine, a smile of overwhelming proportions lifts his lips. “Oh, thank God,” he says, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling me into a gentle hug. “I was so scared. When we found you, I thought… oh God, it was awful.” He squeezes my hand and reaches up to touch my face.

  Tears well in my eyes. “I don’t remember. I just… sort of woke up now.”

  “I know. It’s okay. You’re okay.”

  We share another awkward hug. Mateo appears in the doorway, a police officer standing next to him. He must be how they found me. He was probably looking for me to give me a ride home.

  “Mom?” I ask. “Is she coming?”

  Dad nods. “Yes. She’s—”

  “And Charlie?”

  “Yes. And Mike, too.” Dad waves toward the door. “This police officer found you. And Mateo. The officer needs to ask you some questions.”

  Mateo comes close and touches my arm. “Thank God you’re okay. How do you feel?”

  “Like
I got hit by a bus,” I tell him.

  He smiles down at me. He’s beautiful, and the way he’s looking at me is making me feel funny. I probably look like death warmed over, but I realize in that moment that Mateo is in love with me and probably has been for a while. Despite his pledge to be just friends, he has way stronger feelings than that about me.

  The cop pulls a chair over beside my bed. “Hi, Jade. I’m Officer Smith.”

  “Hi.” I wiggle and try to sit up straighter, making sure to be careful of my IV line.

  Smith pulls out a small notepad and a pen. “Can you tell me how you ended up in Fraser’s house?”

  I glance at my father. He nods, and I know he wants me to make up some kind of story about what happened.

  “I already told him how Fraser was hitting on you,” Mateo says. “And about Blakely.”

  I get it. My story must flow from these facts. “Yeah, so I went to his house to get some proof that he was a creeper. So he’d get fired. And I found a tablet with pictures of teen girls on it. You know, nude pictures…”

  “Okay…” Smith is writing this down.

  “And then he caught me leaving his house with it. He wouldn’t let me leave because I knew about the pictures. And then he confessed that he killed Mr. Avery.”

  Smith is writing furiously. “I see…”

  “Could I have some water?” I ask Dad. “My throat is so dry.”

  “I’ll check with the nurse.” He presses the call button, and someone comes on a speaker. “Can Jade have some water?”

  “Yes. We’ll bring some.”

  Smith gestures at my face. “Did he hit you?”

  “Yeah. When I tried to run.”

  “Did he…?” Smith trails off but his implication is clear.

  I shake my head. “No.”

  “What did he say about Avery?”