If I Die

“I don’t need a babysitter, Alec.”

“I know. But your dad’s afraid that whatever’s supposed to kill you could hit early and leave you lingering on the brink of death for the next few days. And he’s pretty determined not to let that happen.”

“Then he should be at home, not out chasing possibilities that don’t exist.”

“You can’t rationalize with grief and denial, Kaylee.”

“I’m trying to rationalize with you. I have something important to do, and I need you to go home.”

Alec dropped into my dad’s recliner, and I knew with one glance that he wasn’t going to be moved until he was damn well ready. “If this is about Nash…you’re as grown as you’re gonna get and it’s not my place to tell you what not to do with your boyfriend. You two can go back there and close the door and make the whole damn planet quake for all I care. I’ll even wear earplugs, if you think it’s gonna get loud, but—”

“No! This has nothing to do with Nash.” In fact, if I told him, he’d try to talk me out of it. I sighed and sat on the edge of the coffee table. “I swear, I’ll kill you if you tell my dad, but…I’m going to sneak into Lakeside and talk to Farrah Combs. And I need to be back before Nash comes over, so you have to go!”

“You’re gonna sneak into Lakeside? I thought you hated that place.”

“I do.” With a fierce and glorious passion. “But that’s my best chance of finding the bodies in Beck’s closet, and I am not going to die without knowing he’s no threat to Emma, or anyone else at school.”

“Fine. I’ll go with you.”

“You can’t. It’ll be hard enough to get myself in, and bringing you will only double our chances of getting caught.”

He shifted in the chair and it groaned beneath his weight. “How are you going to get in?”

I stared at my hands in my lap, avoiding his gaze. “I have an idea, but it only works for one person. Me.”

“Please tell me you’re not going to get yourself committed.”

He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, trying to catch my gaze. “I’m pretty sure your dad would actually kill me if I let that happen.”

“No! How am I supposed to help anyone if I’m tied to a stretcher?”

“They really tied you down?”

“We have that in common,” I said, and he burst into laughter, no doubt remembering what was probably the most embarrassing moment of either of our lives.

I couldn’t quite decide why I was reluctant to admit the next part, but when I realized he wasn’t going to go without more information, I knew I had no choice. “I’m going to see if Tod can get me into Lakeside without being seen.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Alec asked softly, watching me closely, and I couldn’t tell if he meant breaking into the hospital, or asking Tod for help.

“I’m not sure about anything anymore, Alec. Except that I’m going to die. But not before I take Beck down.” I stood and gestured toward the front door. “Now please go home so I can be reckless and brave for possibly the last time in my tragically short life.”

Alec rolled beautiful brown eyes. “No fair playing the deathcard.”

“No fair having it to play,” I shot back, holding the front door open.

“Fine.” He stood and shoved his hands into his pockets.

“But if your dad finds out, tell him you overpowered me and left me for dead.”

“Got it.” I pushed all six-foot-two, one hundred eighty-plus pounds of him over the threshold with both hands.

“Be careful, Kaylee,” he said, and I nodded solemnly as I closed the door in his face. He hadn’t even made it to the sidewalk when I pulled my phone from my pocket and autodialed.

“Kaylee?” Tod answered on the first ring. “What’s wrong?”

I hesitated on my way to the kitchen with Alec’s empty soda can. “How do you know something’s wrong?”

“You only call me when you want something Nash can’t do for you.”

My face flamed, and I was suddenly glad he couldn’t see me. That I knew of. “That is not true.”

“Oh, yeah?” he teased, and I could hear the challenge in his voice. “So…you don’t need anything?” Was it true? I had kind of come to count on him…

A smile snuck up on me, in spite of his valid point and the grave reason for my call. “As a matter of fact, I was going to offer you something.”

For one long moment, the only sound over the line was the soft whisper of his next inhalation, then his voice sounded a little scratchier than usual. “What did you have in mind?”

“A field trip. You interested in doing something dangerous, and possibly illegal?”

“Does it involve underage girls, broken curfews and assorted fruit toppings?”

I dropped the empty can into the recycling bin and leaned against the kitchen peninsula, grinning like an idiot. “Two of the three. And I could probably scrounge up some strawberry jam, if you’re desperate.”

“I’m never desperate,” Tod said, only his voice hadn’t come from my phone. I whirled around to see the reaper standing behind me, still holding his cell. “But for the record, I prefer apricot.”

“Yuck. Nobody likes apricot jam.”

Tod shrugged and pocketed his phone. “Sure, strawberry is the more obvious choice, but I submit that apricot has a more complex, unusual flavor, with just enough tang to keep things interesting…” He raised one brow, grinning more with his eyes than with his mouth, and I had the sudden inexplicable urge to look away, before I saw too much. Then Tod blinked, and whatever I’d almost seen was gone. “So…what illegal adventure will I be aiding and abetting today?”

I closed my phone and slid it into my front pocket. “Remember when you snuck me into Nash’s room to watch him and Sabine?” At the time, he’d said it was so that I could better understand their friendship, but in retrospect, I think it was so that I could see for myself how connected they were. Tod had made no secret of the fact that he thought his brother and I were a bad match. It was one of the few things he and Sabine had in common.

“Are we playing spy again? That’s my second favorite game.” Tod followed me down the hall and into my room, where I pretended I didn’t want to know what his first favorite game was while I dug in the bottom of my closet for a pair of laceless, slip-on canvas shoes. If I got caught, shoelaces would be a dead giveaway that I didn’t belong at Lakeside—strings of any kind were banned from the facility.

“More like detective. I need to get into a secure building.”

His brows rose in interest. “The police station? Did Sabine get arrested again?”

I stepped into the first shoe. “If she had, I’d be laughing from afar, not busting her out. We’re breaking into Lakeside.”

Tod dropped into my desk chair and it bobbed beneath his very corporeal weight. “Don’t most people try to break out of the psych ward?”

“I’m not most people.” I stepped into the other shoe and slid my ID and a twenty-dollar bill into my back pocket.

“That’s what I like best about you. So why are we breaking into the loony bin?”

“I need to talk to one of the patients. And I figured I should check on Scott while I’m there.”

“Scott’s at Lakeside?” Tod appeared in the living room ahead of me, and when I tried to grab my keys from the empty candy dish, I found them dangling from his index finger instead.

“Your mom said he was moved there for long-term care last month.”

Scott Carter was Nash’s best friend and fellow frost addict. But because he was human, the drug had affected him much faster and stronger than it affected Nash. Scott suffered a psychotic breakdown and irreparable brain damage from his addiction, and he now had a permanent, hardwired mental connection to Avari, the hellion of avarice, whose breath they’d both been huffing.

Nash had visited him several times in the hospital, always hoping for improvement that never came, but he couldn’t get in to see Scott at Lakeside, where visitors had to be approved individually by the attending