Until Beth Read online

  Andre carried my guitar and held my arm as we crunched across the slippery path to the entrance. Not for the first time, I considered how nice it would be to feel this protected and cared for all the time. Sam and I had had a different kind of relationship—we were usually too deep in discussion to even hold hands. But Shelly and Andre were a permanent item, and if I were to be totally honest with myself I had no real attraction to Andre, even if he was smoking-hot gorgeous.

  As we got closer, I noticed that the old stone building was run-down and ancient. Snow-caked ivy clung to its sides. “What kind of place is this, anyway? I thought we’d be at a school.”

  Andre shrugged. “Vincent claims it’s an old brewery that was in the family of the director. The acoustics are great, so they turned it into a retreat and audition space. I think they have concerts here or something.”

  “Wow,” I said. “Pretty cool.”

  “Don’t be fooled by the shabby exterior. I hear it’s amazing inside.”

  A scarred wooden door opened to a toasty warm foyer. Candlelight washed the space in honey-gold light and cast dancing shadows on the brick walls. The scent of hot cider and fresh flowers wafted toward me. With Andre’s hand pressed against the small of my back, I felt my twisted nerves untangle.

  Coming here was probably insane. But at least I was doing something to pull myself out of my funk. With my anxiety symptoms escalating, I had no doubt that I stood at the edge of a bottomless pit. One more push and down the rabbit hole I went.

  A tall woman in a dark, gauzy gown opened the door and motioned us in. Her jet-black hair was swept off her long neck in an artfully careless updo. I noted that she was entirely too dressed up for an audition, but whatever.

  “Hello, Andre! And you must be Bethany Collins! I’m Monica DeWitt, head of recruitment for the High Step Program.”

  I flashed Andre a questioning look, but the woman answered before he could respond. “Didn’t he tell you? Andre is a part-time student with High Step.”

  The wind rushed out of my lungs. “Huh? Why didn’t you say?”

  Andre shrugged and smiled sheepishly. “I wanted you to feel like you did this on your own.”

  “That’s silly. It would have made me a lot less nervous. But why only part-time, dude?”

  “You know the score. With Dad’s pacemaker and all,” Andre said, “and Mom can’t really handle much.”

  “Oh, right.” I felt like an idiot all over again. It had never occurred to me to ask why he hadn’t tried out himself.

  I wondered if I would take that option, too—if I’d want to split my time between the program and home. Carson’s desperate gaze and limp body flashed in my mind, and I reaffirmed my resolve to escape. I had to.

  Monica DeWitt’s eyes glittered like pale blue opals set in ivory; her face crinkled in a luminous smile. Her lyrical alto set me instantly at ease, though I felt small and mousy in her breathtaking presence. “Please, both of you, come in quickly! It’s frigid out there. We are so pleased that you have decided to try out for the program, Bethany. Vincent has spoken very highly of your performance at your high school.”

  At the mention of Vincent, the beautiful boy with the French accent, a fleeting chill chased up my spine. The pressure of Andre’s hand on my shoulder steadied me.

  Monica DeWitt led us through hammered-copper double doors to a huge room with polished wood floors, arched ceilings, and plush couches arranged around two massive fireplaces. Stone walls rose around us, cresting in a vaulted brick ceiling.

  “Wow,” was all I could manage.

  “Lovely, isn’t it?” Monica gestured to a raised platform where an array of musical equipment had been set up. “It’s now our state-of-the-art music space. We hold concerts here as well.”

  “Cool,” I said, completely awestruck and a little weak-kneed.

  “Why don’t you both make yourselves at home at one of those couches around the fire? I’ll get some hot cider and scones after I make a quick phone call. Vincent was supposed to have been here by now.”

  Monica glided from the room, gown trailing behind her.

  “I thought they’d be auditioning other candidates,” I said to Andre once she was gone.

  “It’s mid-semester. You should be honored they’ve arranged for this.”

  “I am,” I muttered. Andre’s phone rang and he answered, brow furrowed with concern. He ended the call, looking distressed.

  “Crap. Dad’s had another heart episode and Mom’s freaking. I’m going to have to leave.”

  “That sucks. They can reschedule this, right?”

  Monica DeWitt reentered with a tray of steaming mugs and a bowl of scones. She set them on a table, but we were both standing.

  “Is something wrong?”

  Andre explained the situation.

  “I’m so sorry about your father, Andre, dear. But Beth, there’s no need for you to leave. We have lovely accommodations here, and Vincent can take you home tomorrow.”

  “Or I can come back tomorrow to get you,” Andre offered.

  Monica turned to me. I was skeptical about the offer, but something told me that if I let this chance slip by, I’d end up warehoused forever in that backwoods town, my mind turning slowly to mush, my nerves shot. Not to mention having to face my helpless brother’s pleading eyes every day.

  “It’s fine,” I said, hesitantly. “If I can get a ride with Vincent, I guess. You don’t need to do all that driving. Or maybe I should just leave with you and come back?”

  “No! Don’t do that. I’ll come back for you.”

  “You sure?” I asked. “Just get going, then. Your parents need you. We’ll figure something out.”

  Andre hugged me hard and left. In his absence, the chill swept through me again until Vincent walked in, shaking snow from his headful of springy curls.

  “Oh, hello. Bethany Collins, right?” Vincent shook my hand gently, as if it was made of eggshells, his broad smile lighting up the room. He’d lost the sunglasses and I could see that his eyes were the startling light blue of phosphorescent undersea creatures, eerily vivid against his tawny skin. The shock of his beauty rippled through me.

  Monica glanced pointedly at her watch. “It’s high time we get started, Vincent, isn’t it? Miss Collins has been waiting patiently for you to get here.”

  “My apologies. Very sorry for the delay.”

  For the audition, it was just me, Monica DeWitt, Vincent Rousseau, and my guitar. I climbed onto the platform, and though I was trembling and knock-kneed, my fingers found their places on the frets. By some miracle, I fell easily into the rhythm of the song. My voice built, forcing past the layers of pain and grief I’d let accumulate, and exploded into a wail of anguish. My cheeks blazed, and Monica’s and Vincent’s rapt expressions fueled my performance. I knew I was killing it.

  While I played, I could have sworn I saw something shift in a dark corner of the room. I soldiered on, determined to ignore it.

  When it was over, I suppressed the smile that twitched on my lips. I couldn’t help but think that I’d nailed this. That I had actually clinched a place in the super-exclusive High Step Program.

  When Monica and Vincent erupted in applause, I knew I was right. I’d rocked it.

  I was in. I had to be. For the first time since Sam vanished, I had truly brought it.

  But neither Monica nor Vincent confirmed my acceptance or rejection. Instead, I was led to a sumptuous guest room upstairs, served hot tea, and wished a good night’s sleep. Votive candles flickered on the mantel of the cozy fireplace.

  Sipping at the tea, I stared into the quivering shadows, expecting to see something move. There was nothing. But the possibility that a mouse might be lurking in one of the dark corners lodged itself in my mind and I could not get it out. Rapists I could handle, but those tiny disgusting little things were my Achilles’ heel.

  Too wound up to sleep, I paced the room and considered calling Shelly to admit where I really was or at least checking in with A
ndre. I felt too guilty about having lied to call Mom, so I’d come clean once I knew the score.

  Turned out I wasn’t calling anyone. My cell phone had no reception.

  The refrain of “Fragile Forever” still echoing in my head, I couldn’t stop thinking of Sam, his memory a thick pressure in my lungs. Suffocating and claustrophobic, I pulled back the heavy drapes. Moonlight had broken through the cloud cover and streamed across the snow like spilled silver.

  Glinting in the moonlight on the ledge of the windowsill was a button. A Blast Mahoney button. The small scratch and dent under the name identified it as the one Sam had given me. I had no doubt it was mine.

  I grabbed for the button and clutched it tightly in my fist, tears squeezing between my lashes. I was lonely and hollow, and without Andre to soothe me, the jagged pain of loss stabbed me like a thousand blades.

  I had no idea how the button got there, but I had to talk to someone before I exploded. I’d been to a shrink a few times, but after Carson’s accident there was no money for that. Now it was obvious the meds she’d prescribed weren’t cutting it either. I was starting to doubt the solution to my troubles would come from a prescription or from entering the High Step Program.

  I wasn’t going to let it out of my sight this time, so I tucked the button into my overnight bag’s outer pocket, and then paced the room searching for reception on my cell. It was a dead zone. No service.

  The call to Andre had gotten through downstairs, so I slipped into the hall in search of reception. The wall sconces had been snuffed out and the corridors were dark, with only the thin strips of moonlight that filtered through the a few slitted windows to guide me.

  I stumbled along, hand trailing the cold walls, in search of the staircase to the ground floor. Then my foot caught and I lost my balance, falling forward into darkness. My head smacked into something hard on the way down and I fell flat onto my stomach, disoriented, engulfed by spinning darkness. There was the scuffle of feet, then concerned voices.

  Strong arms lifted me before it all went silent.

  7

  BRIGHT SUNLIGHT SEARED MY EYELIDS; A HEADACHE reverberated inside my sinuses. I was sitting in a chair, the world revolving too quickly behind my closed eyes.

  “Bethany? Were you listening?” asked a voice inflected with a crisp upper-crust British accent.

  My lashes were crusted together, so it took a few seconds to pry them open. “What?”

  My eyes blinked open. If this was a dream, it was a vivid one.

  A strange man smiled at me from behind a massive oak desk. He was handsome and elegant, shoulder-length auburn waves falling over the collar of what appeared to be a very expensive suit. To the side of the desk, Vincent Rousseau’s gold curls gleamed like the sun’s corona. He gazed intently at me, his forehead creased. Everything was blurred and fuzzy, as if I was looking through a Vaseline-smeared lens.

  “How did I get here?”

  The man sighed. “Bethany, dear, it may take some time for your mind to clear after that nasty fall you had. We feel terrible that your time with us has been marred by your injury. But you are healing fast. You’ll be up to speed in no time.”

  “My time with you? What do you mean? I only just came for an audition last night.”

  The man’s dark eyes were warm and concerned. “You don’t remember what happened after that? Oh, my. Our doctors said you merely had a slight concussion. Perhaps it was more severe than we’d suspected.”

  Watery light poured in from the floor to ceiling windows and hurt my eyes. “I really don’t know what the fu—what the heck you’re talking about. Last thing I remember was that I fell, and—”

  “Yes,” Vincent interjected softly, his voice reassuring and resonant. Between the two European accents, I wondered if I was even still in the US. “I heard the crash. I ran from my room and found you barely conscious on the floor.”

  I squinted and tried to focus my thoughts and vision, but my brain was sponge cake—porous and empty. Anger flared in the pit of my stomach. A dark smear hovered vaguely above the man’s head and tickled the back of my throat. “I remember that, but nothing else. Someone better tell me what’s going on.”

  The man glanced at Vincent, then nodded, stood, and extended a hand to me. I was momentarily fixated by the antique ring set with a massive ruby on the man’s finger. Bits and impressions floated aimlessly in the soup of my mind, but I couldn’t really make sense of them.

  “I’m sorry for how this must seem to you, Bethany. I’m Gideon Ross, the Director of the High Step Talented Youth Program or just High Step, as we like to call it. We had already decided to offer you acceptance into the Program when you fell and hit your head. Under the circumstances, we had to inform your mother of the accident and learned about your situation at home. Given the demands of caring for your disabled brother, your mother, once she got over her initial anger at your deception, agreed it would be best if you entered the High Step Program without delay.”

  I jumped to my feet. “But—but—my friends. My things. I didn’t get to say goodbye to anyone.”

  “But you did, Beth,” Vincent said, brow furrowed. “You don’t remember that either? Your friend Andre came for you. You had two days to get your things together. The audition was a week ago.” He took my hand. I desperately wanted to believe him. I strained to remember, but came up blank.

  “I lost an entire week? How is this possible?”

  “Brain injuries are strange that way,” Gideon Ross said. “We’ve had you evaluated by the school doctor and he gave you the all-clear. But I guess this means you don’t remember anyone here at the Program, so we’ll just start all over.”

  “Not a problem,” Vincent said with smile. He rested a hand on my shoulder and warm comfort rushed over me. Patchy memories seeped in to fill in the blank spaces until I wasn’t sure what I’d actually forgotten. Wispy memories of packing, tearful goodbyes floated through my mind.

  I gazed at Gideon Ross and realized that, somehow, I was pretty sure I did know him.

  And did it matter? Wasn’t acceptance to the High Step Program the answer to all my problems?

  Gideon was beaming at me. “Very well, then. It just so happens that each week the Program showcases the talents of our extraordinarily gifted students, and one showcase is just about to begin. Vincent will be happy to take you there, if you feel up to it.”

  Vincent offered me his arm. “It would be an honor.”

  I slipped my arm into Vincent’s, unsure if I could actually stand and walk on my own. My legs were weak and wobbly; my vision still blurred at the edges. I wasn’t wearing the clothes I’d auditioned in, so apparently time had passed.

  No matter. I’d done it. I’d escaped the fate of the lake house, escaped being a witness to Carson’s suffering. I told myself that he’d adjust to life better without me around to remind him how I could have prevented his tragedy in the first place. And I was one less body for Mom to worry about.

  And maybe, here, I wouldn’t need those meds anymore.

  Vincent led me out of Gideon’s study and my brain hiccuped. The halls of this building did look familiar, even though we were clearly not at the old brewery. Pale light streamed through tall arched windows. I peered out to the snow-covered fields and the birch forest beyond, both clouded in mist. The sense that I’d forgotten something important crept up and gnawed at me.

  Vincent’s hold on my arm kept me steady as we strolled slowly through the halls. “Where exactly are we, Vincent?”

  “The Program compound is not far from the Brewery,” Vincent said. He gestured toward the windows. “We are in the state of Massachusetts. Lovely, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah. Pretty foggy out there, though.”

  “It’s usually this way. We are in a low-lying valley.”

  “It’s always foggy? Even when the sun shines?”

  Vincent nodded.

  “Weird.”

  “You get used to it.”

  “Where are you fr
om originally, Vincent?” I blurted.

  “I was born in Normandy in northern France. But this country is my home now.”

  When I realized his answer was not quite what I’d hoped, I decided to press him a bit.

  “So what’s your talent?”

  Vincent scowled for a moment, then broke into a bright smile. “You mean why I’m in the High Step Program? I play violin.”

  “Neat. I’d love to hear you play.”

  “You most assuredly will,” he whispered as we entered the darkened auditorium. The place was full and hushed, the aisles sloping down to the spotlit stage, bare except for a single stool and a mic stand.

  “It’s packed. We’ll have to sit in the back,” he said.

  We took our seats in the last row just as a tall boy with longish black hair that fell in his eyes walked onto the stage. I couldn’t see his features too clearly from this distance with my still slightly blurred vision, but something about his bearing sparked recognition. I wondered if he was one of the people I’d met this past week and forgotten.

  “Who’s that?” I whispered to Vincent. “Did I meet him?”

  In the dark of the auditorium I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I saw Vincent’s lips curl into a sneer. “I doubt it. Xavier doesn’t socialize much.”

  I was about to press him when the boy mumbled something into the microphone. If there was whispering before, the place became quieter as the boy named Xavier began to sing what sounded like an ancient folk song without instrumentation.

  I’d been around a lot of singers. I’d been told my own voice was powerful and raw, like a baby Janis Joplin, one of the great female rock singers of the twentieth century. But this kid’s voice was like nothing I’d ever heard. Unearthly in its range and purity, at first it dropped to its lowest registers, breathy yet vibrant, then climbed steadily to majestic heights of fiery fury. I felt the vibration in my teeth—in the marrow of my bones, as though I were a human tuning fork.

  The audience was dead silent, apparently as enthralled as I was.