After She's Gone (West Coast #3)

She’d arrived on set to find out that Allie’s assistant, Cherise, had called Little Bea and claimed illness. Lucinda Rinaldi had stepped into Allie’s costume for the reshooting of that final, fateful scene. It appeared that Cassie had been the last person to see her sister before Allie had fallen off the face of the earth.

“Where are you?” Cassie whispered now, leaning against the slick tiles of the tiny shower stall. Not for the first time she wondered if she were somehow at fault, at least partially. The fight. Allie hitting her head. Emotional and physical trauma that she, Cassie, had inflicted. The black hole of missing hours.

And now this. The not knowing.

She started to cry, tears mingling with the drizzle running from the showerhead over her body. Just like the guilt. Always the guilt. The truth was that she loved her sister and yes, there was envy and pain involved, even jealousy and anger, but she still remembered the scared little girl Allie had once been, the nerdy kid who’d been so shy. The girl Cassie had felt an intense need to protect. Before everything had gone so far downhill. God, what had happened to them? Angrily she swiped the salty drops away and pulled herself together. She was no use to herself or Allie or anyone by falling into a billion pieces.

Drawing a breath, she washed her hair and lathered and rinsed her body, scrubbing hard as if the very act could scour away any remaining bits of self-loathing and doubts. Once she was finished, she stepped out of the tile and glass enclosure and realized she hadn’t brought a towel with her.

Dripping, she padded to the hall closet, leaving a trail of wet footprints behind her. She found a bath sheet and wrapped herself in the thick terry cloth before returning to the bathroom and swiping at the fogged-over mirror.

Her phone rang as she was staring at her reflection, and she quickly made her way to the kitchen, where her cell lay charging on the counter. She’d missed the call and saw that no number registered on the screen. All that was listed was: Private call. She felt a moment’s fear, the old worries returning, but told herself it was no big deal. Probably just a wrong number. Or a telemarketer. Whoever it was, if they wanted something, they would call back.

She checked the screen again. Another call had come in, a number she recognized as belonging to Trent. This time he didn’t leave a message and she was surprised that she felt a prick of disappointment, but there it was, a tiny new rip in her already fragile heart. “Fool,” she whispered, and then noticed the face-down picture on a side table in the living room. She and Trent noticed. So much in love. She picked it up. The glass was cracked, a scar from a fight she’d had with Trent when she’d hurled the wedding photo across the living room they’d shared. Her temper had always run white-hot and the fact that she’d caught him having drinks with her sister had sent her over the edge. When he’d tried to explain, she hadn’t listened. Instead she’d thrown the wedding photo across the room, aiming for his face. After he left she’d tossed the picture into the trash only to retrieve it the next day.

She looked at it now. In the photograph, she was wearing a short white dress. Trent was in jeans and an open-throated shirt. It was night, they stood near the street, the lights of Las Vegas blurring behind them. They were so happy, Trent’s crooked, irreverent grin in place, her smile as bright as the future stretching before them. She’d been certain at that moment their life together would be worry-free and guaranteed to have a happy ending. She’d been so naive. Such an idiot to start dating him again after their breakup in Oregon. Granted, they’d separated mainly because of distance and family pressures: She was leaving for LA, and he was staying in Oregon. Her mother had been worried, Cassie had endured so much, she was concerned about the relationship. And though Trent hadn’t given a rip about Jenna’s feelings at the time, Cassie had been confused.

Well, wasn’t she always?

Nothing had changed much there. Maybe her fury at Trent on the night of the fight had been misdirected. She knew now that Allie had targeted her husband, not the other way around. How sick was that, her own sister actually wanting to sleep with him? It was really messed up, but, of course, Cassie’s relationship with Allie had always been difficult and weird.