Chapter 36 – Cassie
“He did what?” Ellie asked, trying to wrap her head around the story I’d just told her. Colt stood beside her looking equally stunned.
“He saw what everyone’s been saying about him online and then he left. Didn’t tell me where he was going or when he’d return. Just walked out with the clothes on his back—nothing else.”
Colt ran a hand over his face, letting out a deep breath. I could tell he was worried about Jace, even if he didn’t say it out loud.
“Has he ever done this before?” I asked, hoping he could give us a clue.
“Not since he got back from rehab,” Colt said, sinking down onto Jace’s couch, leaning forward to think.
“But before he got sober, yeah. He’d do this all the time. And when he got mad, he’d binge drink—a lot.”
I swallowed hard, my stomach twisting.
“Is there anywhere he might go, Cassie? Any place that you know of?” Colt’s expression was serious, his eyes pleading as he tried to find a lead.
I had already been out to Crowley’s Ridge, and he wasn’t there.
“No, I already checked all his normal hang-out spots, called his therapist, and talked to a couple people downtown. No one has seen or heard from him in hours. And his phone goes straight to voicemail. That’s why I called you guys.
I thought you might know him better than I do.
” I sat, covering my face with my hands in frustration.
“You don’t think he’d break his sobriety, do you guys?” I asked, my voice tight. I hated even asking the question.
Colt’s gaze wavered with uncertainty.
Dammit, I was scared––downright terrified if I was being honest. I didn’t know what to do, where to turn. For the first time in my life, I couldn’t pick up all the pieces and put them back together again.
“Did Jace ever tell you why he got sober, Cass?” Colt asked.
“Colt, that’s not your story to tell,” Ellie warned, eyeing him.
“She needs to know the truth, El. Needs to know how important she is to him. If anyone can save Jace, it’s her,” he said, leaving me completely confused.
“No, he never told me why he got sober, just that he did. Why? What are you guys not telling me?” I said, demanding an answer.
Colt took another deep breath, running his hand across his face in frustration.
“He got sober because of you, Cassie.”
“Because of me?”
“Do you remember when your apartment caught fire and you passed out from the smoke?”
I nodded slowly.
“It wasn’t a firefighter that saved you, it was Jace,” Colt said, as Ellie shook her head behind him.
He pulled something from the drawer of Jace’s coffee table—an old, folded newspaper clipping.
As Colt unfolded it, I recognized it instantly. It was the same one I’d read multiple times over the years, a painful memory of the night I almost died.
Colt held up the clipping, pointing to a spot in the background of the picture in the center. Someone was sitting on the curb, getting checked out by a paramedic. Only their shoulder was visible because the EMT taking care of them blocked everything else.
Before today, I had just assumed the person getting checked out was a firefighter or some other first responder who came running to my rescue.
Colt pointed to the person receiving care.
“That’s Jace, Cassie. He was at the Twisted Spur the night of the fire.
He wanted to go home, but he was way too drunk to drive, so he started walking to kill time and sober up.
While he was walking downtown, he smelled the smoke coming from your apartment,” Colt paused for a moment, considering his next words.
“What I’m about to say next, I swore to Jace I’d never tell a soul, but you need to know, Cassie. You need to know how much you mean to my brother,” he said, taking a deep breath before continuing.
“Jace was distraught that night. I’d never seen him so upset as he was after that fire.
He kept screaming about how he almost got you both killed.
Saying he was too drunk to recognize where he was in your apartment, and if it wasn’t for the firefighters calling out your name, he would’ve never made it to the fire escape in time.
“He drunkenly cried for hours. I tried to pull him from his spiral and begged him to get help, but he was in a trance or something. He didn’t even know I was right next to him.
I didn’t know what to do. You know better than anyone that you can’t make someone get help, get sober, if they don’t want to.
But I couldn’t leave him that night. I knew he’d drink until it killed him, and I didn’t want to lose my only brother.
“He cried and cried, not knowing if you’d make it.
Then sometime in the early morning, before the sun had even started to rise, our dad called to let me know they’d finally gotten you to wake up, and the doctor’s believed you’d make a full recovery.
That was the first moment all night that Jace came out of his state of sadness and rage,” Colt said.
The scar on my right side hurt as I remembered waking up in the hospital, barely able to breathe on my own—burns fresh, flesh still peeling.
“After Dad’s call, I have no idea what came over him, but Jace started pouring all his alcohol down the drain, smashing the bottles in his sink.
I thought he was starting to rage out again, but instead he asked me to drive him to the airport.
Told me he was finally ready to get help.
So I drove him down there before he could change his mind.
He took the first flight out to Florida and checked himself into a rehab center that Ellie and I had been begging him to go to for a while.
He didn’t even take a bag, just the clothes on his back, still covered in smoke streaks from that night.
” Colt paused, taking another deep breath.
“He got sober because of you, Cass. He never wanted to be the reason that someone he cared so deeply about got hurt. He almost couldn’t save you and that set off something inside of him.
He didn’t want to feel that out of control ever again.
Whether you saw it or not, he cared about you before the fire, but after that night, he cared on an even deeper level.
I’ve never seen him care about anything else in his life as much as he does you.
He loves you. I always told him to tell you the truth, that you’d give him a chance for sure if you knew, but he was adamant about not doing it that way.
He wanted you to give him a chance because you wanted to, not because you felt obligated to,” Colt said, ending his confessional.
My world started spinning. I had replayed the events of that night in my mind a million times. I’d never once remembered Jace being there. How could I have forgotten something so important?
I felt helpless, not knowing where to go or what to do. Probably how Jace felt the night of the fire.
“Ellie and I will check around town again. Maybe he went to Maggie’s to grab something to eat and clear his head. You stay here, Cass, in case he comes back. We’ll let you know if we find him,” Colt said, pulling his coat off the back of the couch, marching toward the door.
“It’ll be okay, Cassie. We’ll find him,” Ellie said, trying to reassure me, but it wasn’t working.
What if Jace was already at some bar, drinking again? What if alcohol wasn’t enough this time, and he tried something stronger?
Jace was an amazing, gentle, kind-hearted soul who deserved the world and more—he just couldn’t see that for himself. What if he never did?