17 – Ciara
“ Y ou seem off today,” Gerard says, handing me a study book after class so I can catch up on some work I have missed because of everything going on.
“Things are stressful at the moment,” I tell him, trying to offer a convincing smile but I know I fail.
“You want to talk about it?”
I shrug. “I just ... you know things with Alyssa are stressing me out. The police still think I did it, and it doesn’t seem to matter what I do, they’re not looking anywhere else.”
He frowns. “Have you gotten a lawyer?”
I shake my head. “No, but I’m starting to think I should.”
“I think you should. They will walk all over you if you don’t get some kind of assistance. You did nothing, and they won’t be able to find anything if that’s the case.”
“You try telling them that.” I sigh. “I’m going to see if I can figure this out, so they leave me alone.”
“If you ever need a hand, reach out. I might not be able to help much, but I can offer you a listening ear.”
I smile, genuinely this time. “Thank you, I appreciate that.”
“Have you spoken to Alyssa’s family, maybe they know something?”
I shake my head. “I haven’t wanted to make things harder for them, considering what they’re going through.”
“I know her mom, she has been in a few times to discuss Alyssa. Maybe I could take you?”
It’s not a bad idea.
I haven’t spoken to her family because I haven’t wanted to bother them but maybe it’s time I consider seeing what they know. If they can give me some kind of hint as to who this might be, then I might be able to link it back to Cheyenne and figure this out.
“You know, that’s really kind of you. Maybe we’ll do that.”
“Just let me know. At least if you show up with a teacher, it won’t seem so confronting.”
He’s right.
Having him help me will seem less full on for her family.
I don’t want to upset them anymore.
“Thank you, I’ll consider it. I better get to my other class. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Chin up.” He smiles as he waves to me.
Leaving the class, I go to my last one before heading back toward campus where Spike is outside of the front gates waiting. That can’t be good, considering he’s meant to be in my room waiting for whoever has been doing this to come and make a move. Judging by the look on his face, it isn’t good news.
“Hit me with it,” I say on an exhale, stopping in front of him.
“He knows we’re lookin’ for him,” Spike murmurs. “He came to the room, but I couldn’t catch him. I moved too quickly, and he got away.”
No .
I exhale a long, deep breath.
“So he knows we’re looking for him now,” I murmur, running a hand down my face.
This is bad.
The whole point of this was to watch him without suspicion but if he knows we’re watching, he’s going to be clever about his next move and he’s going to wait for the opportunity to strike when the club goes. He has been smart thus far, which means he’s not going to make a stupid move now.
Dammit.
“I fucked up, but I’m goin’ to figure this out,” Spike mutters, his fists clenched.
“The only way is to let him think you were just in town for a night. You have to go, Spike, he has to see me alone or he’s not going to come back.”
“There is no fuckin’ way I’m leaving you alone.”
“You don’t get a choice,” I say, carefully. “He will not come around if he suspects you’re here.”
“That’s a risk I’m not willing to take.”
I step closer, putting a hand on his chest. “Please, just trust me on this. Go stay at my parents’ house, so you’ll be close by. You can keep eyes on me, but he needs to see me coming and going from the dorm and campus alone. If anything happens, anything at all, I’ll call you.”
“I’ll discuss it with Jacks, but this is givin’ me a bad fuckin’ feeling.”
Him and I both.
“I know,” I say, swallowing. “But you have to trust me on this.”
“If anything happens to you, Tom Cat,” he murmurs, tipping my face back so he can bring his lips down to mine.
I kiss him, long and deep.
Pulling back, I stare up at him. “It’s going to be okay.”
I sound confident, but I don’t feel it.
I feel as though the answers are right in front of me and if I don’t find them soon, something bad is going to happen.
I’ll spend the night going through Cheyenne’s things and praying that I’ll get some kind of answer.
If I don’t, I’m back to square one.
And this fucker gets one step closer to his goal.
I can’t let that happen.
“WHAT EXACTLY ARE WE looking for,” Addison asks, tearing open another box and pulling out the items inside.
“Something that might indicate who Cheyenne was seeing. A diary, old pictures, anything from before Spike.”
I hate going through her things, mostly because I have never touched a single item of hers since she died. Partly because I haven’t wanted to face how it feels without her here, but also because I’m scared of coming across something from Spike to her that will hurt. It’s so hard. Even though I’ve accepted that for a time, she was the love of his life, it still doesn’t mean I want to see it.
Still, if this man was bothering her, and has killed Alyssa, then they both deserve us to find who that was and end this.
“Are you okay with this?” Serenity asks, flicking through a heap of old photos. “I know it isn’t easy.”
I shrug, but there is a lump in my throat I can’t shake. “I’m okay, it’s just something I haven’t done, and I didn’t realize that it was going to be this hard. I feel for my mom, having to pack all of this away after she died.”
“Does it hurt?” Addison asks, giving me a sympathetic smile. “I know you two didn’t have the best relationship, but ultimately, she was still your sister.”
“It hurts more than I thought. We might not have been close, but Chey never deserved what happened to her, and I’d do anything to have her back, to at least have the chance to mend the broken relationship.”
“I’m sorry you didn’t get that,” Serenity gives me a small smile. “Maybe this will help with some closure.”
I hope so.
We continue going through the boxes. Mom was okay with us doing it, but she didn’t want to be in the room with us. I know how hard it is, still living with Cheyenne’s death. It’s like a wound that never fully heals. She has accepted she’s gone and isn’t coming back, but she also lives with a pain I just can’t comprehend.
I understand it a little better now I’m a mother.
I couldn’t imagine a single thing worse in this world than losing my children.
I have a new respect for what she went through.
I find an old stack of photos and flick through them. There is nothing apart from pictures of Cheyenne with her friends. My heart aches when I look at her smiling face. I had almost forgotten how beautiful she was, and no matter how hard I think, I can’t remember how her laugh sounded.
How is that possible?
You spend all this time with someone, hearing their laugh every day, but after you lose them, you just can’t remember it.
It’s soul crushing.
“Here are some diaries,” Serenity says, pulling a stack of old diaries out of a box. “They’re locked, but it won’t take much to get into them. Has anyone got a hair pin?”
Addison reaches into her thick, dark hair and pulls out a pin. She hands it to Serenity, and one by one, she unlocks the diaries, handing them to us. I take one and with a heavy heart, I open it. It’s dated quite early, before she would have been at school, so I put it aside. I’m not here to invade her privacy completely.
“Is there one closer to the date?” I ask Serenity.
She flicks through a few pages of another one, putting it aside, and then eventually she finds one that is around the date Cheyenne went to college. She hands it to me, and I begin reading. It takes about half the book for me to find an entry about a man Cheyenne met, but of course, she doesn’t name him. Still, it gives me some insight into who he is and what it was he was doing with her.
Dear Diary,
I met someone.
I can’t say his name because in all honesty, we shouldn’t be together. So many people would get into trouble if we were found out, but I can’t seem to stay away. He’s so charming and funny. He makes me laugh, and I can’t get enough of him. He treats me so well, in a way I’ve never been treated.
I wish we could be together in the open.
I wish the world could see him.
Love,
Cheyenne.
Exhaling, I keep reading.
Most entries are about how amazing their relationship is, until I stumble across one where things are starting to go wrong. Then, I dive into a world that I didn’t know existed for her. Cheyenne was so confident, so bubbly, I never thought she could be scared of someone but reading this, I can see she was indeed scared of him.
Dear Diary,
Things aren’t going the way I thought they would.
I don't understand why I thought being in this kind of secret relationship would be fun and exciting. At first, it was, but now I feel trapped. I can’t talk to anyone because if they found out, he would lose everything. His career, everything he has worked for. I told him I wanted to be together properly, but he told me that if I told anyone, I would regret it.
Something just feels wrong.
I told him we should end it, but he lost it.
I mean, he scared me.
He went crazy, he told me if I left him, he would kill me.
I’m sure he didn’t mean it, but there is something about the way he looks at me that makes me uneasy.
It’s like he’s obsessed.
I’m afraid.
I don’t know what to do.
Love,
Cheyenne.
I show Addison and Serenity the entry, and both of them give me the same expression. Something about the way she writes about him sends chills up my spine. This man was obsessed with her, and the more I read after that, the more I see how toxic this situation was. Eventually, she mentions that she is leaving school and has told mom about him, but only a little.
She never told anyone how bad it was.
In the months following her leaving him, he began stalking her, threatening her, and showing up in the places where she was hanging out. She was terrified, I can hear it in her words, even though they’re only written. She was concerned about what this man was going to do.
Then she met Spike.
And him being in the picture seemed to have slowed the stalking down, but not entirely.
He threatened to kill Spike if she didn’t leave him.
Eventually, her entries stopped, so I’m assuming whoever this man was, finally decided to leave her alone.
Either that or her and Spike moved away, and he lost track of her.
I don’t know which, but I do know whoever this man is, he’s dangerous.
“She mentions him losing his career if people find out. Do you think he’s someone who was older than her?” Serenity asks.
I ponder her question.
It makes sense, of course, but I don’t understand how she met someone older than her while she was at school unless...
“Oh my gosh,” I whisper.
Both of them look at me.
“I’ve figured it out.”
Addison shakes her head, desperately. “Girl, speak .”
“It’s not a married man, or a powerful man. No, these girls were seeing a teacher.”
The room falls silent.
This is bad.
Really damn bad.