Oh my God.
Chase sits up, tousling his hair. “What the…”
I shoot out of bed, my bare feet slapping the tiles as I race to the door and whip it open.
Kenna stands there, bouncing in place, half dressed, her hair wild and mascara smudged. “Annalise. God, come on. Hurry.” She grips me by the wrist and hauls me from the room. “It’s your brother. He—”
“What?” A cry spills out of me as I catapult forward.
She’s tight on my heels, sobbing through the words. “He won’t wake up. I can’t wake him. I don’t know if he’s breathing. I called the police. I just don’t…I don’t—”
“Shit, shit, shit.” My lungs rattle. My limbs are putty. I tear across the hallway, burst through the stairwell, and leap down several sets of stairs.
Chase calls out. “Annie!”
“It’s Tag!” I scream back, tears streaking in rivers down my cheeks. “Oh God. Oh God…”
Kenna pulls ahead, hands trembling as she fumbles with the room key, wearing nothing but a baggy band T-shirt. “He took something. I don’t—I don’t know what it was…” The key slips from her hand. Slips again. “Dammit!”
I pound on the door. “Tag!”
Nothing.
I want to fall apart. Die.
Chase cuts between us, ripping the key away and shoving the door open themoment it unlocks. He runs in first, shirt half open, feet bare. “Christ,” he says, beelining toward Tag who’s sprawled out on the bed, motionless.
He’s on him in seconds. He grips his shoulders, shaking him hard.
No response. No groan. Just deadweight.
My knees buckle. I catch myself on the doorframe, my body frozen, mouth open but silent. The walls tilt. The world narrows.
Kenna hovers behind me with the door open, sobbing, her hands tangled in her hair. “He was breathing a minute ago. I-I tried to wake him. He took a pill to help him sleep—”
“Pills?” Chase tilts Tag’s head back, checks his mouth, his neck, his wrist. “Shit, no pulse,” he mutters. Then louder. “No fucking pulse.”
“No…no, no,no.” My voice finally comes, but it’s a whisper. Broken. Barely mine.
Chase launches into action. He climbs onto the bed, hands braced over Tag’s chest, and starts compressions. “Call them again,” he orders. “Tell them to fucking hurry.”
Kenna’s already redialing, crying into the phone, while Chase counts under his breath, sweat starting to bead at his temple. His arms pump hard, fast, desperate.
One. Two. Three. Four.
“Come on. Come on, man. Stay with me,” he grits out.
I’m paralyzed. Sick.
My brother. My brother is dying. My brother isgone.
A sudden crash behind us.
Zach.
“What the hell—?”
“OD,” Chase says without looking up. “He’s not breathing.”
