she was riding a serious high an hour into the concert. She and Cale had found a place to stand on the far right side, only a few feet from the stage. The people in the area apparently recognized Rachel and were happy to let them squeeze in closer.
Rachel held on to Cale’s arm and leaned her head on his biceps as the guitarist started into the next song, a mellow, plaintive melody. After the exhilaration of the day and having her emotions all over the map the past several weeks, her fatigue hit hard.
“We’re gonna slow things down a bit for a few,” Tim said into the mic. “This song is kind of a surprise just for you guys.”
The crowd cheered and the singer waited for them to calm down.
“We wrote this song just for tonight. In memory of Noelle Culver.” Again, he paused for cheers. “I never knew her personally, but being a couple years younger than her, I remember her well. You didn’t go to school at San Amaro High and not at least know of Noelle Culver.”
Rachel nodded, recognizing the truth in what he said. Noelle had commanded attention without trying.
“I want to thank Trina Jankovich, one of Noelle’s friends, for helping us out. She put together a little show especially for those of you who knew Noelle that you’ll see on the video screens while we play our song.”
The shot from earlier, from Trina’s folder, reappeared larger than life on the twin screens that flanked the stage. As the other band members joined the guitarist in playing a beautiful, haunting song about a girl whose spirit was larger than life, Noelle’s life flashed in front of them in a string of images. Trina had managed to find photos as far back as kindergarten to include.
Rachel’s chest tightened as she watched her sister on screen, with friends, with the family, with her pet box turtle, homecoming dates and more. Cale’s arm slipped around Rachel and pulled her tightly against him, as if he knew she needed the reinforcement. And maybe he needed hers, too. She breathed in Cale’s scent and drew strength from his warmth that encircled her in the night air as she watched the images through blurred vision. The pictures became more recent, and there were a lot Rachel hadn’t seen before, most of them probably taken when Rachel was in med school.
And then there was Cale, up on the big screen, holding Noelle, both of them laughing as if they didn’t even know there was a camera pointed at them, and Rachel’s whole world crashed around her.
This was not her life.
Cale wasn’t her boyfriend or her fiancé or her future. He was the man who had loved her sister. He was her sister’s man.
Rachel ducked out from under his arm, hurried through the crush of people and ran away.
* * *
RACHEL HAD BEEN gone for a full five minutes before Cale decided he was an idiot for assuming she’d just needed a bathroom break. Not when she’d left during that song. Not when she hadn’t taken the time to mention where she was going.
He felt like a salmon swimming upstream as he headed away from the concert. Tim Bowman and his band had just started playing one of their biggest hits, and that drew every last fan who had wandered to the concession stand or the Porta Potti line back into the stage area. The concert had been excellent so far, but with Rachel MIA, Cale couldn’t care less about missing the rest of the show.
He scanned the row of mostly vacant portable toilets as he walked by, and then he went through the hotel lobby and asked a random woman coming out of the women’s restroom there to check for his escapee date. She reported the indoor restroom was deserted, though. No surprise.
Cussing himself out yet again for not following her right away, Cale headed for his truck, which was parked fairly close thanks to the fact that he’d shown up at 4:00 p.m. to help with preparations on the beach.
The idea that Rachel might be heading to her house would be too easy, but he drove by there first anyway. All the windows in the place were dark and her car was in the driveway, but that was expected since she’d ridden with her mom to the hotel. Just in case, he hopped out, leaving his engine running, and went to the door. Knocking three times produced no response, and when