Scared Yet? by Jaye Ford Page A

there – but the caution didn’t fade. She opened the access door to the townhouse, glimpsed around the stairs into the open-plan lower level. Empty. She flicked her eyes up the stairs, licked her lips, tiptoed quickly, quietly to the top.
    â€˜Hello?’
    She heard nothing but her heart beating fast. Would the man in black answer? Or would he freeze on the spot and wait for her to go back downstairs? She stood, undecided, for a long moment. Then made a lot of noise as she stomped down the hall, banging the doors as she threw all three ofthem wide – Cam’s room, the bathroom, hers. Walked on shaky legs down the stairs.
    She put the note in a plastic shopping bag and cast an exhausted, dispirited eye around as she waited for the kettle to boil – at the glass sliding door that looked into the overgrown courtyard, the old sheet that was making do for a curtain, the pair of sofas from her old house that were too big for the room, the unwashed wineglass and mess of newspapers on the coffee table, the packing cases still stacked at the front door and the collage of fridge photos that kept Cameron’s presence here when he wasn’t. Home, sweet home . . .
    A cushion slipped from the sofa as Liv sat up. Had she been asleep? It was dark, she must have been. She listened to the silence of the townhouse, tried to drag her mind from its fug, heard a knock at the door and jerked to her feet. It wasn’t a thumping, just a rat-a-tat-tat on the timber, but she stared open-mouthed at the front entry.
    â€˜Liv, it’s Jase. Are you there?’
    She let out the breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding. ‘Yep, I’m here. Hang on.’ Her strained muscles had seized while she slept and she limped stiffly across the room. ‘You scared the crap out of me,’ she said as she opened the door.
    Jason smiled and he looked so normal and familiar that she stepped onto the porch, threw her good hand around his neck and held on tight. She wasn’t the hugging and kissing type, didn’t greet everyone with a peck and a gush.She was more likely to cuff Jason on the shoulder and call him an old coot but he didn’t hesitate like he had last night at the hospital, just wrapped both arms around her, pulled her gently in. And for a few seconds, she let someone else keep her on her feet.
    â€˜Has something else happened?’ he murmured in her ear.
    â€˜Yes, yeah, I’m okay.’ She pulled away, clearing her throat. ‘Sorry, I’m half asleep.’ She held the door wide for him.
    â€˜Kelly said you missed a meeting,’ he said as he walked in.
    â€˜Oh, shit! Neil Brummer. What time is it?’
    â€˜Five-thirty.’
    â€˜ Shit .’ She dragged a hand through her hair, squeezed her eyes shut. ‘What did Kelly say?’
    â€˜Just that you weren’t there. She asked me to drop by on my way to pick up the girls from swimming to make sure you were okay.’
    She shut the door, frowned at the rattle it made in its frame. ‘I should’ve been there.’
    â€˜You probably needed the rest. Kelly said you weren’t looking too good when you left the office.’ He rubbed her arm, a kind of buck-up-girl, then turned his attention to the room. He hadn’t seen it since the day she’d moved in, when he and Kelly had helped shuffle around furniture and boxes. His eyes moved right to left, from the old weights bench and running machine against the wall, to the two sofas arranged to look into the unkempt yard, to the make-do curtain. It probably looked like nothing hadchanged. Not much had. She braced for a jibe, a ‘Gee, you’ve really got the place looking nice.’
    â€˜So how’s the hand?’
    She mentally winced. Skirting around it made it worse. ‘Sore,’ she said, flicking on lights as she moved towards the kitchen. ‘How did Kelly sound? Like it was bad