Nicotine | Ashton Irwin ✔

5.1

Meet me tomorrow at Riverside Park at 8:30 sharp.

Teddy couldn't sleep. He lay awake, staring at his ceiling, going over those sentences in his head.

I'll tell you everything.

Everything? He wondered. About what? What was so important that need to be said? And why couldn't they have just said so on the back of that picture? Why make him wait? Why make the words eat away at him? There were so many unanswered questions that made him nervous and sick to his stomach.

Including the whereabouts of your sister.

That final sentence crawled through his skin and made his blood run cold. Whoever sent him this knew where his sister was. They were probably in on it. Hell, they probably were behind the whole thing and this was just a ruse to get him out in the open. But he needed to know the truth. And he definitely needed to know where his sister was. For his sake, and Ashton's. The older lad had been camping out on their couch every since her disappearance, which was nearing week number three.

Teddy rolled over onto his side, picking up the photo. It was hard to believe that just last year he had a mother. That his sister was by his side.

Ara looked extremely happy in the photo. They were at the park; it was the day after school let out. Craig had gone away for the week. Teddy smiled softly at the memory.

FLASHBACK

"Fresh air," Ara mumbled, leaning back onto the grass. Teddy laughed.

"What? Don't you get enough of it at home?"

"You call that fresh air?" She opened one eye, and looked at him.

"I'm teasing." He grinned. She smiled back.

"No more school." She sighed. "That means two months of pure freedom."

"And by freedom, you mean hiding in our rooms, begging for school to happen, right?"

"Yep." She replied. "But hey, we get one week without Craig. So, we should do anything and everything we can before he gets back."