"Phoebe, why didn't you let me go after her?" Danny questioned.

"Cause that's not our Cass. I get that she wants to be a detective and all but she shouldn't do it at the expense of our lives," Phoebe said talking really fast which was something she only did when she was furious. She could not wrap her head around the fact that her best friend seemingly cared more about a case than she did her friends safety. With Phoebe's mother not being in her life and with her father hardly in her life, she had always looked to Cassie for stability, her only constant. Cassie's recent action made her question if she really had anyone she could count on forever.  

"You're right, the second we told her we were threatened she should have said she'll drop the case," Danny said, his tone laced with more concern for Cassie, than anger. 

"Yeah she's crazy," Tucker added.

"Watch what you say about my girl, bro," Tyler warned in a firm tone. "This is her lifelong dream, she's just conflicted. Cut her some slack."

"How? from our graves?" Phoebe blurted. "Someone freaking threatened to kill us," she said picking up her phone from the couch. "And you're asking me to cut her some slack?" her eyebrows were furrowed and she rolled her neck as she spoke.

"Woah Phoebes calm down," Tyler said putting his hand if front of him as a shield to protect himself from the enraged Phoebe.

While the whole ruckus was occurring in the living room, Matt was too consumed in his video game to notice or care about anything that was happening around him.

"You know the weird thing?" Danny asked, "Cassie had always said she wanted to be a detective from the first day we met, but it wasn't until a few years ago that her dream turned into this burning obsession."

"She changed in the seventh grade after she got back from a camp. She was weird for a while but she assured me she was okay whenever I'd worry about her," Phoebe said.

"That's odd," Tyler said, "Cassie hates camping"

"Actually, she used to love camping." Danny pitched in "but she started hating it after she got back from the camp she went to in seventh grade."

"Do you think something happened there that aroused her passion to become a detective?" Tucker asked.

"Aroused?" Danny asked questioning Tucker's choice of words "anyways you're right, something probably happened."

"Dude, aroused means other things too," Tucker defended.

"Not for you, it doesn't," Tyler laughed.

"If something happened I'll know about it," Phoebe said, "we promised to never keep anything from each other."

"Making a promise is the easy part, but keeping it, that's hard," Tyler said.

"You guys are reading too much into things," Matt spoke up, they all turned to him shocked that he was actually paying attention. "Cassie grew up and her passion grew with her, I doubt anything significant 'aroused' her interest," he said putting emphasis on the word aroused and they all laughed knowing he was mocking Tucker.

"I'm super scared of the killer and I don't want to die anytime soon, and since Cassie is being stubborn about dropping the case I'm going to keep my distance for a while," Phoebe said.

"You mean you're gonna abandon her?" Danny asked.

"If that's the only way to save my life then yes," she said adamantly, nodding her head.

"I love Cassie and all but Phoebe is right, let's give her her space and maybe she'll come back to her senses once she's had some time alone to think," Danny said.

"Well I'm going to support her all the way," Tyler said. "She goes to the station every afternoon, I'm sure she'll be there tomorrow, so I'll go there and surprise her tomorrow," Tyler said.

"You know what guys? I'm not really in the mood to hang out today, you guys are free to stay if you want," Phoebe suggested. "We can do something tomorrow instead," she said looking to all of them for approval.

"Yeah you're right, babe," Tucker said placing a kiss on her forehead while picking up his leather jacket from Phoebe's couch. "See ya suckers later," he shouted out to everyone. He flung his jacket over his shoulders and walked out the back door.

"Yeah all this arguing is exhausting," Danny said. And with that, they all picked up their things and left. And Phoebe was left with Matt who was still busy playing video games in her living room.

                                                                                          *

Cassie woke up that Saturday earlier than usual, she had been so upset the day before that she slept early because she did not want to be awake and be attacked by terrible thoughts and the memory of her friends' angry faces. 

She cleaned her room and put her dirty clothes in the washing machine, as was her routine every Saturday morning. She brushed her teeth and walked down the stairs.  She met her father watching the news, fully engrossed in it.

"Hey dad," she greeted as she placed a peck on his stubbled cheeks.

"And how's my favourite daughter this morning?"

"I'm your only daughter, say how's my favourite child doing and I'll be satisfied," she said with a pout and puppy dog eyes.

"Alright how's my favourite child doing?" he said bringing his hands up in the air in surrender to her pouty face "but don't tell Caleb I said that," he warned jokingly.

"I'll try not to brag," she hugged him. "Where's mum" She asked after she realized that she hadn't seen her mum since she came down.

"She's at the agency," her dad said looking at her to answer the question and then back at the television.

Cassie's mother owned a modelling agency where she spent most of her time nurturing the next generation of supermodels.

"Oh," Cassie replied before focusing her concentration back on the news. She watched with her father for about an hour hoping that something about the killer would pop up, but nothing did, and so she went back to her room to grab her keys. It was already 3:00pm and so she had to go to the station.

"Bye dad, I'm going to Phoebe's," she lied. Her parents were still in the dark about her being on the murder case and she wanted to keep it that way. She knew that if her parents ever found out things wouldn't end well.

"Have fun," 

"Okay dad," she hugged him and then went out to her car. She was  so eager to get her phone back, she truly hoped that they were able to locate where the threat came from, that was their only stable lead on the case so far.

                                                                                                *

Once she arrived at the station she greeted some of the officers that she had become fond of and likewise, and they let her know that Brady was expecting her. she wasted no time in going to his office. She poked her head through the ajar door and saw Brady with his head buried in some papers, he held a pen in his hand as he read through the words. Cassie knocked on the door to get his attention, he shot his head up as soon as he saw Cassie and smiled.

"Glad to see that you're  alive," he smiled.

She laughed. "What are you working on?" she asked, making herself comfortable in one of the chairs opposite Brady.

"Oh it's nothing important, I'm just looking into a minor case," he replied as he closed the  file he was looking at.

"Oh, alright, anyway were you able to trace the location of that threat?"

"Unfortunately, no, it's another cul-de-sac," he said rubbing his temples in frustration.

"I'm not surprised, to be honest," she sighed.

"He knows what he's doing, or she, who knows,"  he said  handing her back her phone which was beneath a newspaper on his table "I'm sure you have a lot of missed calls from your friends."

"I doubt it," she said sadly as she walked over to his seat to get her phone back from him. 

"Why do you sound so sad?" He asked her concern flooding his eyes.

"They all hate me," Cassie said as she sat down on the edge of his table facing him. "They also got threats and then they asked me to drop the case and I told them I couldn't. We got into a huge fight and I stormed out."

 "they'll come around, they're your friends and they love you," he said reassuringly. "I also have lost some people in my life because of this lifestyle I've chosen, some came back, some didn't," he shrugged.

"Thank you, sometimes I feel like you're the only person that truly understands me, that's why I trusted you enough to tell you about Avril, you understand me," she said with a weak smile. Brady rubbed her knees lightly to comfort her, and in that moment, with being overwhelmed with so much emotion she got the wrong idea from his touch, and before she could stop herself she leaned in and kissed him lightly on his lips. Brady pushed himself back in his chair and stared at her, a horrified expression on his face.

"Woah Cassie," Brady said. "I'm sorry if I confused you, but you're just a kid, I don't see you that way." His voice shook, he could hardly maintain eye contact with her. He adjusted his tie and cleared his throat.

"I'm so so sorry Bra-" she started to apologize, but then someone cut her off, from behind her before she could complete her apology.

"Now I know why you're so attached to this damn case," she turned around and saw the one person that shouldn't have caught them, he was holding a bouquet of flowers and a box of chocolates with a hardened look on his face that Cassie recognized to be pure anger.

"Tyler!" she exclaimed opening her eyes wide in horror "Tyler, I swear it's not what it looks like," she pleaded moving towards him.

He dropped the contents of his hands to the floor forcefully and did the unexpected. He moved past Cassie and made his way to Brady. He grabbed Brady's shirt and punched him hard on his face. Cassie gasped in horror and stepped back. Brady didn't fight back, although from the size of his muscles he would have definitely not had any troubles defending himself if he had to.

"Tyler!" Cassie exclaimed. Tyler ignored her and stormed out of Brady's office.

"Brady I'm sorry," Cassie said with her hands over her mouth.

"It's okay," he said rubbing the spot that Tyler had hit. He had a little blood spill from the side of his mouth "go after him," he said pointing his hand to the door.

"Thanks,"she replied as she grabbed her phone and ran out to look for Tyler.

She ran out of the station and luckily caught Tyler pacing by his car.

"Tyler," she shouted. He paused by his car and kicked it before turning around to look at her.

"What?" He shouted back "do you want to tell me it's not what it looked like, that I'm delusional and I didn't see clearly? Huh?" Cassie flinched at how much he was yelling. She did not blame him, though. He had just forgiven her for messing with his game, and she did something else to upset him.

"It was a mistake okay? that wasn't me, my emotions took over and I'm so sorry," she pleaded.

He laughed bitterly "your emotions? You know what? stop blaming your freaking emotions Cassie, that was all you. How many times have you done this huh? Are you even actually working on the murder case or do you just go there every day to sleep with him?" His tone was harsh.

"How dare you say that? " she asked, as she slapped him on his face, she felt tears roll down her eyes "how dare you  say something like that about me, Tyler?" Her voice broke. 

"What the hell do you want me to think Cassie? I know what I saw and that was a very passionate kiss, you know what Cassie? It's over between us."

" Tyler please, you're being unreasonable. I'm sorry okay? I was confused Tyler please, don't leave me," she pleaded, the tears ran down her eyes in a turbulent manner.

"I'm being unreasonable Cassie? I'm being unreasonable, can you hear yourself? I felt bad about the way everyone pounced on you yesterday and I decided to come over here and show you some support. And what do I see? I see my girlfriend sucking the face of some old man, now tell me if I'm still being unreasonable?" his nose flared, his chest heaved up and down. His eyes were turning red, he had reached the climax of his fury.

"You weren't supposed to see that, it was a mistake," she said, even if she knew it was a sloppy excuse that will do nothing to abate his anger.

"Oh, so now it's my fault! I wasn't supposed to see that? How many times has this happened Cassie?" he demanded.

"Just this once Tyler I swear."

"You know what Cassie? I don't even care anymore. It's over, and I mean it. Have fun solving this 'case'," he said putting emphasis on the word case and making quotation marks with his fingers, he opened  his car door and sped off leaving Cassie standing there crying profusely, she fell to the ground and cried uncontrollably. She stayed there crying for about fifteen minutes, not caring that a few people had walked by and stared at her. No one bothered to ask her if she was okay, the people of Freetown were not compassionate people.

She couldn't believe that Tyler just ended things with her like that after three years of dating. She didn't know who else to go to for comfort, the only person she could think of was Phoebe. She hoped that Phoebe would put aside the fight they had the day before and make her feel better.

As she was about to bring her car to life and head over to Phoebe's place, she heard her phone ring and stupidly hoped it was Tyler. She looked at the screen sad to see Caleb's name on her screen.

"Hey Caleb," she answered trying to sound as tough as possible, she didn't want him to know that she had been crying.

"Hey lil sis, how's the case going?" he asked. 

"What case?" She asked confused.

"The murder case of course," he chuckled. 

"Caleb I have never mentioned the case to you before."

"Sure you have."

"Caleb I have perfect memory, I'll know if I've told you or not."

"Err you know what it doesn't matter, I can't remember how I found out okay? Anyways, I'm calling  so you can  come pick up your shoes that you left here the night of my party. Anytime I bring a girl over they get mad when they see your shoes, they think I have another girl over."

"Then hide it," she grunted.

"I did, but they still find it somehow when they're going round my crib."

"I'll pick it up later okay? Bye, Caleb"

"Bye lil sis," he replied and then he hung up.

She picked herself off the ground and cried her way to the car, she cried in the car a bit longer before finally being able to drive to Phoebe's place.