Denial//5SOS// (A.U)

Chapter 23

Luke's POV

"Where do we search first?" Calum asked me and I shrugged.

"I don't know, Calum. This forest is huge. He could have taken her anywhere." I said, sitting down on a large stone and pulling at my hair slightly.

"Luke... I know this is going to sound really stupid... But should we spilt up?" Calum said and I looked up at him.

"We would be able to cover more ground that way?" Calum said and I nodded.

"Yeah. Okay." I said and I stopped Calum before he walked away.

"If I can't find Lily... Or if I never get to her... Look after her." I said to him and Calum nodded, shining his torch in the direction of where he started to walk.

I sniffed, wiping my face and started to walk a different direction.

All of these trees, the same dirt path, I didn't know if I was going a different way, or if I was going around in circles.

I sighed and turned around, deciding to go and find a different route.

"Hello, Luke." A voice said and I turned round, the beam of my torch landing on Michael.

Of course it was fucking Michael.

"What have you done to Lily?" I shouted to him and Michael raised his hands in defence.

"What makes you think I did something to her?" He said and then I noticed something. His hands had blood on them.

"Who's blood is that?" I whispered and Michael smiled, looking down at the ground.

I clenched my fists and tried to focus on making my breaths less shaky.

He's fooling you Luke, the voice inside my head screamed at me, but it was so hard to listen to it.

"Well the only thing that matters now is that one of the three of you, I have taken care of. And now I'll have you." He said and before my mind could process he lunged for me.

"Fuck!" I yelled and he dragged me to the ground. Michael punched me and I felt blood fill my mouth from a tooth that he had dislodged from the back of my mouth.

I spat a mouthful of blood and the tooth out of my mouth and I grabbed hold of Michael's wrist that had the knife in it to try and keep him from trying to stab me.

"I think it's going to be quite sad that Lily is going to lose her brother and her boyfriend in one night." He said and my eyes widened.

"Ashton?" I yelled and he nodded.

"Yeah. It's quite tragic really." He said and I felt my breath quickening.

As I thought about how I was feeling for Lily, a thought suddenly crossed my mind.

I can't let him kill me.

If Ashton is dead, I don't know if Calum will make it out of this... I can't leave her.

I promised her I wouldn't.

So as Michael pushed the knife down further towards me, I knew I had to act.

Michael pushed the knife down to my side. The knife cut the skin, but did not go in deep.

This was were I knew I had to do something.

I yelled at the top of my lungs and clutched my side desperately, which made Michael stand up, smirk at me, and kick me aside.

"There's only one of you left now." He said and walked off.

I waited until he was out of the way and then I rolled over and stood up. I looked about and found a short, but cry heavy branch and kept it close to me. I also tied my jacket around my side which was bleeding a little and I set out to find Lily.

Lily's POV

"Ashton!" I cried, dropping to my knees and Ashton raised his head to look at the wound in his stomach.

"Shit." He whispered and I unzipped my jacket, rolling it up and pressing it down onto his wound.

Tears were falling down my face as my jacket quickly turned red with his blood.

"Ashton! Don't close your eyes, okay? You have to stay with me." I said and Ashton shook his head.

I quickly looked at the wound on his stomach and swallowed the bile that had risen in my throat.

It was deep.

And it was serious.

Michael had intended it. He stabbed Ashton not just to hurt him. This was going to kill him.

"I'm going to die, aren't I?" He said and I gulped and wiping my tears with the back of my hands.

"No. No you aren't. You are going to be totally fine, Ashton. Okay?" I said and Ashton smiled sadly.

"You know that I can tell when your lying?" He said and I broke down.

Ashton knew he was going to die. There was no point lying to him. He didn't deserve to be lied to.

"You can't leave me." I choked out and he smiled and coughed, a small trail of blood starting to trickle out the corner of his mouth.

"At least I'll be with Lacy," he said, with a sad smile and I smiled back at him, rubbing his cheek.

I couldn't find anything else to say. I was going to lose my brother.

In the end, I lay down on his chest and I felt him weakly throw his arm over my shoulders.

One by one, warm tears fell off my cheeks onto Ashton's t-shirt, as I heard his heartbeat become weaker and weaker and weaker.

I was going to lose him. I was going to lose one of my best friends, the person I knew everything about, the person who I trusted the most, the person I could tell anything to... I was going to lose him. I would no longer be able to have our daily car rides to school, I will no longer be able to have stupid arguments or I would no longer to come downstairs in the morning, see him sitting at the breakfast bar and smile widely at me.

"I'm so sorry." I whispered, bunching up his shirt in my fist as more tears fell down my already stained cheeks.

Then, he took a shallow breath and just... slipped away.

(Please don't hate me..... I did tear up writing that last part and a double update today because there are only a few chapters left in this book... Again, I didn't want to kill Ashton off, but I had kind of planned it from the start of the book... But there is a kind of happy ending? But then there is another very sad thing to happen so prepare yourselves! Thank you for reading and voting, it means a lot!)