“I know that too. I told you, I tried to get us a loan to buy her out.”

“I know, but I’m not giving up. I’m working on an option that might pan out. Has to pan out. Because Piper’s never failed us, not once.”

Winnie nodded. “So let’s not fail her either.”

“We won’t.”

Winnie leaned forward. “So tell me about this option that might pan out.”

Gavin started to tell her his thoughts when Winnie’s phone buzzed with an incoming text, which she read and froze.

“What?” Gavin asked.

“It’s Jenna. She and Piper just left the scene of a horrific car accident. The storm made the roads slick. A family skidded off the highway on the 101, broke through the railing, and rolled down the hill about three hundred feet. The two kids in the back seat survived, ages three and ten. The parents didn’t make it.”

Gavin felt the nausea roll through him and he set down his fork and pushed away his plate. “Piper?” he asked hoarsely.

Winnie shook her head. “Jenna says she handled the job like a pro, but vanished the minute they got back. She just wanted to give us a heads-up.”

Gavin opened the app the three of them had to track each other’s locations. Once upon a time, Piper had used it to keep tabs on him. Now they used it out of sheer laziness, like when Gavin checked to see which of his two sisters was closer to the grocery store when he needed something. “She’s at the tire swing,” he said.

“Where she goes to be alone. What do we do? Do we let her be alone?”

Hell, he actually wasn’t sure, but Winnie was looking lost and he knew he had to at least appear like he had his shit together.

“Should we try to get in touch with Cam?” Winnie asked.

“Do you want to live?”

Winnie sighed. “I know, right? She’d kill us if we worried him while he was gone to God knows where doing God knows what.”

“She’ll come home when she’s ready, and we’ll be here for her.”

But it took her longer than he’d thought it would. It was way past dark, and he was in his room alternately watching TV and eyeballing his phone for both Piper’s location and a call or text from CJ when there came a soft knock at his door.

He opened up, not surprised to see Piper in what she called her “birth control outfit”: sweats that swallowed her whole, hair piled on top of her head, no makeup, feet stuffed into rainboots.

“Our parents died,” she whispered.

He pulled her inside and into his arms as she cracked in half. “I know,” he said, throat tight as she shuddered and began to cry against his chest. “I know.”