One of the things I love—loved—about books is that no matter how dreadful the characters’ plights or how insurmountable the conflicts, everything turns out for the best in the end. Not necessarily happily ever after, and maybe not happy at all, but necessary and true. If there was pain, it was to be for personal growth. If there was loss, it was so something better or more essential could be introduced.

Standing here on the ground floor of a bookstore that is drifting into sleep for the night, with a woman who looks like she fell out of a picture book with her gauzy dress and bejeweled everything—not to mention the proximity of the creator of the Orman Chronicles—I can feel the hint of a story peeping its way from the ashes of the last couple of weeks and I wonder if maybe there really is such a thing as a benevolent wind. But when I wonder why the wind wasn’t there to save Jenna, I feel the magic ebb.

“Amelia,” I say. “My name is Amelia Griffin.”

“Pretty name, that,” Valerie says. “And what brings you to Lochbrook, Amelia?”

This is all said with her same regality, which coming from anyone else would seem fake but from Valerie seems natural and appropriate.

“A quick getaway,” I finally say. “To clear my thoughts.”

“You must have a great deal of thoughts if they brought you all this way from … Texas, was it? Well, no matter. You will find Lochbrook a charming town, though I will be the first to admit, your welcome committee was found lacking this evening. Do you want to take something up to read?”

My eyes have wandered to the second floor and the distant room I did not get to explore. When my gaze darts back to her face, Valerie is smiling.

“You’ve got that hungry look about you,” she says.

“I used to,” I say. “Read, I mean. I … I don’t do it much anymore.”

It’s not a lie, but it’s not the whole truth.

Valerie gives me a long, slow look that is not altogether different from the one my mother used to give me, back when there was little wrong in our world, well before the divorce. Mom used to be able to look into my eyes and know what was wrong in a matter of seconds.

Now there’s nothing behind my mother’s eyes except TV static.

I fear Valerie has the same power, that she’s going to lay my confusion about Jenna, the mystery book, and my future bare at my feet and I’m going to have to examine it too closely, but instead she says, “Suit yourself. It’s bedtime, I think.”

A little piece of me decides to love Valerie for the rest of my days for this one small mercy.