“Sara...tell...them...please.” The tears were flowing freely now, dripping off her chin. She tried to rub them away, but it was too much. Summer clasped her arms around herself, rocking on her heels. She wanted her mother, but there was no one here who would protect her, no one left in the world. A small cry escaped her throat.

“That’s enough.” Dr. Browley stepped behind Sara, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Clearly this girl is very upset and I’m not letting my daughter get dragged into this mess.”

It all happened so quickly. She locked eyes with Sara over her shoulder, seeing the remorse that echoed her own, and then her friend was gone. Summer was alone with them, but she wasn’t hearing anymore.

Her panic was so great that she reached out for something to steady herself and missed, stumbling to the side.

“Whoa, whoa.” O’Connor was coming toward her as she swayed. The room was dancing around her in odd jerks.

Summer saw the officer’s face, pale and oval like an egg, swim in front of her. But it was Taured’s hands she felt on her body, grabbing her by the shoulders and leading her to a chair. She wanted to rip herself away from him, but she was afraid and disoriented. With his hands gripped around her upper arms, he lowered her into the chair closest to his desk, and asked Sara’s dad to get her a glass of water.

Then he knelt on one knee in front of her. Summer froze. There were streaks of gray in his beard and on his temples. She’d never been this close to him—had she?—aside from the night he’d knocked on her door, and she had the same thought then as she did now: behind his eyes, behind the amber of his iris, and the large pupils, was something insatiably hungry, and it wasn’t human.

She held the words she wanted to say behind her gritted teeth.

Please let me go.

“I’m... I—” She couldn’t finish her sentence.

They were speaking around her, to her sometimes, but she couldn’t focus on what they were saying.

“Social services will place her in a foster home until then.” Summer looked up to see the female officer speaking to Taured. He was standing next to her chair now, with his hand on her shoulder. She felt the shift in his body, the tightening of his fingers by just a fraction.