How she would love to be his girlfriend or significant other.

“Stop it, Darby,” she muttered to herself, then winced. First sign of madness…except her first sign had been dissociating herself from reality and watching from a distance as she was horribly violated.

Determinedly, she pushed the memories out of her mind. They can’t hurt me anymore.

She had new problems to deal with, but she was also tired of the stress and the worry and of thinking about the murders. She didn’t know what it meant or who’d committed the brutal crimes, but she needed a break from the constant paranoia that was starting to fill her mind. She went over to the wood stove, pleased to discover the embers still glowed with a faint trace of life.

She tossed on some scrunched-up newspaper and kindling, and a couple of small sticks which caught almost immediately. After a minute she fed in a small log and watched it begin to burn.

Her cell dinged. She wiped her hands and checked her messages, surprised to see it was from Elliot Byrne. He’d been unable to get a flight out of Fairbanks today and told her he was in town if she needed him. She wrote back a quick thanks, then stripped off her jacket and hat and grabbed a slice of pizza from the box while it was still warm. She ate standing in front of the fire.

Ham and pineapple were her favorite toppings. The fact she and Eban both liked the same kind of pizza had given her a pathetic little thrill.

She was so dumb, so naive. Being a total nerd didn’t help.

She’d dated a guy before but hadn’t wanted to have sex until she knew he was serious about her. He’d dumped her. Then Indonesia had happened, making her realize that saving herself for some romanticized version of true love was nonsense.

Sex wasn’t necessarily about procreation. The concept of saving herself for marriage was old-fashioned and smacked of patriarchal control. Sex was supposed to be a pleasurable act. It didn’t have to mean pledging troths or undying love. It could be good fun and sweaty exercise. A physical act between consenting adults. Building it up more than that after all the terrible things she’d gone through was a sure-fire way to set the stage for disaster.

She wanted to be normal. For one day in her life, she wanted to feel utterly ordinary again.

A romantic relationship might help her pave the way to a new sense of normal. It would help her find the strength of character she’d used to have. The optimism. The pluckiness. The bravery.

Unfortunately, she had very little past positive sexual experience to draw upon and that bothered her. She didn’t know if she’d be able to go through with it. Didn’t know if she would freak out during or get triggered by something. And she wasn’t going to find out until she was in a sexual relationship with someone doing all the things…