He understood me on levels I didn’t know were possible. He got the real me, not the Barbie my mother had cultivated for show. With Elis, I wasn’t an upper-class princess or a socialite. I was Devlynn.

The pain of not being with him was so overwhelming that it hurt to breathe. I glanced at his name on my phone, almost willing him to text me. To tell me he didn’t mean it and it was all a mistake. To let me know the love he had for me could overcome anything. But I knew that was too big. Our parents had ruined their lives and our chance of happiness. I knew there would be no one else but Elis for me. Ever.

Chapter 17

Elis – Five Years Ago

The funeral was nice. A closed casket and a bunch of hypocrites who wouldn’t hire my father after what the Prices did to him, telling my mother how he was a great man and they would miss him very much. My mother stood there, shaking their hands and saying thank you on repeat like a damn broken record player.

Sarena was the only one who really looked broken. She was holding onto her teddy bear, an old rumpled brown thing, completely disheveled and mangled. I hadn’t seen that thing in years, but she had been holding it the last week and crying herself to sleep every night. I’d started sleeping on the floor because I was so worried about her. Being an adult and suffering a loved one’s suicide wasn’t easy, but at twelve, it was incomprehensible. I looked at her crouched beside the casket, looking so small.

“Hey, Sarena, want to come with me and get a few snacks?” I asked, offering her my hand.

She gazed up at me. Her eyes were red and swollen as she tried to hold back the tears floating in them. She shook her head as I crouched down beside her.

“It will be okay,” I whispered, putting my arm around her frail shoulders. It broke my heart how she crawled into me and started sobbing uncontrollably.

“We have to move,” she whispered into my chest, her small body shaking.

“Moving isn’t bad. It’s a new adventure,” I lied. “New friends. New house. I’m sure Mom will let you decorate your room any way you want.”

“You know I’m twelve, right?” she asked, looking up at me, her nose scrunched up in disgust. “I’m not some baby who thinks everything will be okay. Our lives are about to change. Say goodbye to everything.”

“Well, shit, if you aren’t a baby, why are you carrying that ugly old thing?” I pointed to her decrepit stuffed bear.

“It doesn’t change. My whole life, the one thing I’ve always been sure of is this bear.” Her eyes cast down as she mindlessly rubbed what was left of the stuffed animal’s nose.