There was a bookshelf on the far wall, and I pulled myself from the floor, walking over to it and perusing the titles in the dim light of the small table lamp I’d left on. A couple of them looked familiar for some reason, and frowning, I pulled one from the middle. Aqueducts and Water Supply. I turned it over, reading the description, the words coming back to me. This had been one of my books, one I’d been reading in the weeks before my mother collapsed and ended up in the hospital. I’d read it up in that loft in the old stable. My secret hideout. God, I hadn’t thought of that place in a long time. I tilted my head, staring down at the cardboard cover. How had it ended up here? Something about this particular book in my hands opened up a small wellspring of peace inside me, as though the very pages contained the simplicity of that time. The innocence. The joy.

Then again, books had been bringing me a measure of comfort for my whole life. Companionship. Distraction. They’d helped me survive my time behind bars.

I returned to my bed on the floor, propping the pillow against the wall so I could read. After a few minutes and feeling much calmer, I turned my head toward the window where shifting shadows barely showed around the edges of the blinds. The outside world. One I was now a part of. Only not really. Or at least…not yet. But I felt a tiny trickle of hope as Mrs. Swanson’s words from earlier filtered through my mind.

More people than you think believe in second chances. God, I hoped that was true.

chapter six

Emily

“Tuck Mattice? Tuck Mattice?”

“Yes, Em, I did say Tuck Mattice,” my mom repeated into the phone. “And he needs a job.”

“I haven’t seen him in a hundred years, Mom, and you want me to hire him?” Along with the shock of hearing my mom say Tuck’s name, a strange and sudden bubbly sensation had erupted in my stomach, like an internal hurricane.

Tuck Mattice.

Or maybe I was just hungry. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast.

Only, that bubbly sensation? It was familiar. My body had always reacted that way to Tuck. And despite the years, it obviously still did. But flesh was dumb. And my body didn’t remember how Tuck had treated me, and how it had hurt.

It didn’t know who he’d become.

“He’s practically family, Emily.”

“Close,” my makeup artist, Sasha, said, and I closed my eyes so he could apply my eyeshadow.