His gaze was insistent as the damp-earth breeze through the window. Every child threatens to run away. Rebecca’s confession was likely the whim of an active imagination. Still, she hesitated to repeat the words. She forced a light laugh. “Now that’s a secret between Miss Rebecca Beiler and myself.” Feeling an urge for music, she hovered her fingers over the knob, then glanced his way. He looked at her unblinking, the tender flesh beneath his eyes shadowed blue-gray. With a thumb, she swiped dust from the radio display and wiped it on her shorts.

“Tessa. Please.”

“Silly talk, nothing more.” Despite his open window, the air was stuffy. She cranked down hers an inch. “She told me all about the trip to Ohio, though. She’s rather miffed you forgot to give me the details.”

For several miles, he was silent.

Green seeped from the trees, and the ridgeline darkened. Like a blast from a water cannon, raindrops spattered the windshield. She flicked the wipers on and off again.

He shifted in his seat and pinched his forehead between thumb and fingers. “Tessa.” His voice was thick.

She swung off the highway too fast, and her tires skidded on the gravel berm. Leaning into the wheel, she veered back on course. “Do you really want to know?” Another spatter of rain strafed the windshield. Clumps of wild tiger lilies lining the road to her house undulated as she passed. She lifted one hand from the wheel and let it fall into her lap. “She said one day she’ll drive away from the farm and never come back.”

With a sigh, he dropped his head against the headrest and closed his eyes.

She wanted so badly to touch him—to reach out and squeeze his hand. “She was just being silly.”

He shook his head. “She will break her mother’s heart.”

“You don’t know that.” Turning into her driveway, she saw the living room windows were open. White sheers billowed phantomlike in the wind. She should close them before heavy rain came. Craving fresh air, she pulled the latch.

Suddenly, he grasped her arm.

A hot flush raced across her collarbones, and she whirled. His eyes were smoldering blue coals above cheekbones like knife-edged mountain peaks. His fingers pressed with firm insistence.

“Do you know what happens when you leave?”

The words were a jagged whisper, urgent yet costly somehow.

He tightened his hold. “Do you?”

Her mouth was dry. She ran her tongue over her bottom lip and caught the flesh between her teeth. “I—maybe I’ve heard, or read—”

“Sure, everyone knows about the shunning. Such a queer, quaint ritual.” He choked a laugh. “Understand this—nothing about this life is quaint. If you join the church and leave, you are dead. No one speaks to you; no one shares a meal with you. You are no longer a person in this world. You are no one.”