Chapters (48)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Books by Erin Jade Lange
- Back Ad
- About the Publisher
I was trapped, outmatched. I wondered if I would have time to speak, to explain who I was and make my case before it was over, before all my human blood was gone, before—
“Who’s there?”
My fear evaporated with that familiar voice, even as the figure took form and stepped into the moonlight, revealing the sharp angles of Dexter’s face.
“Oh, it’s you,” I said.
“You were expecting someone else? In a cornfield, in the middle of the night?”
“Says the guy hanging out in a cornfield, in the middle of the night.”
Dexter’s face cracked into a smile that looked a little like it had snuck past his lips, even as he tried to hold it back. He dragged a long strand of wheat or grass through his hand, for once looking more like a boy from Iowa than California. Maybe it was because he appeared a little less golden in the moonlight.
But no less hot, I noted. The thought felt like Dexter’s smile—escaping against my will.
“So, really,” he said. “Why are you out here? Everything okay?”
“I got in a fight with Reg. Needed some air.”
Sometimes the truth was the easiest lie.
“And you?” I asked.
Dexter stepped closer so that I could make out his features now with or without the moonlight. He was quiet when he spoke, but his voice carried out into the field around us.
“This was our farm—my family’s farm. We sold it last year.”
“Right,” I said, remembering. “Your parents wanted you to be closer to friends, less isolated.”
He shrugged. “That’s the party line, anyway.”
“It’s not the truth?”
“Not the whole truth.”
I waited.
He tossed his fidget grass to the side and shoved his hands in his pockets instead.
“The truth is my parents sold out. It’s tough to keep a family farm afloat, and a corporation finally made an offer they couldn’t refuse.”
That didn’t sound entirely right. An offer you couldn’t refuse was the kind I had been seeking just minutes ago. But I didn’t correct Dexter.
“How much is unrefusable?” I asked.
“I’m not sure ‘unrefusable’ is a word.”
“Thanks, Poe.”
Dexter laughed.
“Enough for my dad to retire. Enough to pay for all four years of college.”
“That’s not so bad.”