One final turn later, and we’re on Fifth Street, careening past the sprawling farmhouse estate of the richest family in two counties: the Packards. A single smokestack rises out of the processing plant behind the Reverend’s two-story brick manor. With no one to live there, the iron gate remains locked across the four-car drive. Attached to the gate is an unending billowing of bouquets and remembrances.

I can’t make room in my heart for sympathy for the Reverend—not today.

I whip my head forward to the end of my road. Where the farmhouse ends, the endless fields of soybeans begin. On the right is a vast plot of land with only a single home in the center—mine. The lawn is choked with cameras, and Agent Elms can’t get any closer than a block away because too many news vans have boxed us out.

“You escaped an island of murderers,” Agent Elms says, throwing us into park. “This is nothing.” I deep breathe the pins and needles out of my arms as I weigh taking Ricky’s urn out of the car with me. I won’t run the risk of someone stealing such famous remains out of Diane’s car, but if people swarm me and I drop Ricky…

“I’m ready,” I say, clutching the urn as if it were my own child.

“Whatever happens,”—Diane reaches tenderly for my wrist—“don’t let her see you sweat.”

We exit into the storm, Diane as my bodyguard. As we approach the front lawn, she waves her FBI credentials as if it were a talisman to ward off wicked spirits, but it only whips them into a greater frenzy. Arms lunge for me. Microphones are thrust. Questions are shouted. Flash after flash explodes as I quietly, gravely, climb the walkway to my mother.

The showdown everyone has waited for.

Will she be a Nightlight Believer or a Connor Believer? Will the next year of my life be fear or love? I don’t know if I want the answer. Who could possibly want the answer?

Would you?

Pale and gaunt, Mom peeks at me through the curtains. She’s waiting. I believe. I believe in love. On my next breath, I take the plunge, turn the knob, and arrive home.

EPILOGUE

EPILOGUE

CONNOR’S ULTIMATUM

FIVE MONTHS LATER

I text my mom Merry Christmas the moment I hear the knock. Like a cat, I curl and stretch luxuriously under my down blanket before welcoming my boyfriend inside. A pinch of spice hits the air as Marcos enters balancing two enormous mugs of coffee. They’ve been sweetened with the gingerbread-flavored syrup I’ve been guzzling like cough medicine lately. “Merry Christmas,” he says, decked out in dachshund pajama bottoms and handing me a cup before flopping onto my queen mattress.