“Barrett helps me, sometimes—when he’s home. But he’s no good with the details; he’s more of a pack mule. Once I asked him to weed the herbs, and he killed every last one of my chives.” She shook her head. “He’s all boy . . . you’ll see when he gets back from Europe.”

I was intrigued by the mention of Barrett. Aside from his photo and the fact that his bedroom was the door past the nursery, I knew nothing about him. Weirdly, as Laura talked about him, I felt a pinch of envy. And I found myself pondering his homecoming and hoping that, when he finally got here, he’d stay out of the garden.

This can be our thing, I thought. Mine and Laura’s.

“Well, I love it out here,” I said. “It’s beautiful.”

My reward was a genuine smile. “I come out here every day,” Laura said. “It’s so grounding to connect with the earth.”

“Literally,” I said.

“Oh, another joke!” Laura said, beaming. Then her expression turned shy and searching. “Margot, you’re welcome to join me anytime.”

I knew I should play it cool—thank her and then make some excuse to decline the offer. Nobody likes a needy orphan.

But then she rested her hand so gently on my arm. “Don’t say no,” she said. “I don’t need an answer—it’s an open invitation.”

CHAPTER

10

MOM ALWAYS SAID a person can get used to anything, and I never thought about whether that was true until the days at Copeland Hall began to grind by. Time seemed to slow inside the great gray house. The hours between meals were long, barren stretches with little to do. The Suttons had no televisions—at least none purchased during the current century—and the Wi-Fi password was lost somewhere in John’s home office, which (from what I could see as I passed by the open door) was an endless sea of papers. Laura promised to call “the internet people” and get it for me, but I didn’t have a lot of hope that would happen anytime soon.

As much as my brain itched to log on and scroll through the perfect lives of strangers, I had to admit that it was, in a way, a relief not to. Since the accident, I’d learned that the number of posts where people casually mentioned families/sisters/mothers/fathers was high enough to make me feel like I was having holes poked in me constantly. Going a couple of weeks without having to read about how someone’s dad is the BEST DAD EVER because he had fixed their sagging bookshelves would probably be good for me.