I had been thinking for years that I wanted to do something important with my life. I had been thinking for years that I wanted to repay Parker for saving me.

All those years ago, Parker Thaysden had given me life. As his eyes caught mine across the water, I had the odd, tingling sensation that maybe the right thing to do was to give it right back to him.

Elizabeth SABOTAGE

“I KNEW HE WAS WRONG for her,” Tilley hissed as I handed her dish after dish to dry. I scrubbed them a tad too hard, the dish gloves Olivia had given me for Christmas—the whimsical ones with the long red fingernails and the huge fake diamond painted on—filling with water when I dipped them too far into the bubbles.

“Well, we all knew it, Tilley. But I never thought he’d do this to her.”

Deep down we’d both known this was exactly how this would end. But we were ladies, so we hadn’t said so.

Even in my anger at Thad, my hurt for my daughter, and my physical discomfort at having wet, soapy water sloshing around inside my gloves, I paused to be grateful. My sister was here tonight. She was herself. She was in this world, with me, where she belonged. I couldn’t count the number of people who said I should put her somewhere where “they could take care of her.” How could they even say such a thing? Who could take care of her better than I could?

I prayed every day—every single day—that she’d pass on one day before I did. I couldn’t bear the thought of her being without me. Who would take care of her then? I didn’t want Amelia and Robby to feel burdened. And, really, after everything she had meant to me, everything she had done for me, it was the least I could do. I prayed for other things, too, but that one was the most persistent.

“Well, I blame Mason,” Tilley said, interrupting my thoughts.

I rolled my eyes, pulling the plug inside the sink and taking my gloves off, hanging them inside out over the drying rack. I leaned on the counter’s chipped blue-and-white tiles. Make up your corner of the world neat and tidy and it will be enough. I said this to myself every day. Keeping Dogwood together was like squeezing sand as hard as you could inside your palm and wondering why it slipped through your fingers. But I would worry about that tomorrow.

Mason and Amelia had dated very briefly right before his accident. But their coming together had felt like kismet. Olivia and I had dreamed of it our entire lives. Anyone could see they were perfect for each other: the son and daughter of two best friends, the star pitcher and the valedictorian. And then, after it all fell apart for him, he just disappeared. He didn’t call her, didn’t write. I understood retreating. But without a word to my daughter? He had told her they were going to be together, had guaranteed her a future. No one knew better than I did that high school romances faded. But there are right ways to do things. And Olivia just let her son abandon Amelia. It was the biggest fight we’d ever had.