Page 35

“I know. It wasn’t okay for me to do that to you. You clearly had a big crush on him, and…”

“No, not that,” she said. I stopped in confusion, and she smiled slightly, shaking her head. “I know… I know I’m boy crazy sometimes. I know I get these intense crushes and that it’s a bit silly and no one ever responds to them. I know that about myself, Charlotte. You dating Jesse isn’t what I’m disappointed about. I’m happy for you, if that’s what makes you happy. What I’m disappointed in is that you didn’t tell me. You kept it a secret, and that hurts.”

“I’m sorry, Tamara,” I said. “Gosh, I’m so sorry. I just, I thought you’d hate me for even going out with him.”

“Never,” she said. “It’s just a boy. Another one comes along eventually. Hell, I had five Galloways to choose from, each one of them as hot as the last. Sure, Jesse is the bad boy of the group, and that’s super hot when you’re a teenager, but now that I’m older, I think I prefer the nerdy one.”

“Collin?”

She shrugged and grinned. “There’s something about how cute he looks when he sits down with a book in the middle of a crowd of people and just checks out into his own world. He gets this grin on his face, like he’s doing something secretive. I started reading the books he reads. They’re really interesting.”

“So you don’t hate me?”

“No,” she said, leaning over to bump my shoulder with hers. “I love you, sis. I wish you were around more, and I wish you felt like you could tell me everything, but I love you anyway.”

Chapter Seventeen

Jesse

I slept fitfully, tossing and turning the entire night, unable to find a position I was comfortable in for more than a few minutes. It happened every so often, usually when I was having a particularly nasty bit of songwriter’s block, as if the music and lyrics were logjammed somewhere in my spine and wouldn’t let me get comfortable until I got them out.

When I finally did zonk out, it was late into the night. Waking up to my alarm much too soon, I shuffled in my bed and went on high alert when I realized someone was in the room with me. The shadow by the window, with the light coming in behind them, turned and as I squinted, I realized it was Logan. He was looking out of the window and was holding something in one of his hands.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked.

As my vision became clearer, the cobwebs of the short night’s sleep going away, I realized what it was he was holding. It was Dad’s old pump-action shotgun. Why in the world would he have that, unless…

I hopped out of the bed and went to the other window which looked out over the main road and down toward the Millers’.

“Look at the fence,” Luke said.

“Shit.”

In the distance, there was movement in the early morning light. It looked like a person, but it could have been an animal. It was too far away and there were still too many shadows to be able to tell. Thankfully, I’d gone to bed wearing clothes this time, so I yanked on my boots and grabbed a shirt as Logan turned toward the door to go out and downstairs.

I followed him as we thundered down, and I wondered where everyone else was. Luke must have stayed with Amber again, and I couldn’t blame him for after everything with the Andersons. Collin should be here somewhere, though—Owen too, unless he ended up staying over where he went last night after everything was over.

“Should I go get the revolver?” I asked as I got to the bottom of the steps.

Logan was already to the front door.

“No, just follow me,” he said.

I nodded, taking off after him and heading toward the side of the house where we’d seen the shadow. We ran for what seemed like a long time, well past the Millers’ place, and spread out a bit to see if we could find the owner of the shadow. Slowly, we came to a stop, and looked at each other.

“We must have missed them,” Logan said.

“Unless they were already gone before we got out here,” I said. “Or worked around us and headed back to the house.”

“Ah, shit,” Logan said. “Nobody’s there. We need to get back there.”

The house was over a hill, which was fine running down as we headed that way, but was a hell of a lot harder to run up. It was a pretty steep hill, and I was terrified that when we crested it, we’d see the house on fire or something. Instead, it loomed in the distance, perfectly fine, and for a second, I breathed a sigh of relief.

“Son of a bitch!” Logan yelled.

“What?” I called out.

Logan had come up closer to the fence than I had, and was looking straight ahead. I followed his gaze and saw what he was upset about. A part of the fence was completely destroyed, leading to the road. Some of the animals had already started to wander out that way, chickens crossing the street and one of the horses walking up it toward the Millers’.