Page 56 of The Same Backward as Forward

I wanted to sob, but I couldn’t, because he was right. Toby Hawthorne was the damn ocean. He was a force. He was awful and wonderful and whether he was here or not, whether I ever saw him again or not—he was never going to benothingto me.

I looked up at Jackson. “He says his father will come looking for him. Theitemthat Toby gave you? It could be dangerous to hold on to it.”

Jackson snorted. “I’m not afraid of billionaires. I don’t evenuse banks. And thatitem? Harry asked me to hold on to it for you, so I’m thinking that’s what I’ll do.”

There was no arguing with that, not unless I wanted him to go for his rifle.

“My family.” I doubted this would go any better than trying to warn Jackson about Tobias Hawthorne had, but I had to try. “If the billionaire comes sniffing around, it could tip them off, too. My cousin Rory’s already suspicious about what I’ve been up to. If he passes those suspicions on to my mother, if she figures out you helped Toby, helpedme—”

“Who says I’m helping anyone?” Jackson chose that moment to press a wad of cash into my hand—a very large wad.

“Jackson,” I said, “you can’t—”

“Change your name,” he told me sternly. “Don’t look back. Sooner or later, Eden will go looking for you. Make sure she can’t find a damn thing.”

“How would you know what my mother would or wouldn’t do?” I asked. He’d used her first name. I thought suddenly about the way he’d told me that I was the damnedest Rooney, like I wasn’t the only one he knew. Personally. “Jackson—”

He cut me off: “None of your business.”

I really should have seen that coming. “I’ll go,” I said. It was what Toby had asked of me.You have to move on. You have to live, for me.“I’ll disappear,” I told Jackson. “But what about you?”

“Someone’s gotta look after the lighthouse.”

I hugged him again. “You’re a good man.

He narrowed his eyes at me. “I oughtta shoot you.”

I almost smiled. “Please don’t.”

Chapter 40

Three months and a lot of covering my tracks later, I ended up in a town called New Castle, Connecticut, just about as far away from Rockaway Watch as I could get. I choseSarahas my first name—not a palindrome. There were weeks at a time when I didn’t want the reminder and weeks when all I could think about was puzzles and games and codes andhim.

I danced every day.

I worked in a diner. I made friends with my coworkers. I thought now and then about going back to school, even if I had to start over, but at the end of the day, I didn’t want to risk any connection to my old life, not even becoming a nurse.

I couldn’t risk being found—not by my family and not by Toby’s.

As the years went by, I slowly stopped expecting the tragedy on Hawthorne Island to end up back in the news, stopped expecting anyone else to discover what I knew: Somewhere out there, Toby Hawthorne was alive.

I loved him.

I loved him.

I loved him—and hated him, too. I tried to forget him—onenight with one man, and I ended up pregnant as a result. Almost from the beginning, in my mind, the baby was ours.

Toby’s and mine.

I told myself that it was wrong. My baby had a father, though he was certainly no prince. I promised myself that when she was born, I was going to give her the actual father’s last name. But in my heart,shewas the fairy-tale ending Toby and I had been denied. She was my new beginning, and I swore that I would be her everything, that I would teach her how to play, how to make everything a game, how to find joy.Every day.

I swore that she would grow up dancing. She would never be invisible. She would always be loved. And someday, I’d tell her—all of it. My story.Ourstory.

Her due date came and went, but my baby showed no signs of making her appearance until the storm of the century rolled in. It was the worst I’d ever seen, worse even than the night of the fire, and I heard a whisper somewhere in my mind.

As far as I’m concerned, Hannah the Same Backward as Forward, you’re the storm.

Hurricane-strength winds knocked out power lines and blew out windows. My apartment lost electricity—and that was when my water broke. There was no way I could drive. Streets were flooding. I tried calling 911 but couldn’t even get through.