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“Is it broken?”
She rolled her eyes and shook her head, like the sheer thought that itmight be wasridiculous. “No,” she said with a scoff. “Probably just a little sprained. I’m just wearing the brace until it doesn’t hurt anymore.”
I narrowed my eyes skeptically. “And you said you … fell?”
“Yep.”
Since the moment we’d become friends, Ray had never bullshitted me. She had always been up front, honest, and real, never holding back or filtering herself. This new side of her was bothersome and concerning, and I didn’tfuckinglike it. Not one bit.
I stepped closer to her, encouraging her to tip her head back to look up at me. “If youwannalie to me, you should learn how to act better than that,” I said in a low, hushed, concerned voice so Noah couldn’t hear, if he happened to be awake. “Ihave togo to work, but I hope you’ll tell me what’s going on. You can trust me, Ray—you know that—and whatever’s going on, I can help. Iwantto help.”
She said nothing in reply as I turned around to leave her porch and grab my bike. But I hoped she would take me seriously. I hoped she would tell me sooner rather than later, and I did eventually get my wish … just two weeks later, when another new, coincidental development touched both of our lives.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
LETTERS: DELIVERED
Once the list of things to do in the trailer started getting shorter and more expensive, I was flying through books closer to my prison rate. Two or three books a week was my average, depending on the length of the story, and thankfully, the library was just a short walk from work.
And thankfully, I had an in with the prettiest librarian.
One day a week, my work schedule coincided with Ray’s, and on that day, we would go home together. Sometimes, if the weather was nice enough, we walked. On other days, we took her car and shoved my bike into the backseat.
I always preferred the days we walked. The air in River Canyon was different from anywhere else I’d been. It was sweeter, lighter, like cotton candy without the stomachache. I couldn’t understand how, when it wasn’t far from larger cities or highways and the traffic wasn’t much unlike other towns. But maybe all I was smelling was hope.
Or maybe it was just the pretty lady at my side.
Whatever it was, on thisparticular night, it had never been sweeter as we walked slowly through the town—a bundle of new books under my arm and a small bag of groceries in the other. Ray carried her purse as well as a book of her own, one I hadn’t read before—A Scarcity of Condorsby SuanneLaqueur. I said that I should read it, and she said I wouldn’t like it, that it was probably too mushy and romantic for my taste. But ever since the moment I’d met her, I had beenpretty certainI would like anything she did, for the simple opportunity of getting to know her—her heart and soul—just a little better.
So, we walked along, beneath a sky with more stars than I’d seen in any other town with this many lights, and I made sure to keep my steps in time with hers, never wanting to leave her side. During a lull in conversation, I decided to ask something I’d never thought to ask before, something silly. Something that I didn’t know was about to change our world forever.
“So, is Ray short for anything? Like Rachel or something?”
She didn’t respond right away, hugging her bruised wrist to her chest. Even weeks later, I couldn’t look at her with that brace without the prickle of anger edging its way beneath my skin.
“I thought it was an innocent question,” I muttered, my feelings mildly hurt as I led the way, turning off Main Street and toward our neighborhood.
“It is, but …” She huffed irritably and tipped her head back to look up at the overhead trees that were beginning to bud with new leaves. “Rain.”
I looked up, squinting at a clear, star-filled sky. “What? I don’t see any—”
“No. I mean, that’s my name. Ray is short for Rain.”
My gait slowed as, all at once, I remembered a girl with soft brown hair and a scream I could still hear to this day. The only girl—the onlyperson—from my time before Wayward whom I had never wronged, whom I had simply saved. The girl who had kept me sane during a time I might’ve otherwise gone crazy.
“That’s weird,” I said quietly, hardly seeing the road in front of me when I could only see that face. Those big green eyes, full of fear and suspicion.
“What is?”
“I met a girl named Rain once.”
Ray hugged her book even tighter. “And I once met a guy named Soldier.”
There’s no way.There’s no possible way …
But … what if…
I swallowed at a lump in my throat, but to no avail. It wouldn’t budge, just as my heart wouldn’t slow and my hands wouldn’t stop shaking. “When … when did you meet him?”
