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For that, I was grateful.
I would go outside during the day tomorrow.
I didn’t care if people stared and gossiped.
It was better than meeting Brother Josiah alone in the dark.
* * *
The knock on my cabin door came early and completely out of the blue.
I blinked a few times, the early morning sun creeping around the edges of the blackout blind in the bedroom I shared with my daughter. Hayley Jade was still sound asleep in her crib, her perfect rosebud lips parted slightly as she breathed. Her dark eyelashes fanned out across her rosy cheeks.
The knock came again, more insistent this time. “Louisa Kara! Open this door this instant.”
“Mama?” I stumbled out of bed, leaving the little bedroom that opened into the rest of the cabin. It was cold, the fire I’d made the night before had gone out. I opened the door and rubbed briskly at my bare arms as my mother strode through the door, a dress hanging over her arm.
She thrust it in my direction. “Get dressed.”
“For what?”
She glared at me. “Have you learned nothing? Stop questioning everyone and everything. Get dressed. There’s a celebration happening today.”
“I’m actually invited?”
She guided me to the tiny kitchen table and pushed me into one of the two hard, wooden seats. “Of course you are.”
I didn’t say anything, because it only would have annoyed her, but I thought I had a right to be surprised to be invited to anything happening on the commune.
Mama pulled out the tie from my hair, and the long lengths tumbled down my back.
She took to it viciously, brushing out my hair the way she had when I was a little girl, and then redoing the tight braid so it was neat and tidy, making sure she covered the scar from when Caleb had ripped my scalp.
She gave a satisfied nod after I stood and faced her, but then her gaze turned away, landing on the dress. “Hurry. I don’t want to keep everyone waiting. You get dressed, and I’ll change Hayley Jade.”
I picked up the dress and stepped into the small bathroom to freshen up. The water was cold when I splashed it on my face, but it had the bonus of shifting the last of the sleepy feeling. I patted my face dry with a hand towel before rummaging through the top drawer in the vanity for my makeup.
“Not too much, Kara. No lipstick.”
“I know, I know,” I muttered. She would have died if she’d seen the bright-red lipstick I’d worn sometimes when I’d been living with Rebel.
My heart squeezed at the thought of my older sister. I missed her a lot, and FaceTime wasn’t the same. I didn’t even know how much longer I would have that. As it was, I’d been hiding the phone Rebel had given me from my parents, knowing full well they wouldn’t approve. They didn’t approve of technology in general, which had been part of the reason I’d left in the first place.
The outside world had seemed big and exciting, and though I was insignificant, I’d wanted to be a part of it.
The outside world scared me now I’d had a taste of it. Though I missed my sister, the commune was safe. Even with Caleb dead, there were other dangers outside our fences.
Other men who would take advantage of a single mom with limited means and a lack of street smarts. It had taken barely any time for Caleb to set his sights on me. There would be others who would do the same.
It didn’t matter how lonely I was here.
All that mattered was my daughter was happy and healthy and had a home where I could take care of her and shield her from the dangers I wished I’d never learned of.
I applied a tiny amount of natural-looking makeup, coating my long lashes with dark mascara and rubbing blusher onto the apples of my cheeks.
The church bells rang from our chapel across the field.
Mama appeared in the bathroom doorway with Hayley Jade on her hip and a frown on her face. “You aren’t even dressed! Louisa!”
