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prologue
Ten Years Ago
This is fine.
Nothing to see here.
There are a lot of things you can tell yourself if you’re willing to listen. I’m not sure if the fact that I believe my own nonsense means I’m a genius convincer or a gullible loser who will believe anything.
Can it be both?
At the moment, I’d say I’m walking a tightrope between stupidly romantic and just plain stupid.
And I’m slipping.
No, literally. My foot is slipping and if I let go of my bunk room’s windowsill, someone is going to have to scrape me off the sidewalk two stories down.
Once the sun comes up.
Maybe it would have been better to do this in the daylight.
Oh, but the sunrise is so much prettier than the sunset. All the soft baby pinks and violet blues and frothy clouds. My window faces a tree that blocks out most of it. I just want to see if I can glimpse the horizon if I climb a little higher up…
Carefully planting my bare foot against a roof shingle, I rebalance the book under my left arm and size up the stretch to the closest eave. Sandpaper texture scratches my toes while the cool morning air settles over my arms. I have to extend every muscle in my spine to reach the next ledge, carefully easing my way around the corner of the roof.
I’m pretty sure if I just skirt around to the side of the house, there’s a dip between two dormers?—
“What are you doing out here?”
My life flashes before my eyes in a dismal blur of government-issue greige. I startle, nearly losing my grip on the corner of the roof.
“EEecht!”
Ignoring my squawk, a big hand snatches my wrist just before I lose my balance. “Are you crazy?” the guy mutters. He drags me into the valley between roof segments before dropping my arm.
I scramble back from him, pressing into the shingles, eyes bugging with fear. “W-wha—Who—Wh-why?”
He’s one of the older kids in our group home. Almost the shape of a man, but too gangly and full of the kind of restless fury that only comes from being caged in an orphanage.
That’s what happens to us, I’ve realized. We either grow fearful… or furious.
I’m afraid this guy is in the second category.
I’m afraid I’m in the first.
Dark brows lower over his eyes. “Don’t freak out,” he mumbles, shifting back. “I don’t give a fuck why you’re up here. I was just saying; you’re crazy.”
Normally, I’m mousy. Sensitive. Skittish. I’ve been called a lot of things, but never crazy.
I’m typically too busy trying to follow all the rules and keep everyone happy to make much headway in the “crazy” department. Though, I suppose, climbing up onto the roof alone, in the dark, doesn’t exactly scream, “sensible.”
A big hand waves in front of my face. “Focus, butterfly. You could slide right off this thing.”
I realize I’ve totally spaced out and duck my chin, hiding the way hot blood blazes under my cheeks. “Right. Sorry.”
He shrugs his shoulder. It’s massive, even in his ill-fitting hoodie. If he hasn’t designated as an alpha yet, I bet he will one day soon.
An oddly serene silence settles between us. A thousand different things to say play through my head before I rewind his earlier remark, quirking my eyebrows at him.
