Page 37 of Surly Sheriff
She pursed her lips and slowly moved her head from side to side. “No. This … this was the wakeup call I needed. Keep—” She swallowed the lump in her throat away. “Keep Kismet with you.”
She turned and walked away. And didn’t look back.
But instead of going straight home, packing her few belongings, and continuing her journey to nowhere, Rae found herself heading for the lake.
Sun glittered off the surface, almost blinding in its brightness. She put a hand up to shield her eyes, blaming the dazzling sparkle for the renewed moisture plaguing her eyes.
There was a small playpark, surprisingly empty, near the water’s edge. Rae settled on the seat of a swing, ignoring the sting of the sunbaked wood against her bare thighs, and set the swing in motion. Higher and higher she rose with each oscillation, head thrown back, sun on her face, wind whooshing in her ears, tears evaporating as they leaked from her eyes.
She emptied her mind, shoving today’s hurt into an already overstuffed trunk. But as soon as she shoved on one end, something spilled from the opposite side.
The memory returned.
Another pair of swings.
Another body of water.
But instead of a lake, it was the Atlantic Ocean. Wide and endless, it glittered and beckoned, hinting at an elusive freedom.
It was the first time she and her sister had talked about escape …
Their motion in sync, on the upward swing her sister said, “What if we let go, do you think we would disappear into the sky? Evaporate like the early morning fog?”
She laughed. “Don’t be silly. We’ll break an arm. Or leg. Or worse, our necks.”
“But if we broke our necks, we’d be dead, and he can’t touch us.”
“Don’t talk like that!”
“It’s true.”
They swung in silence for the longest while.
Then.
“He’s going to hurt you, too,” her sister whispered, looking across the small gap separating them. “Soon.”
She winced.
In a few months she’d turn thirteen and hereducationwould begin.
Maybe letting go and breaking her neck wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
Back and forth they moved, the seconds turning into minutes.
She didn’treallywant to die. There had to be another way.
Her mind churned, ideas floating …
The sun glinted off the ocean, beckoning, offering a path to freedom. “What if we climbed in a boat and sailed away?” she said as momentum propelled them upward.
Movement out of the corner of her eye ripped her back into the present. It was Beau, leaning a shoulder against the green metal poles of the frame. Kismet lay on the grass a few paces away, safely out of range of the swing.
She watched Beau watch her as she swung back.
His scowl matched hers.
“Why’d you come after me?” she asked, passing by him.
