Joss

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I ran back to my room at a dead sprint, heart hammering so hard it hurt, so hard I thought I was going to have a heart attack.

I’d told Lucian the truth. All the truth, everything I’d been hiding from him and from myself.

I couldn’t face him. Not after that. How could he want me, after that? Twenty years old, uneducated, homeless, and a virgin. How could there be anything between us, now?

There couldn’t be.

I changed into my wandering garb: a pair of thick leggings and baggy jeans, thick socks, combat boots, a long-sleeved T-shirt, a sweater, and a thick hoodie, and then shoved the remaining few items of clothing I had laying around my room into my backpack, and headed out the door. Three months here, and packing to leave took thirty seconds. I’d always been planning on leaving, though. The Badds weren’t my family.

I made it to the door at the top of the stairs before anyone stopped me.

“Going somewhere?” Dru asked, sitting at the kitchen table with a laptop open in front of her.

I kept my eyes on the door and my hand on the knob. “Yeah. I’m leaving.”

“For good?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“Can I ask why?”

I sighed, a tremulous sound. “It’s—it’s time. It’s past time.”

“This is about Lucian.” She grabbed something from the table next to her and walked over to me. “Isn’t it?”

“It’s about a lot of things.” I forced my eyes to hers. “You’ll never know how grateful I am to you and Bast for letting me stay here.”

“I don’t know what happened, and it’s none of my business, but…” she hesitated, a lock of red hair falling into her eyes. “I don’t think you’re making the right choice.”

“This is what I do. It’s all I know.”

“So learn something else.”

“I can’t.” I whispered it, barely keeping my voice from breaking. “I can’t. Don’t you see that?”

She searched my face without a word for several long beats, and then nodded. “I guess I do.” She lifted her hand, extending something to me. “Take this. It’s connected to our family plan. Unlimited calling and data. All of our numbers are programmed into it.”

It was a cell phone, a brand new, latest generation iPhone, a glossy black screen with a thick red rubber case to protect it from falls.

“I can’t take this, Dru.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “You can and you will.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re going to get out there, and you’re going to realize how wrong you are. You’re going to realize that home is where you choose to be, and that family is who you choose to surround yourself with. You’re going to realize that we are your family and this is home.” She tapped the phone. “And when you do, you’re going to call me. Day or night, no matter where you are. You’re going to call me, and we’re going to come get you and bring you home.” She reached past me and opened the door for me. “You can leave if you want—”

I resorted to sarcasm as a defense against how she was making me feel. “Oh, I can, can I?”

She ignored me. “You can leave if you want, Joss, but you’ll be back.”

I took the phone, shoved it into the pocket of my hoodie, and pushed past her. “Whatever.”

I ignored Bast’s questions as I swept across the bar and outside. I headed for the nearest mode of transportation out of here: the ferry to the airport. I had to get away, had to get as far from here as I could, as fast as possible. I had the cash, so I may as well use it.

I sat alone at the front of the ferry, clamping down hard on the rampage of thoughts and emotions boiling inside me. The ride was short, and soon I was facing a clerk across a counter, trying to figure out where to go next.

“Where does the next flight out of here go, and how much is it?” I asked.

The clerk tapped at her keyboard, consulted her monitor, and then glanced up at me with a flat attempt at a smile. “Seattle…five-fifty.” She glanced at her watch. “It’s twelve forty-eight now, and the flight leaves at one thirty-six, and it’s almost sold out, so if you want this flight, you’d better decide quickly.”

I blinked at her. “Five hundred and fifty dollars?”

“Round trip, yes.”

I swallowed hard. “One way—how much?”

“Two seventy-five for a one way.”

I twisted my backpack around, dug around for the box with my cash in it, withdrew enough to cover the fare, and handed it to her. “I’ll take it.”

“Luggage?”

I shook my head as I slung the backpack onto my back. “Nope. Just this.”

She processed the purchase and printed out a boarding pass, giving me directions to the gate. And then came the look I’d been waiting for. “One-way trip, no luggage. Running away, are we?”

I gave her a die-bitch glare until she blanched and hurriedly handed me the boarding pass. “Have a nice flight. Next!”

It was less than two hours to Seattle. I deboarded the plane, splurged again, recklessly, on a cab to downtown Seattle. I was barely avoiding a breakdown at this point, forcing myself to breathe slowly and keep my thoughts off of Lucian, off of Ketchikan, off the bar, the brothers, the girls, the bakery…and how I’d been closer than ever to The Garden. If I’d stayed in Ketchikan, could I have saved enough to find a place?

God, stop, Joss, just stop. It’s not happening. It could never happen.

Eventually, the cab let me off downtown, and I was back on familiar ground—on foot, alone, with no destination. Only this time, niggling in the back of my head was a tiny, quiet, but subversive thought: I may not have anywhere to get to, but I do have somewhere to go back to.

It was not a comforting thought.

I wandered Seattle for hours.

And I came to an uncomfortable and unsettling realization: I had no desire to be there. There was nothing here for me. Just…buildings and people, structures that meant nothing and faces I didn’t know, and would never care about.

So, I started walking. Out of Seattle, heading south for the first time, instead of west.

Darkness fell on me somewhere between Seattle and Tacoma. I wasn’t as comfortable in the darkness as I used to be. The highway became ever more deserted as night expanded and darkened around me. I walked on the side of the I-5, passing through evenly spaced pools of light, the occasional car or semi whooshing past me.

My feet began to hurt after only a handful of miles.

I’d never felt more alone in my life.

I kept going until there was a tinge of gray on the horizon. My feet throbbed, and I had several blisters. I was cold. I was hungry. I was exhausted.

I just want to go home.

The thought struck me, unbidden, like a lightning bolt, and I began to cry. Just a tear or two trickling down now and then, but eventually I was bawling like a baby, sobbing, and I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t see for the tears. I staggered off the shoulder of the highway and into the tall grass. Bright white lights buzzed above me—a billboard; I stumbled through the grass and caught up against a low chain link fence, on the other side of which was an RV dealership, the white rectangular bulks of the RVs lit up along the fence line by three tall light poles. I sagged against the fence, gulping down sobs, my fingers grasping blindly at the chain link, my eyes blurred by tears.

I don’t want to wander anymore.

I want to go home.

I sank to my butt in the cold, dew-damp grass, slung my backpack around to my lap, and rested my back against the fence. I unzipped the outermost pocket of the backpack, and, with trembling fingers, withdrew the cell phone Dru had given me.