I stared at the picture on my phone, smiling at the round little face next to mine. I liked to think he’d been smiling back as I’d taken the shot.

Jeremiah, my new nephew, was all puffy cheeks and dark curls. Save for the big, pale blue eyes, he didn’t look much like my older brother, Kaleb. At least not yet, but I knew there was a good chance he’d be a heartbreaker just like his daddy.

A voice droned on over the intercom overhead and I tuned it out, trying not to think about where I was and what I was doing. If I thought about it, I might start panicking. I’d have plenty of time for that later. Swiping the screen, I went to the next picture.

Piety and me. We were posing for the camera while Astra, Piety’s best friend, took the picture. We’d gone down to the beach one Saturday while Kaleb had taken Jeremiah with him to the surf shop, telling us the little guy would be getting his feet wet soon, so to speak. I was just waiting to get a picture of Jer on his first surfboard.

Warmth curled in me as I thought about my family. Kaleb was happier than he’d ever been in his life, settled down with his shop, his son and new wife.

If it wasn’t for me, his life would be just about perfect.

I hated that his concern over me kept getting in the way of that perfect life, and I hated even more that the next few days were probably going to be tough on him. But sometimes, a girl had to do what a girl had to do. When I got back, I’d explain things and hope he understood.

“We’re now boarding priority…” The sound of the woman’s voice had me looking up. The endless blue of the skyline outside the windows would’ve been a beautiful sight, but airplanes taxiing down the runaway wasn’t exactly my ideal scenery. LAX wasn’t where I wanted to be spending my Saturday.

I wanted to be at back at my place, reading a book, or maybe working a new sketch. For once, I wouldn’t have to feel guilty about not studying since classes were out for the semester. I was quite proud of what I’d accomplished. I’d forced myself to pay attention even when they were horribly boring, and I’d maintained a 3.5 GPA. It hadn’t been easy. I’d hated the classes. I didn’t know if it was because they were boring, or I just felt out of place being twenty-two and a freshman, but it had pretty much all sucked. So when I’d handed in my last final, I’d been all set to have a slow and relaxing weekend.

But the phone call yesterday had made sure that wasn’t going to happen.

Camry, please!

A new announcement sounded, startling me out of my daze. Forcing my attention back to the phone and out of my head, I went back to the new picture on my screen. It was me and Kaleb, his arm around my shoulder, his smile and eyes a little harder than they had been when we were kids.

And it was because of me.

This trip to Las Vegas wasn’t going to help things between us. In fact, I expected that what little rebuilding we’d done to our relationship was going to be ruined when he realized I’d taken off without coming to him first.

“What are you doing?” I muttered. Pinching the bridge of my nose, I struggled to find some middle ground for the internal battle that was currently taking place inside my head.

But there wasn’t any.

There’s this lie that people are all fed, that we can make the people who love us happy and still do the things we need to do.

It’s bullshit.

I couldn’t do what I had to do now and still make Kaleb happy.

I knew him. He believed he had to hover over me and protect me, while I knew I needed to handle this shit. And I didn’t have the time it would take to convince him to let me go.

He was going to be so pissed off, and I understood why.

Sure, I’d been clean and sober for a year, but after the hell I’d put him through for the past few years…

Sighing, I dropped my face into my hand, elbow propped on the arm of my chair. Who was I kidding? After our parents had died when I was eleven, I’d rebelled. Kaleb had tried to keep me in line but I’d gotten into fights—real ones—

and drinking. I slept around, smoked both cigarettes and pot. Stole money and various shit from stores. Got picked up by the cops more than once, but always managed to talk my way out of it. Still, I’d gotten an academic scholarship to the University of Nevada, and that was when I’d gone from spoiled brat to full-on tragedy. Freshman year, I started messing around with drugs, hung around with all the wrong people. By the time I was nineteen, I’d gotten hooked on heroin. I’d dropped out shortly before they would’ve kicked me out, and ended up letting my dealer pimp me out.

That had lasted for two horrible years.

It was going to take more than one year of being the good girl for him to realize I was ready to take control.

“And this is going to help sooo much.”

The woman next to me, clad in a sleek suit the color of ripe cherries, slid me a look from under her eyelashes before focusing her attention back on her iPhone and tap, tap, tapping away.

Me and my rambling, making her uncomfortable.

The brat inside me wanted to flip her off.

I resisted and fell back into my brood. A year. I’d been good for a year. I hadn’t gotten in trouble and done anything stupid. I had to admit, it had been nice not to worry about whether or not the cops would show up at my door, or how I was going to explain away the track marks or the shakes. I’d been able to pretend I was like everyone else. Pretend like my story was something bland and boring. Anything but the truth.

I got addicted, dropped out, couldn’t hold a job to keep up with my habit, so my dealer asked if maybe I’d want to do him a few favors…all I had to do was sleep with him, then maybe a few of his friends, and that nasty debt of mine would be washed away. Oh! And I put my sister-in-law and her unborn baby right in the middle of it. Then my boyfriend/pimp/dealer tried to overdose me, and I nearly died. Where are you from?

A near panicked laugh bubbled up in my throat, and I pressed my fist to my lips to keep it trapped inside.

After all of that, and here I was. Going back to ground zero. Where I’d made the worst decisions of my life.

I had to be crazy.

The calmer, rational part of me—I liked to call her Grown-up Camry—stepped up. It’s going to be fine, Grown-up Camry said. Stefano won’t be there. We testified against him, remember? We helped put him away. Twenty-five years. Even on good behavior, he won’t be out for a long, long time.

Then, because Grown-up Camry was mature like that, she faded away. She’d said her piece and wouldn’t come back until she needed to cheer me up or give me another pep talk.

Maybe Grown-up Camry was right. That other panicky part—the old Camry—getting worked up over nothing.

Sure, I could understand Kaleb’s trust issues, but I knew myself. I knew how fortunate I was to have this second chance. I’d helped my pimp slash dealer kidnap my pregnant sister-in-law, and now one of my closest friends. That she didn’t hate me was the most amazing thing. Just as amazing, her dad had actually stepped in to help me.

He’d pulled strings, gotten me the best lawyers.

They’d gotten me a plea deal instead of jail time.

The judge had been a stern-faced piece of work, and he’d made it clear that he’d only agreed because he owed Silas Van Allen a favor. His words still echoed in my ears.

One wrong step and you will be sent back to Australia. You’ve got another chance here. Make the most of it.

I was trying to do just that. The deal had involved six months of mandatory in-house rehab, then another six weeks in a halfway house. From there, I’d gotten my own apartment. My counselor had been a strong force in making that happen, telling Kaleb that his doubt in my strength could sabotage my recovery, that I needed to learn that I could stand on my own two feet.

I’d been on my own—relatively speaking—for a little more than four months. I’d finished my first semester at UCLA, and I had a job. No relapses, no falling for the wrong guys. None of it.

I was doing fine.

And I’d still be doing fine after this trip to Las Vegas.

Even though Kaleb was going to be furious.

Guilt sank jagged teeth into me and I closed my eyes, chewing nervously on my thumbnail. This guilt would still chase me a good fifty years after I died. At least it would be in good company with all the other things I had to feel guilty about.

Shit. Maybe I shouldn’t be doing this. I looked down at the boarding pass, my fingers tightening involuntarily. I’d been lucky to get a flight this soon—or maybe unlucky.

“Zone two!” A cheerful voice called from the desk, and I sighed. I should’ve already boarded, and if I didn’t get up off my ass, I might as well just turn around and go home.

Closing my eyes, I muttered, “It’s do or die time, Cam.” If I was going to change my mind, the time was now. I shoved myself to my feet and grabbed the handle of my carryon.

I heard a sniff, followed by a coolly voiced, “Excuse me…Cam.”

As I looked over, I saw the woman who’d been sitting beside me cut around me, muttering under her breath.

Rolling my eyes, I started toward the counter.

I’d become a pro at traveling light. I didn’t know how long I was going to be gone, but I could get by on the stuff I had for several weeks and do just fine.

Weeks, I thought. If I was gone weeks, Kaleb would have my ass.

Actually, that was going to happen anyway.

I felt like I was doing a perp walk, trudging closer to the desk where they were checking ID. Cherry Business Suit was a person ahead of me, and the smooth flow of the line stopped when she demanded to know why she hadn’t been upgraded to business-class as they’d promised her thirty fucking minutes ago.

Passengers in line winced along with me as her voice rose, right along with her temper.

“Her face is going to be about the same shade of red as her suit if she keeps that up,” I said under my breath, but it hadn’t been quiet enough. The woman behind me heard and snickered.

“Ma’am, if you step aside, we’ll get the manager over here to address your concerns. You’re holding up the rest of the passengers.”

Eying my boarding pass, I wondered if this was God’s way of telling me I shouldn’t be going to Las Vegas.

But it wasn’t two minutes before the line started moving again, thanks to the security officers who’d arrived, along with the manager. The line filed past them as the woman argued about how she had to have business class and somebody at the airlines had screwed up.

“Hello, Ms. Hastings! Welcome aboard.” The woman’s eyes shot past me to Cherry Business Suit and as I moved past them, I heard her mutter, “Well, that woman is not getting into business-class now. That was the only seat we had left.”

I couldn’t help it. I started to laugh.

At least now I was starting this trip off with humor rather than dread. I just hoped I could keep things light like that, but my experience said things would be getting dark far too soon.

* * *

There was nothing like Las Vegas.

That was made clear the moment you arrived at the airport. How many other airports had slot machines waiting for you right near the baggage claim?

Wistfully, I eyed them as I made way out to where the line for taxis waited, but those things were off-limits. Me and my addictive personality. Gambling hadn’t been my poison, but sometimes an itch could be eased by something else. I just knew if I started, even as an ‘instead of’ option, I’d end up in a whole other kind of rehab.

So I went right past the shiny slots with their bright lights and clanging noises. The second I stepped outside, I could swear all the moisture was sucked straight from my pores. In anticipation of the dry Nevada heat, I’d twisted my hair into a bun at the crown of my head, and the sweat that beaded at my nape disappeared almost the second it formed.

Just beyond the shelter of the building’s overhang, the sun shone down, white hot and bright. I dragged out my sunglasses and moved to the taxi line to wait.

I hadn’t been there more than a minute before somebody moved up behind me.

While it’d been amusing when she’d glared at me as she’d stormed through the plane on the way to her second-class seat—her words, not mine—it was less amusing now to glance back and see Cherry Business Suit standing behind me. Her eyes connected with mine, and her lips twisted in a sour smile.

Ignoring her, I turned back to the line as it started another slow shuffle forward.

Across the road was the queue for those heading to pick up rental cars. Absently, I wondered if it wouldn’t have been easier to just rent a car, but then again, I didn’t have my license, and that would’ve been an unnecessary risk. Besides, it’d cost a lot more, and I needed to conserve what money I had.

I’d bought the plane ticket with money from my checking account and the rewards I’d earned traveling with Astra over the past few months. She’d insisted it was training, since I’d told her I was going to counseling, but very little of what we’d done had anything to do with the place where she’d worked in Philadelphia.

It was more like she used her visits back there as a reason to go shopping, and I’d been her travel buddy. I hadn’t minded. Once Astra had forgiven my part in what’d happened to Piety, she’d been a blast to hang out with. Piety had given us knowing looks each time, but she hadn’t ratted us out. She knew I needed space from my brother.

A familiar, obnoxious voice came from behind me. “…gave my seat to this college kid…yeah, probably traveling on Daddy’s dime. I know. There was a problem with my rental car…”

It took me a moment to realized that Cherry Business Suit was talking about me. I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Even though there was a pang of sadness at the word Daddy, the idea was so ludicrous; the only response was laughter.

She paused in the middle of her conversation, and I could feel her eyes glaring daggers at me, but I kept laughing. Daddy’s dime. Where the hell had she gotten that idea?

“Ma’am, your destination?”

Laughter fading, I stepped up to the curb and nodded at the man, giving him the name of my hotel.

As I ducked into the car, my throat clutched up on me.

Camry…what the hell are you doing?

* * *

“You look worn out back there.”

The sound of the driver’s voice had me opening my eyes, and it was only then I realized that I’d fallen asleep.

He glanced at me in the rearview mirror before merging into the left lane.

“It’s been a long day.”

“You fly in from Australia?”

“Yeah.” I grinned at him. “A few years ago. Today, I came from Los Angeles.”

He laughed. “You better rest up some before you hit the city. Vegas will leave you begging for mercy even after twelve solid hours of rest.”

Vegas had certainly done that to me the first time. “You aren’t kidding.”

“Been here before, huh?”

“Yes.” Looking out the window, I watched as the hotels rose into the air, piercing it with their tacky, tasteless beauty. “I’ll grab a nap and be good to go in a bit.”

“Sounds like you know how to handle this devious old lady.”

Amused, I glanced back at him. “That’s a right good term for this city.”

“It’s the only polite one I can use.”

Even from here, I could see his grin, and I completely understood exactly how he meant it.

I had missed Las Vegas. Granted, most of my time here hadn’t exactly been ideal. Hard to appreciate a city when you were either drunk or strung out...both. But I’d had some clear moments here and there, made some good memories.

There had been one night back when I’d still only been using recreationally, and I’d splurged on a discount ticket for one of the magic shows. I couldn’t remember the name of the casino, but it had been the big one shaped like a pyramid, and the show had been amazing.

Another night, one of the girls I’d worked with had gotten a tip from one of her johns, and she had decided she was going to spend it on something other than smack. She’d taken me to the dinner show at the casino that looked like a castle.

Sometimes, I think I was born at the wrong time, Shelly had told me. I should’ve been born back when there were knights and kings and queens. Even if I was just some poor girl working in the kitchen.

Our reality had been far from a fairytale, but Shelly hadn’t wanted reality. She wanted a fantasy and for the night, we’d both had it. We hadn’t worried about Stefano finding out she’d gotten extra money from her john, and we hadn’t worried about not being around when he came looking for us.

He had, of course. And when we’d gotten home, he’d beaten the shit out both of us. But we’d never forgotten what it had been like, for a few precious hours, to pretend we belonged.

“You doing okay back there?”

I glanced up at the driver. “I’m fine, why?”

“Just got this sad look on your face.” He shrugged. “If you need to talk, I got a good ear.” He tapped his right one. “It’s this one. The left one, it kind of sucks.”

His silly, charming humor made me laugh. “That’s a tempting offer.”

And I meant it. I’d learned the value of having somebody to talk to, how poisonous it was to trap everything inside. But this wasn’t something to share with a stranger.

“I’m just working my way through some memories, but thank you.” Then I gestured to the small, relatively plain looking hotel just beyond the glass. “Besides, we’re here. You need to go fetch another sad tourist and offer her a kind ear.”

“You’ve found me out, lady.”

I slid my debit card and added in as generous a tip as I could afford, offering one last smile before climbing out and looking at the hotel.

“Well,” I murmured. “I’m here. Now what?”