Chapter 2 - She Was Supposed to Be Ashes
She was in the corner chair, holding a paper cup of water in both hands like it might get away from her.
Same face as mine. Same dark eyes. Same faint scar through her left eyebrow from the summer we were nine and she took a bike turn too fast on gravel.
My knees quit on me.
"Nora?" It barely came out.
She looked up, and the second she saw me, her whole face came apart.
"Erin." She stood so fast the cup tipped and spilled across the floor. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I didn't know how to—"
"You d*ed." Flat. No air in it. "We buried you. Mom cried every day for two years. She's g*ne now, Nora. She died still missing you."
Nora jerked back like I'd slapped her. "I know," she whispered. "I know I did."
"Then you'd better start explaining." My hands wouldn't hold still. "Right here. Every year of it."
Her eyes cut to the receptionist, then back to me, and her voice dropped so low I had to bend toward her.
"Not here. Please. There are people who still think I'm dead, and if the wrong one hears different before I'm ready—" She caught my wrist. Her grip was cold. "Erin, I was running from someone. I didn't have a choice."
My throat pulled tight. "Running from who?"
Her mouth opened. Then something past my shoulder caught her eye — the window, the parking lot — and the color drained straight out of her face.
"We have to go," she said. "Now."
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What Nora told me next — and the name of the man she'd been hiding from — changed everything I thought I knew about that crash.
