Prologue
Jess’s POV
A few more days.
That was all I had to endure. After years, that should feel like nothing.
But it didn’t.
Months, then weeks, days, even the seconds became unbearable. Dread built upon each of them. Not just because of what it meant for me, but what it meant for my father.
My freedom equaled his financial loss.
And that terrified me.
Every day was hell. Each one like a sentence for a crime I never committed. If the warden were my father, and prison this room, this house, I would finish this sentence and survive it. I would survive him.
But there was no room for mistakes. Not a single one. My freedom depended on it. Maybe a lot more than that.
Every call to the bank felt like an illegal activity. My heart raced, my palms were sweaty, and I felt utterly sick to my stomach by the end of the calls.
Even though the phone shook in my hand, I maintained my wits about me and never gave my name. Not once. Never called a bank twice. I just asked the questions until everything I needed to know was confirmed.
Then I spent the rest of the day wondering if he’d notice something different about me. Could he see a change on my face? Would he know somehow what I had been doing?
When I was young, my mom had me tested. I heard the teacher confirm that I had a photographic memory.
“Speak of this to no one,” my mom whispered.
And I didn’t.
My mom promised it was for the best and that she would explain when I got older.
That day never came.
But I never broke my word to her.
Especially after I returned home with a report card showing I was top of my class. Even that made my father livid. “You just can’t help but draw attention to yourself,” he accused me.
I had been so excited when the envelope with my scores was handed out in class. Something like hope blossomed in my chest.
He’ll finally be proud of me.
But that was a long time ago.
And the last day I ever attended public school.
I closed my eyes and saw the words in front of me. I didn’t understand all the legal terminologies when I first saw them. The calls to the bank helped with those.
God, I hoped I didn’t miss anything. I would give anything to talk to Mom and get her advice.
Wishful thinking wasn’t going to help me now. I would have to trust myself. Trust what she taught me.
When the courier arrived six months ago, I never in a million years expected to hear the male voice ask for me.
No one came to visit me.
Ever.
It was as much a shock to me as it was to my father.
The set of thump, thump, thumps, was politely soft.
No noise was permitted in the house. He always seemed to be listening, eager to punish me for it. “See what you made me do,” he’d snarl.
So, even the softest noise on the door broke the silence like shattered glass on the floor. It startled me so completely that I jerked the mop and my elbow into the kitchen counter. Pain radiated up my arm like a current, and I doubled over, swallowing the pain.
My knuckles grew white around the mop handle as I held my breath.
I let the air out slowly for a count of four as I froze, listening.
Silence.
I softly propped the mop handle against the counter and massaged the throbbing elbow.
My eyes flew open as the rhythm repeated again.
I jolted back as my father crept around the corner, boiling with anger, and jerked me so violently that my feet slid out from under me.
Normally, he would’ve let me fall and walked away without a care in the world. But there was someone at the door.
Someone who might hear.
And they were still knocking.
He steadied me with a look that could kill, pressed a finger to his mouth in warning, and then pushed me toward my bedroom.
I soundlessly padded away without making eye contact with him again.
My heart began to race as I passed by within feet, inches, of someone at the door. The pull on my heart made my nose and eyes sting with captive tears.
But I didn’t dare slow down, knowing his stare burned into the back of my head.
When I vanished around a wall, he bellowed, “I’m coming.”
My bedroom doorknob was still in my hand when I had the confidence to pause. There was hardly an inch left in the opening, but I turned my right ear to it.
The sound of the door seal separating was the only way I knew the front door had opened.
I held my breath.
“Good morning. Is this Jessica Bain’s residence?”
My eyes opened wide, and my hand flew to her mouth. Why would someone be here for me?
The voice was male. Young, if I were to guess. His tone sounded professional and more elegant than I could compare another voice to in my life.
My eyes and nose began to burn again. My eyes closed reluctantly as I willed the tears back.
“Who is asking?”
“Um,” the young voice hesitated. The stranger couldn’t have missed the mark of anger in her father’s tone. “I have a delivery for her, sir.”
Something in my chest ached. Not just because those few words convinced me that the beautiful voice belonged to someone my age, maybe a few years older, but also because I desperately pitied the guy and his measly hourly rate. There was no way it was enough if he often encountered people like my father.
“That’s not what I asked, now was it?”
I grimaced at the sound of his anger. It was almost as scary as when it was directed at me.
I heard a throat clear. “Excuse me, sir?” The sweet voice shook with palpable fear.
“I didn’t ask what you were doing. I asked who was asking,” he paused to take a breath and yelled, “for my daughter!”
My heart almost stopped completely.
“Sir, I am just a courier.”
“Still not the answer,” he raged louder.
My eyes nervously darted around as I strained to hear.
I could swear that at that moment the world stopped. I heard nothing. Not my heart arcing, not a bird, not a car motor...nothing.
Then time resumed. “The papers, boy,” he said with a clipped tone.
“Uh. I have to verify that I hand these directly to her.
Papers. To her.
Wait, what?
“I’m her legal guardian. Give them to me,” he demanded.
There was no yelling. Not a word for what felt like an eternity until I finally heard, “Or shall I take them?”
I imagined the poor guy frozen in fear, like I am when yelled at that way.
Then I heard a car door, and my eyebrows flew up.
The front door closed.
I closed the small inch I had been listening through, careful not to let it make even the softest sound.
Turning quickly, I rushed to the bed and opened the singular book owned. I pretended to read as I strained to listen.
No footsteps came to my room.
I sucked in several deep breaths.
He wasn’t coming in here. Oh, thank God. That didn’t stop my heart from beating out of my chest.
Then the debilitating silence began.
I stared at my window, knowing at that moment I’d almost risk more punishment to have a window at the front of the house and one that wasn’t boarded up. Maybe then I’d go to the far edge and try to peek out.
Maybe not.
I rolled my eyes, tired of my mind playing out what-ifs. There was no way I’d look. Not now, when I had so much to lose. With only months until I was no longer his dependent, nothing was going to jeopardize my leaving. Especially not my impatience or curiosity.
I would continue playing the frightened and obedient daughter.
Part of it was true. I was terrified of him.
I read the page I opened to over and over. As my eyes drifted over the words I knew by heart, I saw nothing. Not a single word.
Someone had been outside. Someone my father didn’t want here, and yet so close that I had just heard his angelic voice.
Ah! I wanted to scream. Frustration threatened to rip it from my throat.
That’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to scream at the top of my lungs at the first chance I get. Just because I can.
I huffed out a long breath of air.
It helped some.
Screaming would’ve helped more. I sighed, shaking my head.
My thoughts ricocheted as I tried to remember the last time someone had come by the house. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember.
Time stopped. My eyes subconsciously began the pattern I had taught myself out of necessity. Without a way of knowing what time it was from within my room, my eyes drifted over each hole in the walls, every water stain on the ceiling, and each chunk of missing carpet in the nine-by-nine bedroom.
Then, time began to tick like a clock in my head. I had used this method for a few years, and when coupled with the sun’s movement on the walls, I have been able to do this during the night fairly accurately.
I finished the first count.
Damn it. Only a minute had passed. It felt like twenty.
Was my father outside? Was he inside and just ignoring what had just happened?
Would he punish me for someone coming by?
I began the next round of counting.
Silence.
I began the third and was halfway through when a voice bellowed down the hall in a forced whisper.
