PROLOGUE
Elle
Ten years prior
I’m sitting in the kitchen, playing cards with my grandma’s neighbor Murray. He loves to teach me how to play poker and gin rummy, instead of the usual children’s games like go fish or Uno.
He’s an interesting character—his mustache and hair never quite match, his balding head always a few shades darker. He loves to show me his false teeth, the way he can wiggle them around.
Engrossed, I’m watching him remove what he calls a bridge, revealing a large gap in his top row of teeth. With sleight of hand, he replaces them just like a magician would.
The phone rings, snapping me out of my trance. Always wanting to answer and rarely being allowed at seven years old, I see a golden opportunity, since neither of my parents are around.
I rush to answer it before Murray can protest. “Hello!” I yell into the phone. “Laughlin residence.”
A long pause follows.
This doesn’t deter me. “May I ask who’s speaking?”
A male voice, no nonsense, shrills from the other end. “Can I please speak to Katrina Laughlin?”
“Just a second.” I drop the phone, now dangling by the cord off the wall, as I holler, “Mom! Mama, someone’s on the line.”
My mom’s passed out, her hand drooping off the sofa, as if she planned to pick the cigarette back up that’s stubbed out in a copper tin next to her on the floor.
“Wake up.” I shake her shoulders as she groans.
“Baby, stop,” she reprimands me. “Let Mama sleep in peace.”
“You have a phone call.”
“I can’t right now. Take a message.” She mumbles, “Or, better yet, have Grandma or Murray take one.”
“K.” I pretend not to hear the last part as I run back to the kitchen, sliding across the linoleum in my socks. “She’s busy. Can I take your number down?”
“No, this is very important. Might there be another adult in the house I can speak with?”
“My father doesn’t live with us anymore,” I say matter of factly.
Another long pause. “Is there anyone else in the house?” I shrug at Murray, who’s now standing over my shoulder. Bored with adult interaction, I shove the phone into his hand.
He addresses the person on the other end, and then he listens. His face contorts, but not in its usual comical way. This time his lips twist into a grimace, and his eyes seem to retreat farther into his head. “We’ll call you right back.” Ending the conversation, he sets the phone back into the cradle, too carefully.
“Sweetheart, would you mind picking up the cards and putting them away?” He motions to the table. “I’d like it if you would run to the gas station, grab us a Coke to share, and pick us up some snacks.”
After thrusting a five-dollar bill into my hand, he rushes me out the door, not even telling me to watch out for strangers or look both ways before I cross the street. His only request? “Make sure you knock when you come back.”
Striding down the sidewalk, I finger the crisp paper in my pocket, reminding me I’m rich.
A squad car drives by, then disappears around the corner.
I don’t know what prompts me to turn around, but I do, running all the way back to the house, tripping over my shoelaces, the money forgotten.
My father’s car is now parked in the drive, the rusted-out exhaust system and dirty license plate half covered by dust.
“Daddy!” I shout.
His jaw twitches when he spots me. At first, I think he’s acting like Mom on one of her binges, but there’s something off, a wild expression tainted with fear in his dark eyes.
“Lovebug.”
“Daddy, what’re you doing here?”
“I came to talk to Mom and Grandma.”
“Did you come to get me?” I squeal. “Can we go to the park?”
“Not now, ’Bug. I’ve got important matters to discuss.” He reaches out to grab my hand, his large palm swallowing my small one. “Come here, baby girl.”
Sirens start wailing as my father drags me into the house behind him. He slams and locks the door behind us. Murray’s already perched at the door, his hand on the knob as we enter.
Daddy suddenly drops my hand, rushing to where Grandma is seated on the couch, next to my dozing mom.
Startled, Grandma stands up, visibly surprised to see my father, then my tiny figure behind him.
He motions to her, and she joins him in the kitchen, but I can’t make out their muffled words. The blare of squad cars overcomes all the noises in the house, from the television to the radio, until tires skid to a halt in the driveway.
Grandma’s eyes drift to the small kitchen window over the sink. Looking over her shoulder at me, she snaps, “Elle, go to your room.”
I don’t listen. I’m rooted to the green shag carpet in the living room as I stare at the adults.
“Daddy?”
He strides over to me and gives me a tight hug and a sloppy kiss, the kind I usually hate, but at this moment it feels right. The smell of his Old Spice deodorant lingers against my cheek. “Listen to Grandma, ’Bug.”
The doorbell shrieks, followed by sharp pounding. Deep voices announce a dreaded word in this part of town, “Police,” and Daddy leans against the counter, still whispering to Grandma.
My mom, her blue eyes emotionless, hasn’t moved from the couch by the time they reach for my daddy with the metal rings.
“I knew he’d kill someone, someday,” she mutters before rolling over to her other side, her back to him.
To all of us.
And just like that, he’s arrested, my screams and sobs unable to elicit a response as two men—one bald, one young—handcuff him and push him into their waiting car.
Horrified, I watch as his flannel shirt and construction boots fade from sight.
CHAPTER 1
Elle
Present day
I blink my eyes instinctively at what looms ahead beneath an enormous blue sky that offers nothing but prairie grass and asphalt. It’s always a surprise, yet never a shock, after passing the long stretch of open road and winding around a sharp curve, to see the massive brick fortress up ahead that houses the male inmates.
Closing my eyes, I imagine the men bare chested, pounding their hands against the concrete walls, slicing their fingers on the razor wire fencing that spans the perimeter, trying to find a way out.
This has to be the definition of hell.
The majority of prisoners deserve to be locked up and kept like the goldfish you win at a county fair, half-dead and googly eyed inside a clear plastic bag. Instead of swimming, they’re merely floating in the bag of lukewarm water, their fate sealed by the time you get home, when you’re forced to flush their lifeless, bloated bodies down the toilet.
But not him.
He doesn’t deserve to be kept here with the real dangers to society.
Clenching my hands against my sides, I squeeze them hard to keep from reaching for the door handle. It’s probably a lucky coincidence that the right side is broken. Ejecting myself from the car doesn’t seem smart, but my other option is to go through the various obstacles of fencing, prison guards, and searches, through various rooms and hallways, until I get to sit uncomfortably and face him. And this time, I’m scared out of my mind. Fearful in a way I don’t think is possible. If he can’t help . . .