A minute of silence ticks by before Stale throws his hands in the air. “Fine. Do whatever you want. See if I care.” He storms for the door and jerks it open. At first I think he’s really going to leave and let us do this on our own, but then he shoots us an impatient look. “Are you two coming?”

I suppress a grin as I nod then Emery and I walk to the door. We don’t take anything with us, except the clothes on our backs and each other. It makes me feel weightless and in the strangest way, happy.

As I step over the threshold, I smile to myself because I can almost feel myself entering a new life, the one I’ve always wanted.

I’m finally, finally free.

Chapter 19

I Finally Found My Wings

Eight months later…

Emery

“So, you’re saying you think the reason why I forgot so many things about my life is because of the medication I was on?” I ask my therapist, a middle-aged woman with wild red hair. “That it was a side effect?”

She crosses her arms on top of her cluttered desk. “It could be because of a side effect. Although, if the right person knew a lot about the drug, they might administer it in an attempt to give a person temporary amnesia.”

I sigh heavily. “It’s probably the latter.”

She hesitates, chewing on the end of her pen. “I know you’ve said that you don’t want to tell me who was giving you the drugs all those years, but I want to remind you that you can trust me.” She motions at the closed door. “Everything that gets said in here is strictly confidential, Em.”

She calls me Em and believes my name is Emelia, just like everyone else I meet does. It’s the name I was given eight months ago when I was relocated to Florida under witness protection.

I thrum my fingers on the armrests. I would love to tell her everything, but doing so would be risking my new identity, and right now, it’s not worth the risk.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I finally say.

“All right then.” She sifts through a file on the desk, moving on. “So, how are the hallucinations coming along? Have you had any?”

I shake my head. “Not for quite a few months.”

“That’s good.” She jots something down on a legal pad. “That makes me believe even more that they were stemming from the medication you were on. Although, I do believe that you saw your brother as a coping mechanism over the guilt you felt because of his death.”

I nod, almost agreeing with her this time. In the beginning, I was so caught up in the madness, that it was hard for me to believe the drugs were causing my mind to slip away.

I haven’t seen Ellis since the day I remembered his death, so I’m hoping she’s right. Still, life hasn’t been easy. I do have nightmares at least once a week and my panic attacks can get intense. But that’s part of life. Even Ryler has stuff he’s dealing with, like missing Violet and Luke and sometimes he can sink into a funk. But we’re always there to help each other out.

“What about your anxiety?” she asks.

I shrug. “It comes and goes.”

She scrawls down something else. “Good. You’re doing really well. You’ve made great progress over the last several months.” She sets down the pen and paper. “I’m proud of you.”

I offer her a small smile. “Thanks.” My attention drifts to the clock on the wall. “Oh shit, I’m going to be late.” I spring from the chair and reach for my bag on the floor.

She pushes back from her desk. “Late for what? I thought you didn’t have class today.”

“I don’t.” I walk backward toward the door. “I’m meeting someone, though.”

She smiles as she walks back to the filing cabinet and puts my folder away. “Have fun with Reece. I’ll see you next Tuesday.”

“How do you know I’m meeting Ryl—Reece?” I ask as I turn the doorknob, cringing when I almost call Ryler by his real name.

Sometimes it happens, and it probably doesn’t help that when we’re behind closed doors, we still call each other Emery and Ryler. He’ll always be Ryler to me, the first guy I ever trusted and felt love for.

“Because you only ever smile like that when you’re meeting him.” She shuts the filing cabinet drawer. “Go have fun, Em. You deserve it.”

Throwing a wave over my shoulder, I hurry down the hallway of the University of Florida where my therapy sessions take place and where I attend school. It’s the end of fall semester, and the hall is buzzing with energy as finals wrap up. Soon, the holidays will be here and everyone will clear out to go home.

Ryler and I have other plans that involve simply cuddling up at home, and I’m okay with that. More than okay, actually. Simple is good. Simple is perfection.

The hot Florida sun glistens down on me as I race across the campus lawn toward the parking lot like a mad woman, ignoring the alarmed stares thrown in my direction. After everything I’ve been through, getting looked at like I’m crazy doesn’t matter as much anymore.

Sure, it gets to me sometimes. It was really hard when my therapist put me on a mood stabilizer, not because I have psychosis, but to help with the trauma I endured.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” I apologize as I approach Ryler’s beat up Dodge Challenger. He had to leave his old one behind, but he managed to save up and buy a junker. “Izzy and I got caught up in our session today.”

Ryler is lying on the hood of his car, writing down something in his journal, looking as sexy as ever, even in faded grey shorts and a black t-shirt. “I love how you call your therapist by her first name.” He closes his journal, sits up, and stretches his arms above his head.