Although I’d only been gone a few days, the house felt alien to me. Maybe that was just because I hadn’t had a lot of time to get used to it before I was taken to Flagstaff, but somehow I thought it was more than that. Being out of Jerome, living with Connor, had shown me just how circumscribed my life was before this past week.
No one said much of anything as I opened the door and led everyone inside. The dining room, with its large table, seemed the logical place to go. Besides, there I could sit at the head of the table, act like the prima, even though inwardly I could feel myself jittery and nervous, wondering whether they would listen to me, wondering what I would do if they didn’t.
I shot Connor as reassuring a glance as I could and nodded toward the chair to my right as I sat down
