AT THE GATHERING AT Aunt Lynore’s, Jace shut himself away from everyone—going upstairs to Matt’s room and refusing to come out. He let Jarrett in with him but no one else was welcome—not even Lannette or me. Which hurt almost as much as Irvy’s walking away from me. But in his grief, I don’t think Jace even knew about that or wondered at it if he had paid attention to it.
Lannette and I sat on the carpeted stairs where we could be out of the way of the press of people that’d squeezed into the house, but yet, where we could hear the various conversations taking place.
We should’ve done what Jace had—just shut ourselves away in Lannette’s room, but we didn’t. Her room was directly across from Matt’s, and she hadn’t spent any more time in it than it took to grab some clothes. Hadn’t slept in
