Lia rushed outside, leaving Chuck and the thick, putrid air of that dirty old building. Her body scratched all over, attacked by a feral boy (yet another sacrifice for Ryan, she thought, to help save her). Oh, how she longed then for a boy like Jody. A boy smart enough to place her at the center of the frame, a longing so deep and acute she had to block the thought of it entirely, for the reminder of what she’d lost, of what Ryan had forced her to give up, nearly brought her undone.
Home. Suddenly after her night alone (no matter who she’d met, all along she’d been terribly alone), the saccharine comfort of her bed seemed like a quaint yet not entirely unpleasant notion. But how to get there? She was so lost, so confused inside her mind, she had no idea how to get home. Chuck had promised
