This might be a huge mistake.
But I’m not a complete i***t. I know I’ll need clothes and food if I’m going to survive in the outside world—which is how I ended up standing in Oliver’s kitchen, barefoot and wary, ready to bolt at the first sign of trouble.
“Are you hungry?” Oliver asks, his voice tentative, as if he’s only just realized he’s lured a wild animal into his cabin and doesn’t know what to do now.
“No,” I lie, my arms crossed tight over my stomach. Hunger claws at me, but I can’t forget what happened the last time they fed me—when that meal led straight to a lifeless cell and a door that wouldn’t open no matter how hard I screamed.
Oliver sighs, dragging a slender hand down his face. His shoulders drop like something heavy’s been unhooked from his spine, and for the briefest
