Thorns of Decision by Breeana Puttroff

Author:Breeana Puttroff
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3, epub
Publisher: Thirteen Pages Press
Published: 2012-05-22T00:00:00+00:00

14. Secrets

It was several minutes before Quinn could open her eyes on the other side of the gate. The difference in temperature had assaulted her immediately – it was colder here than she had been expecting. Or maybe it just felt that way as she absorbed the difference between being in William’s warm, safe arms on a late-summer evening, and standing here alone and scared on a chilly winter night.

Climbing down from the bridge was disorienting, and she felt out of place. There was no car waiting for her in the pull-off, no keys or cell phone hiding under a rock, nothing to do put pull her hood over her head, yank the zipper the last few inches, and start walking.

As she walked, she rehearsed the same lines in her head that had been playing for two days, ever since that conversation with Alvin on the side of the crumple field. She knew he was right, that she had lied to her mother, too, and was guilty of hiding information. Part of this mess was her own fault.

Alvin had stayed at the castle for another full day, often locked up in meetings with Stephen. He hadn’t said another word about her needing to talk to her mother, though last night at dinner she’d caught him studying her. He had left shortly after that – she’d never told him she was going to take his advice and go home.

She’d thought about it enough, though, to realize that even if she wasn’t completely innocent, she could still be angry. Wrong or right, the secret that she had hidden from her mother was nothing like the secret her mom had kept from her. Samuel had been her father, and she deserved to have known some of these things about him. It was beyond her why everyone would keep this from her, especially after she’d already discovered the gate and traveled to Eirentheos.

The further she walked, the angrier she became; a block before she reached her street, she had to stop herself to make sure that she wasn’t actually yelling out loud. But when she finally turned the corner, and she could see her house, the fear turned to dread. How was she ever going to do this?

She paused for a long moment at the base of the driveway, seriously considering not going in. In the end, it was only the cold that propelled her forward. With the possible exception of Nathaniel’s house, she didn’t have anywhere else to go, and she wasn’t sure if he was working tonight – that would be an awfully long walk in this bitter cold just to be left standing outside an empty house.

Her teeth were chattering by the time she reached the front door, where she stopped again. Should she ring the doorbell? No. It was her house, too. She moved the loose panel under the eave, and took out the key.

As soon as she opened the door and stepped inside, she saw her. Her mother was sitting silently in the oversized chair in the living room, watching the door.

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