Hush

Orion stepped forward, put a hand up. “Shelby, don’t.”

Jaclyn glared at her. “Orion, you’re not her mother. Shelby can make her own goddamn decisions. She needs to be able to do that. To know how to make up her own mind. To not be told what to do every waking second of her life.”

Orion lifted her brow, though she didn’t disagree. “Says the woman pushing it on her.”

The two women glared at each other for a beat until Shelby lifted the flask to her lips. As soon as she tried to swallow, her face screwed up, eyes bulging, a spray of whiskey spreading over the cheap comforter. She scrambled up and all but sprinted to the bathroom, the sounds of retching reverberating through the room.

Orion glared daggers at Jaclyn, who was merely grinning wickedly, taking her next drink from the flask, a little smoother than last time.

“Welcome to womanhood, Shelby,” Jaclyn said after she swallowed. She looked at Orion, caught her glare. “What?” she asked. “We’ve been deprived of all traditional coming-of-age type things, of everything, and becoming very well acquainted with the toilet bowl and just how terrible whiskey tastes happens to be one. She’ll have to learn what she likes and what she doesn’t.” Jaclyn took another swig, and then handed it back to April, running her other hand across her lips. “I happen to love that shit! Definitely not like any whiskey I ever tried before.”

April returned the flask to her purse and extended a hand, presenting a joint between Orion and Jaclyn like some kind of olive branch.

Jaclyn zeroed in on the joint with delight, and so did Orion, but for a different reason.

“Just try it, Ri,” Maddox urged, smoke billowing from his mouth.

April was already staring at the television and eating Cheetos by the handful.

Ri bit her lip, staring at the joint, at Maddox’s outstretched hand. She didn’t want to seem like some kind of wuss . . . some kind of child. The last thing she wanted Maddox to see her as was a child. Smoking weed was what the cool girls did. The pretty girls who knew themselves, were comfortable with themselves.

Ri did not know herself beyond the fact she loved horror novels and did not want to live in a trailer park when she was an adult. And she was certainly not comfortable with her gangly limbs, tiny boobs, and the period that was yet to signal her entrance into womanhood.

She also knew she wasn’t sure if she was ready to risk turning into a version of her mother and father if she somehow became addicted to weed.

“Ri,” Maddox urged.

She snapped out of her head and met his eyes. Despite the weed, they were clear. Lucid.

“You’re safe,” he said. “You can trust me.”

Ri blinked a couple of times then took the smoke.

“Jac, no!” Orion snapped, back in the present, where things weren’t safe and no one was to be trusted, especially not some ghost from her past who now worked for the state.

Jaclyn scowled at Orion. “Why the hell not?” she asked. “I thought the whole bloody murder, grand escape thing meant we were free. Free to do as we please.”

Orion ground her teeth.

“It’s legal here now,” April interjected. Her voice was even, warm, a little shy. She was tentative, but she was trying to push a connection. A friendship.

“What do you mean, legal?” Orion asked, voice not at all tentative, shy, or warm.

April blinked vacantly for a beat, then understanding dawned on her face. She didn’t have much of a poker face, realizing that they hadn’t been around to know such things—drugs becoming legal, childhood friends growing up, getting tattoos, guns and badges, the world continuing on without her.

“Um, it’s medically legal . . . in Illinois,” she explained. “But I have a guy who brings it into Missouri for me. In states like Washington and Nevada, it’s fully legal

recreationally.” She shrugged as if she didn’t know what else to say. “It’s only a matter of time before all states legalize it. Plus, everybody smokes these days.”

Orion narrowed her eyes as the smell of skunk filled the room. She didn’t like the scent and the memories it brought her. She didn’t need this. She certainly didn’t need April here with her kind eyes and her need to bond.

“You smoke this for medicine?” she clarified. She may have been gone for a decade, but she remembered the drugs were touted as bad and people were locked up for it. It was crazy that the whole country had changed their tune in a decade.

April smiled nervously. “I mean, I don’t. But a lot of people do. And it’s gonna be on the ballot here in Missouri really soon.” She took it from Jaclyn to extend the joint—or was it an olive branch—to her.

Orion waved it off and pretended she didn’t see the little look of hurt on April’s face. “I’m fine,” she said, and she made her way back to the bed, plopping herself down on it.