Page 3 of Nowhere to Hide
“Sloane.”
“Yeah?”
“I want this year to be special for you.”
“Me too.”
“You have every reason to do well here. You’re smart, you’re charming, you come from a good family, and you’re following in my footsteps.” She waves her own sentimentality off. “Halden rewards a certain kind of young woman, Sloane. Someone with poise and discretion.”
“I know.”
“It has a long memory, this place.”
“Iknow, Mom.” My restraint cracks. “I know, okay?”
“I’m not bringing up last year.”
Oh, she’sdefinitelybringing up last year.
“I only mean — last year taught you something, didn’t it? About how quickly a situation can impact your life.” She saysyourbut meansour. “And I’m not saying it was your fault. I’mnot. I just think we both learned the value of discretion with a boy until you’resure.”
“Iwassure, Mom,” I say, quietly, trying to keep my voice level. “I didn’t ask for Harrison to do any ofthatto me.”
“I know, Sloane.” She touches my cheek. “I know you didn’t, but you need to learn from it. Because you’re too bright to get tangled up in something like that again.”
I smile. It’s a good smile. I’ve practiced this one too.
She takes my silence as agreement, then kisses my head, lecture successfully delivered. “Go now, and I’ll call you next week.”
I nod and step away, and Dad hands me the last box and duffel bag that will carry me to freedom. Then I walk back toward Sterling House, trying not to well up in front of the Whitmores — who go to the same country club as my parents — or anyone else.
I’m halfway across the quad when my duffel bag dies.
Or, more precisely, the strap.
It gives up with one clean pop, and the bag lists sideways off my shoulder and hits the ground. Then, because the universe has a sense of timing, the main zipper decides it’s done too, and I immediately regret overstuffing the bag and forcing it closed.
The bag opens like a clam in the middle of the Sterling House courtyard.
Everything comes out.
Everything.
Because of course my underwear was in the duffel bag.
A pink bralette skids across the bricks. A pair of black lace briefs lands about eighteen inches from a dad in a Haldenquarter-zip. Three more pairs fan out around my feet like I’ve performed a magic trick I did not rehearse.
I start sweating.
Move, I think. Pick it all up. Do not make a sound. Do not make a face.
I crouch and start scooping. Hair falls into my eyes and I shove it back with a wrist, because my fingers are full of lingerie in the middle of a courtyard, while a woman somewhere behind me saysoh, honeywith the specific pity that makes me want to die.
A pair of sneakers stops next to my bag.
“You know,” says a male voice above me, “if you’d used a pair of these to tie the handles together, we wouldn’t be here.”
I look up.
