Read Set Me Free for Free Online Page B

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    Tonight? They definitely knew. It was just as well, I told myself. I needed this. I had nowhere else. It was lucky that I’d decided to come here tonight.
    Lucky.
    Except that whenever I thought back to my first day on Fall Island, I could not remember deciding to drive onto the bridge. I’d passed so many towns, but none had drawn me in like this one. It was like the island had scooped me up, though for what, I could not imagine. Since then, I’d gotten a job, found Suzanna’s statue, and now this—as if the island had moved me wherever it wanted me to go, like a chess piece.
    An eerie tingling crept up the back of my neck—the way you feel when you’re being watched.
    Still, what choice did I have? I took a deep breath.
    “Tonight would be great.”

    * * *
    W e drove over after the bar closed. Kaye showed me around their weather-beaten white Colonial. The house was run-down, but after living out of my car for almost a month, heat and running water felt opulent.
    “Let me show you the second floor. You can tell a bunch of guys live here,” Kaye added, eyeing a tennis shoe sprawled across the bottom step. She turned to me with one of her broad smiles. “I’m really excited to have you here. Have I said that yet? I’m so tired of being the only clean one around the place.”
    At least she thought I was clean. That had to be a good sign.
    We headed upstairs, where she showed me the layout of the bedrooms. Strange to think I’d have my own bedroom again. No car. No Rhys.
    “What’s that?” I asked, noticing the outline of a rectangle in the hallway ceiling.
    “Oh, that’s the attic. I have no idea who finished it, or why, but they did a nice job. Do you want to see it?”
    Attics, like basements, are very mysterious to native Floridians like myself. “Definitely.”
    Kaye was tall enough at nearly six feet that she could reach up and trace the outline of the door just by standing on her tiptoes. She took hold of the handle and carefully lowered the interlocking stairs. We climbed up into a wide-open space with a peaked ceiling that sloped to the floor on either side. A small window in an alcove overlooked the forest behind the house—it was the most perfect painting nook I’d ever seen.
    “We can’t really use it, since the ceilings are so slanted.” Kaye was already stooped over. Since I was at least six inches shorter than Kaye, though, I was fine.
    “I love it.”
    “Really? Do you want it? It’s always bothered me that we can’t use it. It’s not incredibly functional, but it’s a cool space.”
    I ran my fingers along the slanted wall. “You wouldn’t mind if it was my room?”
    “Not at all! I’m so glad you like it.”
    For the second time that night, my eyes stung. This time, I didn’t feel ashamed or trapped, but grateful. “Thank you, Kaye,” I said quietly.
    She waved a hand. “Let’s go see the guys. You can meet Scott and Rusty.”
    We went downstairs into the bitterly cold Maine midnight. Kaye pulled me towards three men sitting around a smoldering bonfire.
    “I found us a new housemate,” she announced. “Your replacement, Rusty, since you’re abandoning us. This is Miranda Lewis. M., this is Scott and Rusty. Rusty is the one with the hats.”
    Rusty was indeed wearing a hat—a dark fedora with a feather stuck in the band.
    “Looks good.” I leaned forwards to shake the hand he had extended. “So, why are you moving out?”
    He shrugged. “Girlfriend.”
    “She wants Rusty to grow up. I tried to tell her not to get her hopes up, but she didn’t listen. I’m Scott, by the way.” Scott’s eyes were glassy, his cheeks flushed, as if he’d been drinking for hours. He had a baby face that made him look younger than the others, though I guessed him to be the same age. I was pretty sure they had all been in high school together.
    “And this is Muscles.” Kaye gestured at the third man, who was poking at the fire pit with a stick. “He doesn’t