Chapter 12: The Cellar

I dropped the coffeepot.

It didn't break. It bounced on the rubber mat and rolled under the counter, and coffee went everywhere.

I didn't care.

I came around the counter and got down on my knees and Bodie walked straight into my arms.

He smelled like pine and car exhaust and the inside of a wool blanket.

"You rode a hundred and forty miles under a blanket," I said into his hair.

"It was boring," he said. "I had to pee the whole time."

The owner was standing in the kitchen doorway.

"Bathroom's in the back, kiddo," she said.

He went.

When he came out, I sat him in the last booth by the window with a grilled cheese and a chocolate milk, and I slid in across from him.

He ate half the sandwich before he said anything.

Then he put it down.

"Am I in trouble?"

"No."

"Delaney says if you run away from the pack, you're in trouble forever."

"Delaney isn't your mom."

He looked at his plate.

"She said she was going to be."

"Bodie." I put my hand over his. "Why did you get in the car?"

He pulled his hand back.

Not away from me. He just turned it over and showed me.

There was a blister across the inside of his fingers.

A long, shiny, straight one.

My whole body went cold.

"What is this?"

"From the cellar."

"What cellar?"

"Under the lodge." He picked at the crust of his sandwich. "There's a room with a door with bars on it."

"The bars are silver. Delaney put me in there last night after Dad brought me back. So I wouldn't run again."

"All night?"

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