Mated to My Step-brother and His Best Friend novel · Chapter 18 of 32
Chapter 18: The Company Store
My mother set the suitcase down on the cattle grate.
"Mama," I said. "What are you doing?"
"He woke up," she said. "Abner. For about a minute, after the vote."
"Is he..."
"He's alive. He knew me." Her chin wobbled and she made it stop. "He said, Go with the girl, Sherry. He'll put it on you next."
"And he gave me this," my mother said.
She held out her hand.
In her palm lay the jagged flattened fragment from Abner's shoulder.
LO, worn into the base.
"It was in his trouser pocket," she said. "Where he kept it all week. He said, Give it to the girl."
Then she reached back into the truck bed and lifted out a canning jar wrapped in a dish towel.
"The Elder caught me at the back door," she said. "He said, Keep this out of this house."
I took the jar.
I took the fragment.
I stood on the cattle grate with every piece of proof I had in my two hands, and I started to cry.
My mother put her arms around me.
"I'm sorry," she said into my hair. "I should have come home five years ago."
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–16 of Mated to My Step-brother and His Best Friend are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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