Saved From Suicide, Sold Into a Lie novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Visiting Hours

Connor's POV

The county jail visiting room had eight stools bolted to the floor and a long pane of scratched glass.

Joanna sat on the other side in an orange jumpsuit.

Her honey hair was pulled back with a rubber band.

Without the camel coat she looked smaller, and older, and exactly like her sister.

I picked up the phone.

She picked up hers.

"You came," she said.

"You said it was about the boy."

"It is." She pressed her lips together. "Is he eating?"

"Hank is feeding him pancakes and teaching him to read a license plate."

She laughed once, wetly, and wiped her face with a sleeve.

"I'm going to plead guilty," she said. "The prosecutor offered three years if I do. Dorian will get ten. I'm not asking you to forgive me. I want you to take him."

"Take him."

"Until I'm out." Her fingers tightened on the receiver. "You and Leanne. Not your mother. I won't let her near him, and I won't let him go to strangers."

I looked at her for a long time.

"You had a rule once," I said. "If he wants to die, that is his choice."

"I know."

"Say why."

Her eyes slid away.

"You won't want to hear it."

"I'm here. Say it."

She took a breath.

"Because I knew that if I turned around, I would never leave again," she said. "I stood at that gate with my hand on the phone and I knew you might die. I knew it. And I wanted to leave more than I wanted you to live."

The pane between us was cold under my other hand.

I had expected a lie, something with a reason in it, something I could argue with.

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