Chapter 16: The Navy Wool

Dylan's text reached me before I got to the hospital doors.

Girl in the lobby of our hotel. Braces, big sewing bag, says she's your sister. She's been there since seven. I gave her cocoa.

I stood in the parking lot with the phone in my hand and my mother's voice still in my ear.

Then I called her back and said, "Linnea is at my hotel."

She made a sound that wasn't a word.

"Stay at the hospital with Dad," I said. "I'll bring her to you."

"She's sixteen."

"She's with a paramedic, Mom. She's safer than she was at home."

I hung up on her, which I had never done.

The lobby of the Holiday Inn was empty except for the clerk and a small girl in a puffy white coat on the long couch.

Dylan sat in the chair across from her with his elbows on his knees and a second paper cup in his hands.

Linnea saw me and stood up so fast the sewing bag slid to the floor.

Her braces were the first thing I saw, and then her eyes, red and swollen.

She had taken the first bus from the end of our street to the hotel.

Erik had told her the name of it over the phone the night before.

"I didn't have a plan," she said. "I just didn't want to be there when you got back."

"You didn't know I was here."

"Erik said you'd be at the hotel. He said you were with a man."

"I am."

Dylan lifted one hand an inch off his cup.

"Hi," he said. "I'm the man."

Linnea gave a wet, startled hiccup of a laugh.

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