Chapter 5: The Ladder

At two o'clock Kat sent me to the barn with a box of string lights and a message that made me want to scream.

"Sam's already there," she'd texted. "I'm still inside a horse. Be good."

He was standing under the main rafters with a stepladder and a roll of electrical tape.

He saw me in the doorway and went back to the ladder.

"Stay on the ground," he said. "I'll climb."

"I'm lighter, and I'm already holding the lights."

"Annie."

"We've never met," I said. "Strangers don't give each other orders."

He let out a short breath that was almost a laugh, and he set both hands on the ladder.

I climbed.

The barn smelled like sawdust and old hay, and a band of afternoon sun lay across the rafters.

I looped the cord over the first beam and called down, "Hand me the tape."

He did, and our fingers brushed, and neither of us looked at that.

"You're still counting," he said from below.

"What?"

"The rungs. Your lips move."

"Eleven," I said. "There are eleven."

"Twelve. The one at the top is bent."

I looked down at him.

He was smiling a little, a real smile, the first one since the airport, and for half a second I forgot how angry I was supposed to be.

That was when a swallow burst out of the rafters beside my face.

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