The Daughter They Abandoned Twice novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: The Kitchen Door

"We wait for the state investigators," Levi said on Friday night, for the fourth time.

"They said Monday."

"Monday is the earliest they can get a warrant."

"She's pulling her out of school on Saturday," I said. "Which means she's moving her on Saturday."

We were parked a block from the Open Door Fellowship, in a gravel lot behind a hardware store.

The church sat dark and low on its hill, with one yellow bulb burning above a side door.

Levi had his hands on the steering wheel and his eyes on that bulb.

"If you go in there," he said, "and anything goes wrong, I can't protect you."

"You've never protected me."

"That's not fair."

"It's true." I turned to him. "Nobody has. Nobody did when I was six and nobody did in foster care, and I'm not mad about it. I'm only telling you I can do this part."

"Why you?"

"Because I know what a back room looks like," I said. "I've been in one."

He looked at me a long moment.

Then he took a key off his ring and put it in my palm.

"Church kitchen door, the one under the bulb," he said. "The lock is original. I picked it with a hairpin when I was fourteen, in this exact church, at a youth lock-in."

I stared at him.

"Don't tell anyone that," he said.

"You're a deputy."

"I was a very bad fourteen-year-old."

I almost laughed.

It came out as a shaky breath instead.

"Fifteen minutes," he said. "If you're not out, I come in. I don't care what I told you."

"Fifteen."

"Hallie." He caught my hand before I opened the door. "Take her out through the kitchen. Don't stop for anything."

I got out.

I crossed the lot with my hood up, terrified.

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