By the end of July 2009, the health­care bill had passed through all rel­e­vant House com­mit­tees, with the Sen­ate Health and Edu­ca­tion Com­mit­tee also com­plet­ing its work. The chal­lenge remained to get the bill through Sen­ate Finance Com­mit­tee chaired by Max Bau­cus. Despite efforts to expe­dite, Bau­cus sought a bipar­ti­san bill, delay­ing progress amid increas­ing Repub­li­can oppo­si­tion and strate­gic nar­ra­tives of a gov­ern­ment health­care takeover. Sig­nif­i­cant con­ser­v­a­tive oppo­si­tion, notably from Sen­a­tor Jim DeMint, spot­light­ed the bil­l’s poten­tial to sig­nif­i­cant­ly impact Oba­ma’s pres­i­den­cy. Efforts to court mod­er­ate Sen­ate Repub­li­cans like Grass­ley and Snowe through com­pro­mis­es met with lim­it­ed suc­cess. Ten­sions over strat­e­gy and delays were pal­pa­ble, lead­ing to a direct con­fronta­tion over the need to expe­dite the bil­l’s pas­sage.

With the Sen­ate and House recess, Oba­ma uti­lized the time for pub­lic engage­ments, blend­ing his health­care advo­ca­cy with fam­i­ly trips. Despite the attempts at pub­lic engage­ment, the health­care ini­tia­tive faced intense scruti­ny and oppo­si­tion, notably dur­ing the “Tea Par­ty sum­mer,” with protests and wide­spread media cov­er­age paint­ing the health­care efforts neg­a­tive­ly.

The pas­sage of health­care leg­is­la­tion through var­i­ous com­mit­tees and intense nego­ti­a­tions under­scored the polit­i­cal and strate­gic com­plex­i­ties of achiev­ing sig­nif­i­cant health­care reform. Oppo­si­tion from Repub­li­cans was staunch, with strate­gic com­mu­ni­ca­tions aim­ing to derail the ini­tia­tive by lever­ag­ing pub­lic fear and skep­ti­cism. Despite these chal­lenges, the com­mit­ment to health­care reforms remained unwa­ver­ing, with strate­gic and per­son­al efforts direct­ed towards nav­i­gat­ing the polit­i­cal land­scape to real­ize health­care reform.

In Chap­ter 17, the pro­tag­o­nist is wok­en by a night­mare, only to be thrust into a real­i­ty far more har­row­ing. Hear­ing screams and shouts, she rush­es to inves­ti­gate, find­ing Tam­lin car­ry­ing a severe­ly injured faerie into their manor. This faerie, dis­tin­guished by his blue skin and gan­g­ly limbs, suf­fers from griev­ous wounds where his wings once were, now bru­tal­ly sev­ered. The dis­cov­ery prompts a des­per­ate attempt to save him, led by Tam­lin, with Lucien assist­ing, amidst the chaos and blood­shed.

The faerie reveals he is from the Sum­mer Court, hint­ing at the actions of a pow­er­ful, malev­o­lent fig­ure who has tak­en his wings—an act sym­bol­iz­ing pro­found loss and cru­el­ty. As Tam­lin tries to tend to the faerie’s wounds with mag­ic that seems insuf­fi­cient for the task, the pro­tag­o­nist steps in to assist, dri­ven by an impulse of mer­cy or per­haps an instinc­tive need to soothe the unimag­in­able pain. Despite their efforts, it becomes trag­i­cal­ly clear that the faerie’s life is slip­ping away; his wounds too severe to over­come.

In his final moments, the pro­tag­o­nist offers com­fort, hold­ing his hand, try­ing to offer assur­ances she knows to be hol­low. She wit­ness­es his last breath, feel­ing the weight of a promise she could­n’t keep. After his pass­ing, the inter­ac­tion shifts towards Tam­lin, who express­es grat­i­tude for her actions, ques­tion­ing why she, who has shown dis­dain towards faeries, would demon­strate such com­pas­sion. She replies, reveal­ing a depth of empa­thy and regret for past actions, empha­siz­ing a uni­ver­sal desire not to face death alone, and acknowl­edg­ing the val­ue of pres­ence and com­fort in the final moments of life. This chap­ter, blend­ing ele­ments of fan­ta­sy with poignant reflec­tions on mor­tal­i­ty and com­pas­sion, delves into the themes of empa­thy, regret, and the com­plex inter­play between ene­mies brought togeth­er by shared human­i­ty in the face of suf­fer­ing and loss.

Chap­ter 17 explores com­plex fam­i­ly dynam­ics and deep-seat­ed emo­tions sur­round­ing aban­don­ment, for­give­ness, and the intri­cate ties that bind fam­i­ly mem­bers. Set in a reflec­tive con­text, the pro­tag­o­nist Dan­ny, along­side his sis­ter Maeve, nav­i­gates the emo­tion­al ter­rain of their moth­er’s return after a lengthy absence. This reunion unfolds beside Maeve’s hos­pi­tal bed, prompt­ing a jour­ney through mem­o­ry, anchored in the tan­gi­ble details of their past lives. The nar­ra­tive beau­ti­ful­ly inter­twines the present hos­pi­tal scene with rem­i­nis­cences of their impov­er­ished yet rich­ly detailed child­hood, focus­ing on the piv­otal role their moth­er played in their ear­ly expe­ri­ences ofjoy and hard­ship.

Through vivid rec­ol­lec­tions, we see glimpses of their ear­li­er life—from their hum­ble home equipped with basic fur­nish­ings to their inven­tive sur­vival strate­gies amid finan­cial scarci­ty. These mem­o­ries, shared between Maeve and their moth­er, stitch a tapes­try of resilience, show­cas­ing how they cher­ished sim­ple joys and weath­ered adver­si­ties togeth­er. As the sto­ry pro­gress­es, Dan­ny wres­tles with his com­plex feel­ings toward his moth­er’s aban­don­ment and return. The exchange between Maeve and Dan­ny reveals a sig­nif­i­cant emo­tion­al rift; Maeve has cho­sen to embrace their moth­er’s return as a cher­ished recon­nec­tion, while Dan­ny remains ensnared in bit­ter­ness and betray­al.

This chap­ter adept­ly cap­tures the essence of human com­plex­i­ty, with char­ac­ters grap­pling with for­give­ness, accep­tance, and the unyield­ing hope for famil­ial rec­on­cil­i­a­tion. The nar­ra­tive oscil­lates between the past and present, cast­ing light on the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of under­stand­ing and love in mend­ing bro­ken bonds. As Maeve and Dan­ny stand at a cross­roads of for­give­ness and resent­ment, the chap­ter poignant­ly ques­tions the nature of fam­i­ly, loy­al­ty, and the ardu­ous path toward emo­tion­al heal­ing.

Beth’s adven­ture begins with a chal­leng­ing creek cross­ing amidst a storm, where she encoun­ters three strand­ed chil­dren at a ram­shackle cab­in. Despite her horse, Scooter’s, refusal to cross the swollen creek, Beth wades through the water to res­cue them. Amidst the chaos, Beth man­ages to call for help from Izzy Brady, who attempts a dar­ing but ulti­mate­ly unsuc­cess­ful res­cue with her car and a rope. Togeth­er, they use a com­bi­na­tion of brav­ery, team­work, and the uplift­ing spir­it of the “Camp­town Races” song to fer­ry the chil­dren to safe­ty, leav­ing Izzy’s car to the mer­cy of the flood. The intense episode clos­es with a heart­felt con­nec­tion between Beth and Izzy, high­light­ing an unfore­seen cama­raderie born out of cri­sis.

Par­al­lel to Beth’s sto­ry, Fred and Alice nav­i­gate their own flood of emo­tions, encap­su­lat­ed in the con­fined space of Fred’s home filled with res­cued books. Their inter­ac­tion evolves from a com­fort­able domes­tic scene into a com­plex emo­tion­al dance where Alice grap­ples with her impul­sive nature, and Fred with his moral con­vic­tions. Embar­rass­ment, rev­e­la­tions of love, and a mutu­al respect for bound­aries weave through their inter­ac­tion, illus­trat­ing the depth of their feel­ings against the back­drop of the flood’s after­math.

In anoth­er thread, Margery, con­va­lesc­ing after exhaus­tive efforts in the flood, con­tem­plates her unex­pect­ed preg­nan­cy. With Sven, they share a moment of pro­found inti­ma­cy and hope, despite the grim back­drop of the flood­’s destruc­tion. Their con­nec­tion deep­ens over the shared antic­i­pa­tion of their child, sym­bol­iz­ing resilience and con­ti­nu­ity amidst adver­si­ty.

The chap­ter con­cludes with the Brady house­hold’s inter­nal storm post-flood, where famil­ial ten­sions cli­max over Izzy’s future. Mrs. Brady’s staunch defense of Izzy’s choic­es against Mr. Brady’s tra­di­tion­al views under­score a piv­otal shift in their rela­tion­ship and fam­i­ly dynam­ics, mir­ror­ing the broad­er upheavals wrought by the flood. Each storyline—Beth and Izzy’s har­row­ing res­cue, Fred and Alice’s emo­tion­al tur­moil, and the Brady fam­i­ly’s confrontation—reflects themes of sur­vival, love, and self-dis­cov­ery set against a back­drop of nat­ur­al dis­as­ter and soci­etal expec­ta­tion.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

SEVENTEEN
Today Andrew and Nina have an appoint­ment with that fer­til­i­ty spe­cial­ist.
They’ve both been ner­vous and excit­ed about the appoint­ment all week.
I heard snatch­es of their con­ver­sa­tion dur­ing din­ner. Appar­ent­ly, Nina got a
bunch of fer­til­i­ty tests and they’re going to be dis­cussing the results today.
Nina thinks they’re going to be doing IVF, which is expen­sive, but they’ve
got mon­ey to burn.
As much as Nina gets on my nerves some­times, it’s sweet how the two
of them are plan­ning for the new baby. Yes­ter­day, they were talk­ing about
how they were going to turn the gue­stroom into a nurs­ery. I’m not sure who
is more excited—Nina or Andrew. For their sakes, I hope they get preg­nant
soon.
While they’re at the appoint­ment, I’m sup­posed to be watch­ing Cecelia.
Watch­ing a nine-year-old girl shouldn’t be dif­fi­cult. But Cecelia seems
deter­mined to make it so. After a friend’s moth­er dropped her off after God
knows what les­son she had today (karate, bal­let, piano, soc­cer, gym­nas­tics
—I’ve com­plete­ly lost track), she kicks one of her shoes off in one
direc­tion, the sec­ond in anoth­er, and then throws her back­pack in yet a third
direc­tion. Luck­i­ly, it’s too warm for a coat, or else she would have to find a
fourth place to aban­don her coat.
“Cecelia,” I say patient­ly. “Can you please put your shoes in the shoe
rack?”
“Lat­er,” she says absent­ly, as she plops down on the sofa, smooth­ing out
the fab­ric of her pale yel­low dress. She grabs the remote and flicks on the
tele­vi­sion to an obnox­ious­ly loud car­toon. An orange and a pear appear to
be argu­ing on the screen. “I’m hun­gry.”
I take a deep, calm­ing breath. “What would you like to eat?”
I assume she’s going to come up with some­thing ridicu­lous that I need
to make her, just to get me to sweat. So I’m sur­prised when she says, “How
about a bologna sand­wich?”
I’m so relieved by the fact that we have all the mak­ings of a bologna
sand­wich in the house that I don’t even insist that she say please. If Nina
wants her daugh­ter to be a brat, that’s her pre­rog­a­tive. It’s not my job to
dis­ci­pline her.
I head to the kitchen and grab some bread and a pack of beef bologna
from the over­flow­ing fridge. I don’t know whether Cecelia likes
may­on­naise on her sand­wich, and fur­ther­more, I’m sure I’ll put too much or
too lit­tle on it. So I decide to just give her the bot­tle of may­on­naise and she
can por­tion it out her­self to the exact per­fect amount. Ha, I’ve out­smart­ed
you, Cecelia!
I return to the liv­ing room and place the sand­wich and may­on­naise on
the cof­fee table for Cecelia. She looks down at the sand­wich, crin­kling her
brow. She picks it up ten­ta­tive­ly and then her face fills with dis­gust.
“Ew!” she cries. “I don’t want that.”
I swear to God, I’m going to stran­gle this girl with my bare hands. “You
said you want­ed a bologna sand­wich. I made you a bologna sand­wich.”
“I didn’t say I want­ed a bologna sand­wich,” she whines. “I said I
want­ed an abalone sand­wich!”
I stare at her, open-mouthed. “An abalone sand­wich? What is that?”
Cecelia grunts in frus­tra­tion and throws the sand­wich on the ground.
The bread and meat sep­a­rate, land­ing in three sep­a­rate piles on the car­pet.
The only pos­i­tive is that I didn’t use any may­on­naise, so at least I don’t
have to clean up may­on­naise.
Okay, I’ve had enough of this girl. Maybe it’s not my place, but she’s
old enough to know not to throw food on the floor. And espe­cial­ly if there’s
going to be a baby in the house some­time soon, she needs to learn to act
like a child her age.
“Cecelia,” I say through my teeth.
She lifts her slight­ly point­ed chin. “What?”
I’m not sure what would’ve hap­pened between me and Cecelia, but our
show­down gets inter­rupt­ed by the front door unlock­ing. That must be
Andrew and Nina, back from their appoint­ment. I turn away from Cecelia
and plas­ter a smile on my face. I’m sure Nina will be burst­ing with
excite­ment over this vis­it.
Except when they come into the liv­ing room, nei­ther of them are
smil­ing.
That’s an under­state­ment. Nina’s blond hair is in dis­ar­ray and her white
blouse is wrin­kled. Her eyes are blood­shot and puffy. Andrew doesn’t look
so great either. His tie is half undone, like he start­ed to pull it off and then
got dis­tract­ed dur­ing the process. And actu­al­ly, his eyes look blood­shot, too.
I squeeze my hands togeth­er. “Every­thing okay?”
I should have just kept my mouth shut. That would have been the smart
thing to do. Because now Nina directs her gaze at me and her pale skin
turns bright red. “For God’s sake, Mil­lie,” she snaps at me. “Why do you
have to be so nosy? This is none of your god­damn busi­ness.”
I swal­low. “I’m so sor­ry, Nina.”
Her eyes drift down to the mess on the floor. Cecelia’s shoes. The bread
and baloney near the cof­fee table. And some­time in the last minute, Cecelia
has scur­ried out of the liv­ing room and is nowhere to be seen. Nina’s face
con­torts. “Is this real­ly what I have to come home to? This mess? What am I
pay­ing you for any­way? Maybe you should start look­ing for anoth­er job.”
My throat con­stricts. “I… I was going to clean that up…”
“Don’t do any work on my account.” She shoots Andrew a with­er­ing
look. “I’m going to go lie down. I have a pound­ing headache.”
Nina stomps up the stair­case, her heels like bul­lets on each step,
punc­tu­at­ed by the door to their bed­room slam­ming shut. Obvi­ous­ly,
some­thing did not go well at that appoint­ment. There’s no point in try­ing to
talk to her right now.
Andrew sinks onto the leather sofa and drops his head back. “Well, that
sucked.”
I bite down on my lip and sit beside him, even though I sense I prob­a­bly
shouldn’t. “Are you okay?”
He rubs his eyes with his fin­ger­tips. “Not real­ly.”
“Do… do you want to talk about it?”
“Not real­ly.” He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment. He lets out a sigh.
“It’s not going to hap­pen for us. Nina is not going to get preg­nant.”
My first reac­tion is sur­prise. Not that I know much about it, but I can’t
quite believe that Nina and Andrew aren’t able to pay their way out of this

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

CHAPTER
17
Juri­an.
The name clanged through me, even after we fin­ished din­ner, even after
Mor and Cass­ian and Azriel and Amren had stopped debat­ing and snarling
about who would do what and be where while Rhys and I went to the Prison
—what­ev­er that was—tomorrow.
Rhys flew me back over the city, plung­ing into the lights and dark­ness. I
quick­ly found I much pre­ferred ascend­ing, and couldn’t bring myself to
watch for too long with­out feel­ing my din­ner rise up. Not fear—just some
reac­tion of my body.
We flew in silence, the whistling win­ter wind the only sound, despite his
cocoon of warmth block­ing it from freez­ing me entire­ly. Only when the
music of the streets wel­comed us did I peer into his face, his fea­tures
unread­able as he focused on fly­ing. “Tonight—I felt you again. Through the
bond. Did I get past your shields?”
“No,” he said, scan­ning the cob­ble­stone streets below. “This bond is … a
liv­ing thing. An open chan­nel between us, shaped by my pow­ers, shaped …
by what you need­ed when we made the bar­gain.”
“I need­ed not to be dead when I agreed.”
“You need­ed not to be alone.”
Our eyes met. It was too dark to read what­ev­er was in his gaze. I was the
one who looked away first.
“I’m still learn­ing how and why we can some­times feel things the oth­er
doesn’t want known,” he admit­ted. “So I don’t have an expla­na­tion for what
you felt tonight.”
You need­ed not to be alone… .
But what about him? Fifty years he’d been sep­a­rat­ed from his friends, his
fam­i­ly …
I said, “You let Ama­ran­tha and the entire world think you rule and
delight in a Court of Night­mares. It’s all a front—to keep what mat­ters most
safe.”
The city lights gild­ed his face. “I love my peo­ple, and my fam­i­ly. Do not
think I wouldn’t become a mon­ster to keep them pro­tect­ed.”
“You already did that Under the Moun­tain.” The words were out before I
could stop them.
The wind rus­tled his hair. “And I sus­pect I’ll have to do it again soon
enough.”
“What was the cost?” I dared ask. “Of keep­ing this place secret and
free?”
He shot straight down, wings beat­ing to keep us smooth as we land­ed on
the roof of the town house. I made to step away, but he gripped my chin.
“You know the cost already.”
Amarantha’s whore.
He nod­ded, and I think I might have said the two vile words aloud.
“When she tricked me out of my pow­ers and left the scraps, it was still
more than the oth­ers. And I decid­ed to use it to tap into the mind of every
Night Court cit­i­zen she cap­tured, and any­one who might know the truth. I
made a web between all of them, active­ly con­trol­ling their minds every
sec­ond of every day, every decade, to for­get about Velaris, to for­get about
Mor, and Amren, and Cass­ian, and Azriel. Ama­ran­tha want­ed to know who
was close to me—who to kill and tor­ture. But my true court was here,
rul­ing this city and the oth­ers. And I used the remain­der of my pow­er to
shield them all from sight and sound. I had only enough for one city—one
place. I chose the one that had been hid­den from his­to­ry already. I chose,
and now must live with the con­se­quences of know­ing there were more left
out­side who suf­fered. But for those here … any­one fly­ing or trav­el­ing near
Velaris would see noth­ing but bar­ren rock, and if they tried to walk through
it, they’d find them­selves sud­den­ly decid­ing oth­er­wise. Sea trav­el and
mer­chant trad­ing were halted—sailors became farm­ers, work­ing the earth
around Velaris instead. And because my pow­ers were focused on shield­ing
them all, Feyre, I had very lit­tle to use against Ama­ran­tha. So I decid­ed that
to keep her from ask­ing ques­tions about the peo­ple who mat­tered, I would
be her whore.”
He’d done all of that, had done such hor­ri­ble things … done every­thing
for his peo­ple, his friends. And the only piece of him­self that he’d hid­den
and man­aged to keep her from taint­ing, destroy­ing, even if it meant fifty
years trapped in a cage of rock …
Those wings now flared wide. How many knew about those wings
out­side of Velaris or the Illyr­i­an war-camps? Or had he wiped all mem­o­ry
of them from Pry­thi­an long before Ama­ran­tha?
Rhys released my chin. But as he low­ered his hand, I gripped his wrist,
feel­ing the sol­id strength. “It’s a shame,” I said, the words near­ly gob­bled
up by the sound of the city music. “That oth­ers in Pry­thi­an don’t know. A
shame that you let them think the worst.”
He took a step back, his wings beat­ing the air like mighty drums. “As
long as the peo­ple who mat­ter most know the truth, I don’t care about the
rest. Get some sleep.”
Then he shot into the sky, and was swal­lowed by the dark­ness between
the stars.
I tum­bled into a sleep so heavy my dreams were an under­tow that dragged
me down, down, down until I couldn’t escape them.
I lay naked and prone on a famil­iar red mar­ble floor while Ama­ran­tha
slid a knife along my bare ribs, the steel scrap­ing soft­ly against my skin.
“Lying, trai­tor­ous human,” she purred, “with your filthy, lying heart.”
The knife scratched, a cool caress. I strug­gled to get up, but my body
wouldn’t work.
She pressed a kiss to the hol­low of my throat. “You’re as much a mon­ster
as me.” She curved the knife over my breast, angling it toward my peaked
nip­ple, as if she could see the heart beat­ing beneath. I start­ed sob­bing.
“Don’t waste your tears.”
Some­one far away was roar­ing my name; beg­ging for me.
“I’m going to make eter­ni­ty a hell for you,” she promised, the tip of the
dag­ger pierc­ing the sen­si­tive flesh beneath my breast, her lips hov­er­ing a
breath above mine as she pushed—
Hands—there were hands on my shoul­ders, shak­ing me, squeez­ing me. I
thrashed against them, scream­ing, scream­ing—
“FEYRE.”
The voice was at once the night and the dawn and the stars and the earth,
and every inch of my body calmed at the pri­mal dom­i­nance in it.
“Open your eyes,” the voice ordered.
I did.
My throat was raw, my mouth full of ash, my face soaked and sticky, and
Rhysand—Rhysand was hov­er­ing above me, his eyes wide.
“It was a dream,” he said, his breath­ing as hard as mine.
The moon­light trick­ling through the win­dows illu­mi­nat­ed the dark lines
of swirling tat­toos down his arm, his shoul­ders, across his sculpt­ed chest.
Like the ones I bore on my arm. He scanned my face. “A dream,” he said
again.
Velaris. I was in Velaris, at his house. And I had—my dream—
The sheets, the blan­kets were ripped. Shred­ded. But not with a knife.
And that ashy, smoky taste coat­ing my mouth …
My hand was unnerv­ing­ly steady as I lift­ed it to find my fin­gers end­ing
in sim­mer­ing embers. Liv­ing claws of flame that had sliced through my bed
linens like they were cau­ter­iz­ing wounds—
I shoved him off with a hard shoul­der, falling out of bed and slam­ming
into a small chest before I hur­tled into the bathing room, fell to my knees
before the toi­let, and was sick to my stom­ach. Again. Again. My fin­ger­tips
hissed against the cool porce­lain.
Large, warm hands pulled my hair back a moment lat­er.
“Breathe,” Rhys said. “Imag­ine them wink­ing out like can­dles, one by
one.”
I heaved into the toi­let again, shud­der­ing as light and heat crest­ed and
rushed out of me, and savored the emp­ty, cool dark that pooled in their
wake.
“Well, that’s one way to do it,” he said.
When I dared to look at my hands, braced on the bowl, the embers had
been extin­guished. Even that pow­er in my veins, along my bones,
slum­bered once more.
“I have this dream,” Rhys said as I retched again, hold­ing my hair.
“Where it’s not me stuck under her, but Cass­ian or Azriel. And she’s pinned
their wings to the bed with spikes, and there’s noth­ing I can do to stop it.
She’s com­mand­ed me to watch, and I have no choice but to see how I failed
them.”
I clung to the toi­let, spit­ting once, and reached up to flush. I watched the
water swirl away entire­ly before I twist­ed my head to look at him.
His fin­gers were gen­tle, but firm where he’d fist­ed them in my hair. “You
nev­er failed them,” I rasped.
“I did … hor­ri­ble things to ensure that.” Those vio­let eyes near-glowed in
the dim light.
“So did I.” My sweat clung like blood—the blood of those two faeries—
I piv­ot­ed, bare­ly turn­ing in time. His oth­er hand stroked long, sooth­ing
lines down the curve of my back, as over and over I yield­ed my din­ner.
When the lat­est wave had ebbed, I breathed, “The flames?”
“Autumn Court.”
I couldn’t muster a response. At some point, I leaned against the cool­ness
of the near­by bath­tub and closed my eyes.
When I awoke, sun streamed through the win­dows, and I was in my bed
—tucked in tight­ly to the fresh, clean sheets.
I stared up at the sharp grassy slope of the small moun­tain, shiv­er­ing at the
veils of mist that waft­ed past. Behind us, the land swept away to bru­tal
cliffs and a vio­lent pewter sea. Ahead, noth­ing but a wide, flat-topped
moun­tain of gray stone and moss.
Rhys stood at my side, a dou­ble-edged sword sheathed down his spine,
knives strapped to his legs, clothed in what I could only assume were
Illyr­i­an fight­ing leathers, based on what Cass­ian and Azriel had worn the
night before. The dark pants were tight, the scale-like plates of leather worn
and scarred, and sculpt­ed to legs I hadn’t noticed were quite that mus­cled.
His close-fit­ting jack­et had been built around the wings that were now ful­ly
out, bits of dark, scratched armor added at the shoul­ders and fore­arms.
If his attire hadn’t told me enough about what we might be fac­ing today
—if my own, sim­i­lar attire hadn’t told me enough—all I need­ed was to take
one look at the rock before us and know it wouldn’t be pleas­ant. I’d been so
dis­tract­ed in the study an hour ago by what Rhys had been writ­ing as he
draft­ed a care­ful request to vis­it the Sum­mer Court that I hadn’t thought to
ask what to expect here. Not that Rhys had real­ly both­ered explain­ing why
he want­ed to vis­it the Sum­mer Court beyond “improv­ing diplo­mat­ic
rela­tions.”
“Where are we?” I said, our first words since win­now­ing in a moment
ago. Velaris had been brisk, sun­ny. This place, wher­ev­er it was, was
freez­ing, desert­ed, bar­ren. Only rock and grass and mist and sea.
“On an island in the heart of the West­ern Isles,” Rhysand said, star­ing up
at the mam­moth moun­tain. “And that,” he said, point­ing to it, “is the
Prison.”
There was nothing—no one around.
“I don’t see any­thing.”
“The rock is the Prison. And inside it are the foulest, most dan­ger­ous
crea­tures and crim­i­nals you can imag­ine.”
Go inside—inside the stone, under anoth­er moun­tain—
“This place,” he said, “was made before High Lords exist­ed. Before
Pry­thi­an was Pry­thi­an. Some of the inmates remem­ber those days.
Remem­ber a time when it was Mor’s fam­i­ly, not mine, that ruled the
North.”
“Why won’t Amren go in here?”
“Because she was once a pris­on­er.”
“Not in that body, I take it.”
A cru­el smile. “No. Not at all.”
I shiv­ered.
“The hike will get your blood warm­ing,” Rhys said. “Since we can’t
win­now inside or fly to the entrance—the wards demand that vis­i­tors walk
in. The long way.”
I didn’t move. “I—” The word lodged in my throat. Go under anoth­er
moun­tain—
“It helps the pan­ic,” he said qui­et­ly, “to remind myself that I got out. That
we all got out.”
“Bare­ly.” I tried to breathe. I couldn’t, I couldn’t—
“We got out. And it might hap­pen again if we don’t go inside.”
The chill mist bit at my face. And I tried—I did—to take a step toward it.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

T HE NIGHT AFTER THE NEW arti­cle came out, Don was not
con­vinced that it had been the right move, and Har­ry was busy but
wouldn’t say with what, which I knew meant he was see­ing some­one.
And I want­ed to cel­e­brate.
So Celia came over to the house, and we split a bot­tle of wine.
“You’ve got no maid,” Celia said as she was search­ing around the
kitchen for a corkscrew.
“No,” I said, sigh­ing. “Not until the stu­dio is done vet­ting all the
appli­cants.”
Celia found the corkscrew, and I hand­ed her a bot­tle of caber­net.
I nev­er spent much time in the kitchen, and it was sort of sur­re­al to
be there with­out some­one look­ing over my shoul­der, offer­ing to make
me a sand­wich or find what­ev­er I was look­ing for. When you are rich,
parts of your house don’t real­ly feel like they are yours. The kitchen
was one of them for me.
I looked through my own cab­i­nets, try­ing to remem­ber where the
wine­glass­es were. “Ah,” I said when I found them. “Here.”
Celia looked at what I was hand­ing her. “Those are cham­pagne
flutes.”
“Oh, right,” I said, putting them back where I’d found them. We had
two oth­er sizes. I showed one of each to Celia. “Which?”
“The rounder. Do you not know glass­ware?”
“Glass­ware, serv­ing ware, I don’t know any of it. Remem­ber, hon­ey,
I’m new mon­ey.”
Celia laughed as she poured our drinks.
“I’ve either not been able to afford it or have been so rich some­one
would do it for me. Nev­er any­where in between.”
“I love that about you,” Celia said as she took a full glass and
hand­ed it to me. She took the oth­er for her­self. “I’ve had mon­ey my
whole life. My par­ents act as if there is a rec­og­nized nobil­i­ty in
Geor­gia. And all of my broth­ers and sis­ters, with the excep­tion of my
old­er broth­er, Robert, are just like my par­ents. My sis­ter Rebec­ca
thinks my being in movies is an embar­rass­ment to the fam­i­ly. Not so
much because of the Hol­ly­wood aspect but because I’m ‘work­ing.’ She
says it’s undig­ni­fied. I love them, and I hate them. But that’s fam­i­ly, I
guess.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I . . . don’t have much fam­i­ly. Any, real­ly.” My
father and the rest of the rel­a­tives I had back in Hell’s Kitchen had not
suc­ceed­ed in con­tact­ing me, if they had even tried at all. And I hadn’t
lost one night of sleep think­ing about them.
Celia looked at me. She appeared to nei­ther pity me nor feel
uncom­fort­able for all that she’d had grow­ing up that I didn’t have. “All
the more rea­son for me to admire you the way I do,” she said.
“Every­thing you have you went out and got for your­self.” Celia leaned
her glass into mine and clinked. “To you,” she said. “For being
absolute­ly unstop­pable.”
I laughed and then drank with her. “Come,” I said, lead­ing her out
of the kitchen and into the liv­ing room. I put my drink down on the
hair­pin-leg cof­fee table and walked over to the record play­er. I pulled
out Bil­lie Holiday’s Lady in Satin from the bot­tom of the stack. Don
hat­ed Bil­lie Hol­i­day. But Don wasn’t there.
“Do you know her real name is Eleano­ra Fagan?” I said to Celia.
“Bil­lie Hol­i­day is just so much pret­ti­er.”
I sat down on one of our blue tuft­ed sofas. Celia sat on the one
oppo­site me. She fold­ed her legs under­neath her, her spare hand on
her feet.
“What’s yours?” she asked. “Is it real­ly Eve­lyn Hugo?”
I grabbed my wine­glass and con­fessed the truth. “Her­rera. Eve­lyn
Her­rera.”
Celia didn’t react real­ly. She didn’t say, “So you are Latin.” Or “I
knew you were fak­ing it,” as I feared she might be think­ing. She didn’t
say that it explained why my skin was dark­er than hers or Don’s. In
fact, she said noth­ing at all until she said, “That’s beau­ti­ful.”
“And yours?” I asked. I stood up and moved over to the couch
where she was sit­ting, to close the gap between us. “Celia St.
James . . .”
“Jami­son.”
“What?”
“Cecelia Jami­son. That’s my real name.”
“That’s a great name. Why did they change it?”
“I changed it.”
“Why?”
“Because it sounds like a girl who might live next door to you. And
I’ve always want­ed to be the kind of girl you feel lucky just to lay your
eyes on.” She tilt­ed her head back and fin­ished her wine. “Like you.”
“Oh, stop.”
“You stop. You know damn well what you are. How you affect the
peo­ple around you. I’d kill for a chest like that and full lips like yours.
You make peo­ple think of undress­ing you just by show­ing up in a room
ful­ly clothed.”
I felt flushed hear­ing her talk about me like that. Hav­ing her talk
about the way men saw me. I’d nev­er heard a woman talk about me
that way before.
Celia took my glass out of my hand. She threw the wine back into
her own throat. “We need more,” she said, wav­ing the glass in the air.
I smiled and took both glass­es into the kitchen. Celia fol­lowed me.
She leaned against my Formi­ca counter as I poured.
“The first time I saw Father and Daugh­ter, do you know what I
thought?” she said. Bil­lie Hol­i­day was now faint­ly play­ing in the
back­ground.
“What?” I said, hand­ing her her glass. She took it and put it down
for a moment, then hopped up onto the counter and picked it up. She
was wear­ing dark blue capri pants and a white sleeve­less turtle­neck.
“I thought you were the most gor­geous woman who had ever been
cre­at­ed and we should all stop try­ing.” She inhaled half the con­tents of
her glass.
“No, you did not,” I said.
“Yes, I did.”
I took a sip of my wine. “It makes no sense,” I told her. “You
admir­ing me like you’re any dif­fer­ent. You’re a knock­out, plain and
sim­ple. With your big blue eyes and your hour­glass fig­ure . . . I think
togeth­er we real­ly give the guys a wild sight.”
Celia smiled. “Thank you.”
I fin­ished my glass and put it down on the counter. Celia took it as a
chal­lenge to do the same with hers. She wiped her mouth with her
fin­ger­tips when she was done. I poured us more.
“How did you learn all the under­hand­ed, sneaky stuff you know?”
Celia asked.
“I have absolute­ly no idea what you’re talk­ing about,” I said coy­ly.
“You’re smarter than you let on to just about any­body.”
“Me?” I said.
Celia was start­ing to get goose bumps, so I sug­gest­ed we go back
into the liv­ing room, where it was warmer. The desert winds had
swooped in and turned this June night into a chilly one. When I start­ed
to get cold, too, I asked her if she knew how to make a fire.
“I’ve seen peo­ple do it,” she said, shrug­ging.
“Me too. I’ve seen Don do it. But I’ve nev­er done it.”
“We can do it,” she said. “We can do any­thing.”
“All right!” I said. “You go open anoth­er bot­tle of wine, and I’ll start
try­ing to guess how to get it start­ed.”
“Great idea!” Celia flung the blan­ket off her shoul­ders and ran into
the kitchen.
I knelt down in front of the fire­place and start­ed pok­ing the ash­es.
And then I took two logs and laid them per­pen­dic­u­lar to each oth­er.
“We need news­pa­per,” she said when she came back. “And I’ve
decid­ed there’s no point in glass­es any­more.”
I looked up to see her swig­ging the wine out of the bot­tle.
I laughed, grabbed the news­pa­per off the table, and threw it in.
“Even bet­ter!” I said, and I ran upstairs and grabbed the copy of Sub
Rosa that had called me a cold bitch. I raced back down to show her.
“We’ll burn this!”
I threw the mag­a­zine into the fire­place and lit a match.
“Do it!” she said. “Burn those jerks.”
The flame curled the pages, held steady for a moment, and then
sput­tered out. I lit anoth­er match and threw it in.
I some­how man­aged a few embers and then a very small flame as
some of the news­pa­per caught.
“All right,” I said. “I feel con­fi­dent that this is slow­ly com­ing along.”
Celia came over and hand­ed me the bot­tle of wine. I took it and
sipped from it. “You have a lit­tle catch­ing up to do,” she said as I tried
to give it back to her.
I laughed and put the bot­tle back up to my lips.
It was expen­sive wine. I liked drink­ing it as if it was water, as if it
meant noth­ing to me. Poor girls from Hell’s Kitchen can’t drink this kind
of wine and treat it like it’s noth­ing.
“All right, all right, give it back,” Celia said.
I teas­ing­ly held on to it, not let­ting it out of my grasp.
Her hand was on mine. She pulled with the same force I did. And
then I said, “OK, it’s all yours.” But I said it too late, and I let go too
soon.
Wine went all over her white shirt.
“Oh, God,” I said. “I’m sor­ry.”
I took the bot­tle, put it down on the table, took her hand, and pulled
her up the stairs. “You can bor­row a shirt. I have just the per­fect one
for you.”
I led her into my bed­room and straight into my clos­et. I watched as
Celia looked around, tak­ing in the sur­round­ings of the bed­room I
shared with Don.
“Can I ask you some­thing?” she said. Her voice had an airi­ness to it,
a wist­ful­ness. I thought she might ask me if I believed in ghosts or love
at first sight.
“Sure,” I said.
“And you’ll promise to tell the truth?” she asked as she took a seat
on the cor­ner of the bed.
“Not par­tic­u­lar­ly,” I said.
Celia laughed.
“But go ahead and ask the ques­tion,” I said. “And we’ll see.”
“Do you love him?” she asked.
“Don?”
“Who else?”
I thought about it. I had loved him once. I’d loved him very much.
But did I love him any­more? “I don’t know,” I said.
“Is it all for pub­lic­i­ty? Are you just in it to be an Adler?”
“No,” I said. “I don’t think so.”
“What, then?”
I walked over and sat down on the bed. “It’s hard to say I do or don’t
love him or to say that I’m with him for one rea­son over anoth­er. I love
him, and a lot of the time I hate him. And I’m with him because of his
name but also because we have fun. We used to have fun a lot, and now
we still do some­times. It’s hard to explain.”
“Does he do it for you?” she said.
“Yes, very much. Some­times I find myself aching to be with him so
much it embar­rass­es me. I don’t know if a woman is sup­posed to want
a man as much as I find myself want­i­ng Don.”
Don may have taught me that I was capa­ble of lov­ing some­one and
desir­ing him. But he also taught me that you could desire some­one
even when you don’t like him, that you can desire some­one espe­cial­ly
when you don’t like him. I believe today they call it hate-fuck­ing. But
it’s a crude name for some­thing that is a very human, sen­su­al
expe­ri­ence.
“For­get I asked,” Celia said, stand­ing up from the bed. I could tell
she was both­ered.
“Let me get the shirt,” I said, walk­ing toward the dress­er.
It was one of my favorite shirts, a lilac but­ton-down blouse with a
sil­very sheen to it. But it didn’t fit me well. I could bare­ly fas­ten it
around my chest.
Celia was small­er than me, more del­i­cate.
“Here,” I said, hand­ing it to her.
She took it from me and looked at it. “The col­or is gor­geous.”
“I know,” I said. “I stole it from the set of Father and Daugh­ter. But
don’t tell any­one.”
“I hope you know by now that all of your secrets are safe with me,”
Celia said as she start­ed unbut­ton­ing it to put it on.
I think for her it was a throw­away line. But it meant a lot to me. Not
because she said it, I sup­pose. But because when she said it, I real­ized

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

17
I was hap­py with my new album, In the Zone. “Me Against the Music,”
fea­tur­ing Madon­na, was the �rst sin­gle o� the album. The next sin­gle was
“Tox­ic,” for which I won a Gram­my Award. “Tox­ic” was inno­v­a­tive as well as a
mas­sive suc­cess, and is still one of my favorites to per­form.
To pro­mote the album, I went out with an MTV cam­era crew in New York
City one night to �lm a spe­cial called In the Zone & Out All Night. We drove all
over the city to appear at three nightclubs—Show, Splash, and Aval­on. It was
elec­tri­fy­ing to see large groups of peo­ple danc­ing to the new songs. As has
hap­pened again and again in my career, my fans remind­ed me why I do what I
do.
But then, one day, there was a knock on my door. When I opened it, four
men just walked in right past me; I didn’t rec­og­nize three of them. I’d nev­er seen
their faces before in my life.
The fourth was my father.
They pro­ceed­ed to sit me down on a sofa (the same one I have to this day in
my bed­room). Imme­di­ate­ly they start­ed pep­per­ing me with ques­tions,
ques­tions, and more ques­tions. I was mute: I wasn’t will­ing to talk with any­one.
I had noth­ing to say.
A day lat­er I got a call from my team that I was going to speak to Diane
Sawyer… and on that same sofa. Because of what had hap­pened with Justin, and
every­thing I’d been through, I felt like I was no longer able to com­mu­ni­cate with
the world. I had a dark cloud over my head; I was trau­ma­tized.
I’d often retreat­ed to my apart­ment to be alone; now I was being forced to
speak to Diane Sawyer there and cry in front of the entire nation.
It was com­plete­ly humil­i­at­ing. I wasn’t told what the ques­tions would be
ahead of time, and it turned out they were 100 per­cent embar­rass­ing. I was too
vul­ner­a­ble then, too sen­si­tive, to do this type of inter­view. She asked things like,
“He’s going on tele­vi­sion and say­ing you broke his heart. You did some­thing
that caused him so much pain. So much su�ering. What did you do?”
I didn’t want to share any­thing pri­vate with the world. I didn’t owe the media
details of my breakup. I shouldn’t have been forced to speak on nation­al TV,
forced to cry in front of this stranger, a woman who was relent­less­ly going after
me with harsh ques­tion after harsh ques­tion. Instead, I felt like I had been
exploit­ed, set up in front of the whole world.
That inter­view was a break­ing point for me internally—a switch had been
�ipped. I felt some­thing dark come over my body. I felt myself turn­ing, almost
like a were­wolf, into a Bad Per­son.
I hon­est­ly feel like that moment in my life should have been a time for
growing—and not shar­ing every­thing with the world. It would have been the
bet­ter way to heal.
But I had no choice. It seemed like nobody real­ly cared how I felt.
Back home in Louisiana again for the hol­i­days, I invit­ed some friends over. We
were try­ing to hang out in the guest­house I’d built behind the main house—and
my moth­er got annoyed with us for being noisy. Sud­den­ly, it hit me that I had
enough mon­ey that we did not have to stay in Louisiana. I booked us a trip to
Las Vegas for New Year’s Eve and some friends from my tour joined us.
We cut loose at the Palms Casi­no Resort and drank—a lot. I’ll admit that we
got phe­nom­e­nal­ly stu­pid. I will also say that this was one time when I almost felt
over­whelmed hav­ing that much free­dom in Sin City. I was this lit­tle girl who had
worked so much, and then all of a sud­den the sched­ule was blank for a few days,
and so: Hel­lo, alco­hol!
Paris Hilton showed up at the casi­no to hang out and have some drinks.
Before I knew it, we got on top of tables, took our shoes o�, and ran through the
whole club like fairy-dust­ed idiots. No one got hurt, and I had the best time
with Paris—we were just play­ing, and we still do every time we get togeth­er.
I wasn’t rude to any­body. It was just inno­cent fun. Most peo­ple will prob­a­bly
judge, and now you can’t do things like that because peo­ple will all whip their
cam­eras out. But back then, that time in Vegas, we just act­ed sil­ly. Hav­ing
already been under so much media scruti­ny, I wasn’t inter­est­ed in caus­ing
trouble—it was about feel­ing free and enjoy­ing what I had been work­ing so hard
to achieve.
As a twen­tysome­thing will do after a few drinks, I wound up in bed with one
of my old friends—a child­hood friend who I’d known for­ev­er. The third night
we were there togeth­er, he and I got shit­faced. I don’t even remem­ber that night
at all, but from what I’ve pieced togeth­er, he and I lounged around the hotel
room and stayed up late watch­ing movies—Mona Lisa Smile and The Texas
Chain­saw Massacre—then had the bril­liant idea of going to A Lit­tle White
Chapel at three thir­ty in the morn­ing. When we got there, anoth­er cou­ple was
get­ting mar­ried, so we had to wait. Yes—we wait­ed in line to get mar­ried.
Peo­ple have asked me if I loved him. To be clear: he and I were not in love. I
was just hon­est­ly very drunk—and prob­a­bly, in a more gen­er­al sense at that time
in my life, very bored.
The next day, my whole fam­i­ly �ew out to Vegas. They showed up and stared
at me with these eyes of such fury. I looked around. “What hap­pened last
night?” I asked. “Did I kill some­one?”
“You got mar­ried!” they said, as if that might be some­how worse.
“We were just hav­ing fun,” I said.
But my mom and dad took it so seri­ous­ly.
“We have to get this annulled,” they said. They made way too big of a deal
out of inno­cent fun. Every­body has a di�erent per­spec­tive on it, but I didn’t
take it that seri­ous­ly. I thought a goof-around Vegas wed­ding was some­thing
peo­ple might do as a joke. Then my fam­i­ly came and act­ed like I’d start­ed World
War III. I cried the whole rest of the time I was in Las Vegas.
“I’m guilty!” I said. “I’m so sor­ry. I shouldn’t have got­ten mar­ried.”
We signed all the doc­u­ments they told us to sign. The mar­riage last­ed �fty-
�ve hours. I thought it was strange they got so involved so quick­ly and so
decisively—without my even hav­ing time to quite regret what I’d done.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

CHAPTER 17
Patri­cia went down the shaky front steps with a sil­ver Boy Scout
flash­light in one hand. Mrs. Greene stood in the door­way.
“I’m just going to look around the back of the trail­er,” Patri­cia said,
but Mrs. Greene had already closed and locked the front door.
Patri­cia heard her slide the chain into place.
All over Six Mile she heard the hum of air con­di­tion­ers. The woods
around her were a tor­na­do of scream­ing insects. Every breath felt
like it came through a tow­el soaked in warm water. She made her
legs move, tak­ing her around the dark cor­ner of the trail­er.
She clicked on the flash­light and played it over the big wood­en
spool, as if she might see an incrim­i­nat­ing foot­print out­lined in black
ink on its top. She shined her light down on the sandy soil and saw
inden­ta­tions and shad­ows and lumps but didn’t know what any of
them meant. She straight­ened and shined her light at the woods.
The pale yel­low beam played over pine trees. They were spaced
pret­ty far apart and she real­ized she could walk along the edge of
them and still keep an eye on the trail­er. Before she could think
bet­ter of it she stepped around the first one, then the sec­ond, the
flash­light beam­ing a lamp­light cir­cle on the ground in front of her,
lead­ing her into the woods step by step, as the scream­ing insects
closed in around her.
Some­thing grabbed her foot and yanked and her heart flood­ed
with cold water before she saw that she’d snagged it on a rusty wire
stretched along the ground. She looked back behind her, feel­ing
con­fi­dent, but the lit win­dows of the hous­es were far­ther away than
she’d expect­ed. She won­dered if the police had arrived but knew
she’d see their blue lights if they had.
The smell of warm sap sur­round­ed her, and pine nee­dles were
thick under­foot. She knew this was the last moment when she could
turn back. If she kept walk­ing for­ward she wouldn’t be able to see the
lit win­dows at all any­more and then she was going to be out here
alone with James Har­ris.
Hang on, Des­tiny, she thought as she start­ed walk­ing deep­er into
the woods. I’m com­ing.
With the flash­light beam bounc­ing before her, she con­cen­trat­ed on
each tree trunk, not the entire dark mass of them crowd­ing around
and behind her. She went care­ful­ly, not want­i­ng to step in a hole,
con­scious of the loud crash­ing sounds her body made as she brushed
through the branch­es, bush­es, and vines.
Some­thing that wasn’t her rus­tled to the right. She froze and
clicked off her flash­light so it wouldn’t give her away. The night
rushed in around her. She strained to lis­ten over the sound of blood
throb­bing in her ears. Her pulse thumped in her wrists. Her breath
rasped in her nose. Then she real­ized: the insects had stopped
scream­ing.
Blobs of dark col­or flashed across her vision. She heard some­thing
scur­ry through the trees, and sud­den­ly the thought of stand­ing still
pan­icked her, and she need­ed to move, but with­out the flash­light she
couldn’t see her way for­ward so she clicked it back on and the trees
and pine nee­dles on the ground mate­ri­al­ized in front of her again.
She moved fast, flash­light point­ed down, look­ing for a lit­tle girl’s
leg clad in den­im stick­ing out from behind a pine tree. Mixed in with
the sound of her breath and her heart­beat and her pulse she heard
things groan­ing in the trees all around her; any minute a big hand
would set­tle on the back of her neck. Her pound­ing heart pulled her
for­ward.
She should turn around and go home. She was noth­ing but a tiny
speck in the for­est. She was a fool to think she’d some­how stum­ble
across Des­tiny Tay­lor this way, and what was she going to say when
she saw James Har­ris? Was she going to knock him over the head
with her lit­tle flash­light? She need­ed to go back.
Then the trees stopped and she stepped onto a dirt road. It wasn’t
very wide but the sandy soil was loose and she real­ized some­one
must be build­ing some­thing near­by because of the big tread marks
pressed into its sur­face. She flashed the light in one direc­tion and
saw the lit­tle road dis­ap­pear­ing into a dark tun­nel of trees. She
flashed the light in the oth­er direc­tion and saw the chrome grille of
James Harris’s white van.
She snapped off her light and stepped back into the pines,
stum­bling over a stump. He could’ve seen her. She’d snapped her
light off in time, but she real­ized that he could’ve seen her beam
bob­bing through the trees as she approached, and then she’d stood
there like a dum­my look­ing the oth­er way before shin­ing her light at
the van. She want­ed to run but made her­self hold still instead. The
van didn’t move.
It wasn’t fifty feet away. She could walk over and touch it. She
need­ed to walk over and touch it. She need­ed to know if he was
inside.
She walked toward it, her shoes sink­ing into the sand, mak­ing no
sound, her stom­ach churn­ing. She wait­ed for the head­lights to
scream on and pin her down, the engine to roar to life and run her
over. The van’s grille and wind­shield swam from side to side in her
vision, bounc­ing up and down, get­ting clos­er, and then she was
there. She real­ized that inside was dark­er than out­side so she ducked
down, knees pop­ping, to make sure he didn’t see her head out­lined
through his wind­shield against the night sky.
She put out one hand to steady her­self. The curve of the hood felt
cool. She won­dered if the police were at Wanda’s trail­er yet. She
want­ed to go back. Didn’t drug deal­ers have guns, and knives, and all
kinds of weapons? She imag­ined Blue in the back of the van and
knew she had to look. Des­tiny Tay­lor wasn’t her child but she was
still a child.
Patri­cia slow­ly rose, knees crack­ing, and leaned for­ward until the
edges of her hands touched the cold wind­shield, and she cupped
them around her eyes and peered inside. Beyond the thin cres­cent
rim of the steer­ing wheel it was pitch-dark. She nar­rowed her eyes
until the mus­cles in them ached, but she couldn’t see a thing.
Then she real­ized he wasn’t in the van. He was still in the woods
with Des­tiny, or he’d fin­ished with her and was on his way back.
Before he got there she could look inside quick­ly and see if there
were any clues, any clothes from that oth­er child, any­thing that
belonged to Francine. She had sec­onds.
She walked to the back of the van, wrapped her hand around the
door han­dle, and pulled. Then she raised her flash­light and turned it
on.
A man’s back bent over some­thing on the floor, his rear end and
the soles of his work boots turned toward her, and then his back
reared up, and he turned into the flashlight’s beam and she saw
James Har­ris. But there was some­thing wrong with the low­er half of
his face. Some­thing black, shiny, and chiti­nous like a cockroach’s leg,
stuck sev­er­al inch­es out of his mouth. His jaws hung open, stu­pe­fied,
as he blinked bleari­ly in the light, but oth­er­wise his body didn’t move
as this long insec­toid appendage slow­ly with­drew into his mouth,
and when it had retreat­ed ful­ly, he closed his lips and she saw that
his chin and cheeks and the tip of his nose were coat­ed in slick, wet
blood.
Beneath him, a young black girl lay sprawled on the floor, long
orange T‑shirt pushed up to her stom­ach, legs akim­bo, an ugly dark
pur­ple mark on the inside of one thigh, oily with flu­ids.
James Har­ris slapped the palm of one hand against the met­al side
of the van and the vehi­cle shook from side to side as he hauled
him­self to his feet. He squint­ed and Patri­cia real­ized her flash­light
had blind­ed him. He took an unsteady, lurch­ing step toward her. She
froze, not know­ing what to do, and then he took anoth­er step,
rock­ing the van more, and she real­ized there was only three feet
between them. The lit­tle girl moaned and squirmed like she was
asleep, whim­per­ing like Rag­tag in his dreams.
The van rocked as James Har­ris took anoth­er step. There were
maybe two feet between them now and she had to do some­thing to
get that lit­tle girl out of there, and he still squint­ed into the flash­light
beam. He reached for it slow­ly, fin­gers out­stretched, inch­es from her
face. Patri­cia ran.
The sec­ond the flash­light beam was off his face she heard his feet
clang once on the van’s floor and then hit the sand behind her. She
ran into the woods, flash­light on, beam danc­ing crazi­ly over stumps
and trunks and leaves and bush­es, and she shoved her way past
branch­es that slapped her face and tree trunks that bruised her
shoul­ders and vines that lashed her ankles. She didn’t hear him
behind her but she ran. She didn’t know for how long, but she knew
it was long enough for her flashlight’s bat­ter­ies to dim. She thought
these woods would nev­er end, and then the woods spat her out
beside a chain-link fence and she knew she was back on one of the
roads lead­ing into Six Mile.
She shined her light around but it only made the shad­ows loom
larg­er and dance crazi­ly. She searched for some­thing famil­iar and
then every­thing explod­ed into bright white light and she saw a car
com­ing her way slow­ly, jounc­ing up and down the bumpy road, and
she cringed against a fence and it stopped, and a police officer’s voice
said, “Ma’am, do you know who called 911?”
She got in the back and had nev­er been so grate­ful to hear
any­thing as she was to hear the door slam shut behind her. The air
con­di­tion­ing instant­ly dried her sweat and left her skin grit­ty. She
saw that the offi­cer had a gun on his hip, and his part­ner in the
pas­sen­ger seat turned around and asked, “Can you show us the
house where the child went miss­ing?” They had a shot­gun in a rack
between them, and all of it made Patri­cia feel safe.
“He’s got her right now,” Patri­cia said. “He’s doing some­thing to
her. I saw them in the woods.”
The part­ner said some­thing into a hand­set and they turned on
their flash­ing lights but not their siren, and the car flew down the
nar­row road. Patri­cia saw the Mt. Zion A.M.E. church ahead of them.
“Where did you see them?” the offi­cer asked.
“There’s a road,” Patri­cia said as the police car bounced into Six
Mile. “A con­struc­tion road back in the woods behind here.”
“Over there,” the offi­cer in the pas­sen­ger seat said, low­er­ing the
radio hand­set, point­ing across the car.
The dri­ver turned hard, and mobile homes reeled to the right in
their head­lights. Then the police car surged for­ward between two
small homes and they left Six Mile behind. Trees sur­round­ed them
and the offi­cer dri­ving turned the wheel to the right and Patri­cia felt
its tires slide on sand, heavy and slow, and then they were on the
road she’d found.
“This is it,” Patri­cia said. “He’s in a white van up ahead.”
They slowed, and the offi­cer in the pas­sen­ger seat used a han­dle to
steer a spot­light mount­ed out­side the car to shine into the woods on
both sides of the road, pan­ning across the trees. It was thou­sands of
times brighter than Patricia’s lit­tle flash­light. They rolled down their
win­dows to lis­ten for a lit­tle girl’s cries.
Before they knew it, they’d reached the end of the road, com­ing to
where it ran into the state road.
“Maybe we missed him?” one of the offi­cers said.
Patri­cia didn’t look at her watch but she felt like they drove up and
down that soft, sandy road for an hour.
“Let’s try the house,” the dri­ver said.
She direct­ed them back to Six Mile and they parked out­side
Wanda’s trail­er. The part­ner let Patri­cia out of the back and she ran
up the rick­ety front porch and banged on the door. Wan­da prac­ti­cal­ly
threw her­self out­side.
“She hasn’t come back,” she said. “She’s still out there.”
“We need to see the child’s room,” one police offi­cer said. “We
have to see the last place you saw her.”
“You don’t need to do that,” Patri­cia said. “His name is James
Har­ris. He lives near me. He might have tak­en her back to his house.
I can show you.”
One offi­cer stayed in the liv­ing room and wrote what she said on a
pad while the oth­er fol­lowed Wan­da down the short hall to Destiny’s
bed­room, then a loud shriek filled the trail­er. The offi­cer low­ered his
pad and ran down the hall. Patri­cia couldn’t squeeze past the offi­cers
so she stayed with Mrs. Greene until Wan­da Tay­lor emerged from
between them with Des­tiny in her arms.
The lit­tle girl looked sleepy and uncon­cerned about all the fuss.
Wan­da sat on the sofa, Des­tiny draped across her lap, limp body
cra­dled in her mother’s arms. The offi­cers didn’t say any­thing and
their faces betrayed no expres­sion.
“I saw him,” Patri­cia told them. “His name is James Har­ris, he
lives on Mid­dle Street, his van is a white van with tint­ed win­dows.
Something’s wrong with his mouth, with his face.”
“This hap­pens some­times, ma’am,” one of the offi­cers said. “A kid
hides under the bed or sleeps in the clos­et and the par­ents call the
police say­ing she’s been abduct­ed. Gets every­one worked up.”
The enor­mi­ty of what he was say­ing was too much. All Patri­cia
could say was, “She doesn’t have a clos­et.”
Then she real­ized what she could do.
“Check her leg,” she said. “Beneath her panties on the inside part
of her thigh, there should be a mark there, like a cut.”
Every­one looked at each oth­er but no one moved.
“I’ll look,” Mrs. Greene said.
“No, ma’am,” the offi­cer said. “If you want us to check the child we
need to call the ambu­lance and take her to the hos­pi­tal so some­one
qual­i­fied can do it. Oth­er­wise we can’t use it as evi­dence.”
“Evi­dence?” Patri­cia asked.
“If you want to bring charges against this man, you have to do it
the right way,” the offi­cer said.
“If you’re alleg­ing that you saw a man molest­ing this child, it is
imper­a­tive that a trained med­ical pro­fes­sion­al exam­ine her,” the
oth­er offi­cer said.
“I’m a nurse,” Patri­cia told him.
“No one’s tak­ing my lit­tle girl any­where,” Wan­da said, hold­ing
Des­tiny, her limp head flop­ping against her mother’s shoul­der, eyes
half closed, arms hang­ing down at her sides. “She’s stay­ing with me.
She’s not going out of my sight again.”
“It’s impor­tant,” Patri­cia said.
“She’s see­ing the doc­tor in the morn­ing,” Wan­da Tay­lor said.
“She’s not going any­where until then.”
Pound­ing came from the front door and they looked at each oth­er,
frozen. The alu­minum door rat­tled in its frame until Mrs. Greene
pushed past every­one. She flung the door open. Carter stood on the
porch.
“Jesus Christ, Pat­ty,” he said. “What the hell is going on?”
—
“If my wife says she saw this man doing this, then that’s what
hap­pened,” Carter told the offi­cers, stand­ing in the mid­dle of the
trail­er. He looked out of place to Patri­cia, and then she remem­bered
he’d grown up poor, and if mobile homes had exist­ed in 1948 he
would almost cer­tain­ly have been born in one.
“We searched every­where she told us, sir,” the offi­cer repeat­ed
with a heavy empha­sis on the sir. “But that doesn’t mean we don’t
believe her. If they find any­thing wrong with this lit­tle girl tomor­row
we’ll have what your wife said tonight in the report.”
“I’m sleepy,” Des­tiny said, dreamy and soft, and Wan­da began the
process of get­ting every­one out of her home.
Out­side, Carter made sure the two offi­cers had his infor­ma­tion,
while Mrs. Greene walked over to Patri­cia.
“No point stand­ing around out­side when it’s this hot,” she said,
and they start­ed back to her house. Then she added, “They’re going
to take that lit­tle girl away.”
“Not if there’s noth­ing wrong with her,” Patri­cia said.
“You saw how they looked at Wan­da,” Mrs. Greene said. “You saw
how they looked at her home. They think she’s trash, and she is, but
not the kind of trash they think she is.”
“She needs to get to the doc­tor,” Patri­cia said. “No mat­ter what.”
“What’d you real­ly see that man doing to her?” Mrs. Greene asked.
They stepped over the low rail­ing around Mt. Zion A.M.E. and got
all the way to its steps before Patri­cia said any­thing.
“It wasn’t nat­ur­al,” she said.
It took Patri­cia two steps to real­ize Mrs. Greene had stopped
walk­ing. She turned around. In the church’s porch light, Mrs. Greene
looked very small.
“Everyone’s hun­gry for our chil­dren,” she said, and her voice
cracked. “The whole world wants to gob­ble up col­ored chil­dren, and
no mat­ter how many it takes it just licks its lips and wants more.
Help me, Mrs. Camp­bell. Help me keep that lit­tle girl with her
moth­er. Help me stop that man.”
“Of course,” Patri­cia said. “I’ll—”
“I don’t want to hear of course,” Mrs. Greene said. “When I tell
some­one what’s hap­pen­ing out here they see an old woman liv­ing in
the coun­try who’s nev­er been to school. When you tell them, they see
a doctor’s wife from the Old Vil­lage and they pay atten­tion. I don’t
like to ask for favors but I need you to make them pay atten­tion to
this. You know I did every­thing I could to save Miss Mary. I gave my
blood for her. When you called me on the tele­phone tonight you said
we’re all moth­ers. Yes, ma’am, we are. Give me your blood. Help
me.”
Reflex­ive­ly, Patri­cia almost said of course again, then wiped it
from her mind. She didn’t say a thing. She stood across from Mrs.
Greene and spoke, soft and firm.
“We’ll save them,” she said. “We won’t let them take Des­tiny, and
we won’t let that man take any more chil­dren. I will do every­thing in
my pow­er to stop him. I promise you.”
Mrs. Greene didn’t reply, and the two of them stood like that for a
moment.
“Well, that’s that,” Carter said, com­ing up behind her. “They’ll
have her to the doc­tor tomor­row and if anything’s wrong they have
my infor­ma­tion in the report.”
The mood broke and the three of them walked toward Mrs.
Greene’s house.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

17
Lat­er, we sit out­side in the big wood­en Adiron­dack chairs in the yard, a fire crack­ling away in the big
stone ring in front of us. Near­by, the grill smokes, and the scent of cook­ing meat reminds me of those
sum­mer nights in Phoenix, when the air was so still and so dry it felt like a loose spark could send
every­thing up in flames.
The grill turned over, the burn­ing coals spread over the grav­el yard, Jane, the real Jane,
cry­ing, Mr. Brock’s red face, a sweat­ing beer can in one hand, a pair of tongs in the oth­er.
His KISS THE COOK apron with a giant frog on it, its lips red and obscene in a puck­er, me
sprawled in the rocks, my hand burn­ing, my face sting­ing, think­ing how stu­pid that apron was,
how stu­pid it was that a man like him had this much pow­er over all of us.
I haven’t thought about that for such a long time. I’ve pushed it all away, but now here it is, this
ugly mem­o­ry, in this per­fect place.
Look­ing down, I study my engage­ment ring again, turn­ing my hand this way and that, catch­ing the
light of the flames.
That’s over. That can’t touch you. No mat­ter what John says.
Next to me, Eddie sighs, his long legs stretched out in front of him.
He real­ly does look good tonight. I think of how slight­ly ragged he was when I first met him, how
those edges have smoothed a lit­tle in the past few months, and I feel a lit­tle surge of sat­is­fac­tion. I did
that, I think. I’ve made him hap­py. He’s like this because of me.
And soon, I’m going to be his wife.
I think about the wed­ding dress­es I saw today, the veil there in the win­dow I’d itched to put on my
head.
“I think we should elope.”
I don’t know I’m going to say the words until they’re out, but then they are, and I real­ize I don’t
want to take them back.
Eddie paus­es, his beer lift­ed to his mouth. Then he takes a sip, swal­lows, and low­ers his arm
before look­ing over at me and say­ing, “We don’t have to do any­thing you don’t want to do.”
“It’s just … I don’t have a big fam­i­ly,” I say. “And I hard­ly know any­one in Birm­ing­ham, or at
least no one I’d want at my wed­ding.”
Eddie smirks slight­ly at that, rais­ing his eye­brows.
“I don’t want that John ass­hole at my wed­ding, either.”
Reach­ing over, he takes my hand, his thumb mak­ing cir­cles on the heel of my hand.
“Janie, say the word, and we’ll get mar­ried at the cour­t­house tomor­row. Or we’ll go to the lake.
Hell, we can go up to Ten­nessee if you want, rent one of those cheesy moun­tain chalets. I think they
even have dri­ve-through wed­ding chapels in Gatlin­burg.”
I smile, but don’t say any­thing, ignor­ing the weird sink­ing in my stom­ach at the idea of mar­ry­ing a
man like Eddie, but still hav­ing the kind of wed­ding girls like me always get. Cheap, fast, tacky. When
I sug­gest­ed elop­ing, I was imag­in­ing say­ing our vows on a white-sand beach, an inti­mate wed­ding
night in a big bed with gauzy mos­qui­to net­ting. I wasn’t imag­in­ing pulling up to a win­dow like we
were grab­bing french fries and head­ing to a motel adver­tis­ing free park­ing on a neon sign.
Still, what I know for cer­tain is that I can’t get mar­ried here. I can’t walk down an aisle at a big
church in a big dress and see the Camp­bells and the Car­o­lines, Bea’s friends, com­par­ing me to her.
I head inside, pick­ing up our emp­ty beers as I go. When I slide the patio door open, there’s a
sound from some­where above me.
I freeze there in the door­way, one ear cocked toward the ceil­ing, wait­ing.
There’s anoth­er thump, fol­lowed by a sec­ond, a third.
Slid­ing the patio door closed behind me, I glance back out at Eddie.
He’s still sit­ting in his Adiron­dack chair, hands behind his head now, his chin lift­ed to the evening
sky, and I creep a lit­tle deep­er into the house.
The sounds are rhyth­mic now, a steady thump thump thump like a heart­beat.
I think about that sto­ry they made us read in mid­dle school, the one with the man buried under the
floor­boards, his mur­der­er think­ing he could still hear the old man’s heart, and for a hor­ri­fied moment,
my brain con­jures up Bea.
Then the sounds stop.
I stand there, prac­ti­cal­ly hold­ing my breath, the emp­ty beer bot­tle dan­gling from my fin­gers as I
wait.
Three sharp raps at the front door make me near­ly jolt out of my skin, one of the bot­tles crash­ing
to the floor as I make a sound some­where between a shriek and a gasp.
It’s com­ing from the front of the house, though, not upstairs. Some­one knock­ing at the door.
“Jane?”
I see Eddie through the glass door, still sit­ting out­side, the words tossed casu­al­ly over his
shoul­der, his head bare­ly turned toward me.
I scowl at the back of that head, that per­fect­ly tou­sled hair. “I’m fine,” I call back. “Just some­one
at the door.”
There’s anoth­er knock just as I reach the foy­er, and when I open the door, a woman is stand­ing
there.
She’s wear­ing khakis and a blue but­ton-down, and there’s a badge snapped to her waist.
She’s a cop.
My heart is beat­ing so fast in my chest that I feel like she must be able to see it, and I lay a hand
there against my col­lar­bone, sud­den­ly grate­ful I have the dia­monds and emer­ald on my fin­ger, to let
her know I am some­body.
I have no rea­son to be afraid any­more, I remind myself. The woman stand­ing on the porch doesn’t
see the girl I used to be, doesn’t know the things I’ve done. There’s no sus­pi­cion in her gaze, no
nar­rowed eyes and thinned lips. She sees a woman who belongs in this house, a woman wear­ing Ann
Tay­lor and real jew­els, a woman whose dish­wa­ter-blond hair isn’t pulled back into a scrag­gly

Upon redis­cov­er­ing the “Kin­caid”, Mugam­bi, along with a native woman he unex­pect­ed­ly encoun­tered, and a horde of fierce beasts, ven­tured down­riv­er in a com­man­deered dugout. Their jour­ney was has­tened under the cloak of dark­ness, aim­ing to reunite the fero­cious pack with Tarzan by reach­ing the ves­sel where the dra­ma between human and beast would unfurl. How­ev­er, ten­sions spiked when Mugambi’s par­ty unex­pect­ed­ly col­lid­ed with anoth­er canoe, occu­pied by Rokof­f’s men, insti­gat­ing chaos. Shots were fired, pan­ick­ing both par­ties and attract­ing Tarzan’s atten­tion, who was else­where in the water, igno­rant of the “Kincaid”’s prox­im­i­ty.

Mean­while, the “Kin­caid” had sub­tly maneu­vered down­stream, ensnared by an eddy’s whims, bring­ing Jane Clay­ton inad­ver­tent­ly back into per­il’s embrace. Tarzan, dri­ven by the gun­fire din, nav­i­gat­ed the dark waters towards the unfold­ing con­flict. His arrival was time­ly but wrought with the real­iza­tion of Jane being in dis­tress, ensnared in anoth­er of Rokof­f’s traps. Tarzan’s inter­ven­tion was swift and bru­tal, redi­rect­ing his wrath from Rokoff to address the imme­di­ate dan­ger Jane faced. The deck became a bat­tle­ground, with Mugambi’s and Tarzan’s com­bined forces over­whelm­ing Rokof­f’s men, despite the lat­ter’s des­per­ate attempt to retal­i­ate.

In the com­mo­tion, Rokof­f’s cow­ardice was laid bare before his crew, lead­ing them to cast him out, deliv­er­ing him into the jaws of his doom—Sheeta, the pan­ther, whose pres­ence spelled a cru­el but fit­ting end for Rokoff. Tarzan, pre­vi­ous­ly con­sumed by a thirst for vengeance, found him­self swayed by Jane’s pres­ence, restrain­ing him­self to pro­tect her amidst the chaos.

The chap­ter reach­es its cli­max with Rokoff’s demise by Shee­ta, mark­ing an end that seemed to bring a sin­is­ter sat­is­fac­tion to Tarzan, one that delin­eat­ed jus­tice in its most pri­mal form. Yet, when the dust set­tled, the grim real­i­ty of their sit­u­a­tion resumed focus, with Tarzan and Jane sur­viv­ing yet anoth­er ordeal, stand­ing amidst friends and foes, bond­ed by their per­se­ver­ance and the relent­less tri­als that seem to pur­sue them across the dark, treach­er­ous waters of the Ugam­bi.