“Where did you go?” Amelia asked, sitting on the carpet in front of the couch. She had her legs spread far apart, where MJ sat with his nose buried in some phone game. He lay back against her, completely unaware of the conversation between them.
Evie slurped her coffee from the armchair, letting the hot mug warm her hands. She had always run a little cold, but Diane’s disappearance wasn’t helping her discomfort. “It’s a long story involving a trip to New York on a desperate mission to find myself.”
“Sounds a little optimistic.”
“Just naïve, really. Let me put it this way: if it were a book, nobody would read it.”
Amelia giggled. “You weren’t worried that Uncle Mason would lose control?”
“Sure. What he did with you-know-who made me worry about the person he was becoming. But the thing to admire about him is that he’s always questioning himself. Even when he’s the best man in the room, he’s always looking within to see how he can become better. It’s a part of why I left in the first place.”
“To try doing the same?”
“Kind of. And also because I couldn’t stand to look at him.”
“But you forgave him eventually?”
Evie raised her lip, nodding. “Yeah, I guess. We all screw up sometimes. But for Mason… I don’t know. Until you stumbled back into my life, he was the only family I had. There wasn’t much of a choice other than to come back to him eventually.”
There was more truth to this than she had initially realized. It wasn’t that she couldn’t live without Mason and all the drama he came with, but she needed someone in her life. Evie had always been more of a lone wolf, but not because she wanted to be. Becoming orphaned so young forced a solitary feeling into her from the early days of her life, and now she was coming to realize that she didn’t need Mason—she just needed someone, and that someone could be sitting right in front of her.
“So what’s next for you?” Amelia asked.
“I actually have no idea. First, I want my business to reach a stable point. Then maybe I’ll sell it on and use that money for a fresh start. I don’t mind flipping businesses for a time, keeping things fresh.”
“And where would you go? I think Paris.”
“Why Paris?”
“Because it looks beautiful in the movies,” Amelia said, smiling as she checked down on MJ over his shoulder. “Doesn’t everyone want to travel the world, seeing all the things the world left behind for us to view?”
Evie crooked an eyebrow. “I thought you wanted to be a journalist.”
“Not necessarily a journalist. Just a writer. Maybe a travel writer.”
“Okay,” Evie said with a slight sigh, setting down her mug. “I get it. Every part of you says you need to write, but you just haven’t figured out what to put on paper. I’ve been there. Always will be there, I guess, but first you need to learn to do it.”
“And how do I do that?”
“By… well, by doing it.”
“Practice makes perfect, then?”
“Practice makes practice. It’ll never be perfect.”
Evie checked her phone, flipping it over on the table. There was still no word from Mason about Diane. Each passing hour made her worry more and more about whether she was still alive. Having met the Lullaby Killer himself, she was becoming less confident that her sister-in-law was still in one piece. Given that this family had already lost so much, she couldn’t bear the idea that Mason could soon be without a wife.
“What’s wrong?” Amelia asked.
“It’s nothing,” Evie told her, trying to keep the news from reaching MJ. “Let’s just focus on the future, shall we? Tell me where you would go after Paris.”