THE STONES STAYED for church service, listening to Charles preach about the end of the world with rapt attention.

“You must CLEANSE yourselves, brothers and sisters! You must be READY!” He slammed his hand against the wooden pulpit. “God is coming. He will offer salvation to those of us who have believed! Who have practiced his principles, abided by their message!”

“Amen,” Mrs. Stone whispered to my right.

Mr. Stone’s eyes were closed as his lips moved in silent prayer. Josiah stared ahead with no expression. Nate was asleep at the other end of the pew, not quite snoring, not quite not.

At the end of the service, the congregants, somber and stunned as usual, filed out of the church. They shielded their eyes against the sunlight even though the sky was blanketed with low-lying clouds, like a million cotton balls had descended from Heaven. But after leaving the darkness of the church, any natural light was painful and abrasive.

I used my hand as shade and searched for my best friend, Polly Lowe. On any given day, I would leave church and find Polly, eager to return to a world free of fire and brimstone. But today was different from any other day. I was now engaged to be married. Talk about a buzz kill. Not that I’d ever had a buzz but I had an idea what it was from the kids at school and this marriage thing? Killed it.

When I saw Polly ahead talking to her older sister, Mary, and their brother, Samuel, I let my hand drop and my feet stayed rooted. The overcast sky didn’t even begin to mimic the blackness in my heart.

Polly would know what it meant to have the Stone family at the service, sitting by my side. She would understand I was now engaged. It might be modern times and no young marriages had taken place in the church since my parents’, but we were still taught the older ways. Was the church changing? Reverting to its puritanical, more diabolical roots?

If so, why? And what had I done to deserve this?

Dear God, if you’re truly there, help me.

“Please come to our home for coffee and cake,” Edna was saying as she exited the church with Mrs. Stone hot on her heels.

“We would be much obliged,” Mrs. Stone answered.

Charles started toward our house, Mr. Stone stepping in behind him. The two women folded in line and then Josiah. Nate lingered in the distance. My own feet felt like they’d been replaced with cement blocks. I was stuck and didn’t know if I’d ever be free to move again.

How could a girl my age be a wife? This wasn’t the Middle Ages. I was sixteen, for goodness’ sake. The girls at school were shopping, going on dates, going to parties. And me? I wanted those things too. I wanted to hang out with friends, go to movies and malls, go on road trips to the beach. I definitely wanted to wear normal clothes teenage girls wore instead of worn-out, frumpy skirts and shirts. I wanted makeup and a proper haircut.

Who was I kidding? I wanted freedom.

I wanted to live.

Only now there was no hope. I would never have a normal life. I would never be free.

As Charles, Edna, and the Stones veered toward our modest home, I took several steps to the left, weaving out wide enough to see the distant cabin at the edge of the forest. My reclusive Uncle Robert lived in this cabin, alone and isolated.

He did not attend church services, did not speak to Charles or Edna that I had ever seen, and had never had a visitor that I knew of. Now he was emerging from the backside of his cabin, stalking close to the outside wall like a bearded bandit who did not want to be seen. A dead snake, long and black, dangled from one hand. The other held a long knife, the tip covered in blood.

Robert looked up as we approached the front porch of the larger house. He didn’t slink away like he often did when anyone was outside. Rather, he stepped away from the house, just a foot or two, and stopped. The distance was too great for me to see his eyes clearly, but the hairs raised on the back of my neck anyway.

“Marlina!” Edna snapped, covering the distance to my side in two long strides. Her fingers wrapped around my shoulder like a clamp and I cringed, waiting for another pinch. Instead, she squeezed. Hard. “Get in the house.”

I hurried forward, but just before I passed through the door, I turned to see Edna hadn’t followed me. Instead, she was focused, eyes as black as an adder’s, on the spot where Robert had been. Her lips were pursed tight, her pasty skin a shade whiter.

“Serve the coffee and cake,” Charles ordered from the doorway.

I shook my head to clear it and darted inside.

The small party settled in our humble living room with its colorless rug and frayed furniture. An antique grandfather clock ticked away the endless minutes from its spot in the corner, the sound blaring in the otherwise heavy silence. On the wall opposite the front door hung a hand-carved wooden cross, three feet in length, three feet in width. Similar to the cross above the church, a snake was carved along the base, flat head peering out at anyone who dared enter our home. Whoever created this piece had taken the time to insert reddish rock in the eye sockets, giving our home a demonic, threatening feel that permeated far beyond the tiny living room.

I didn’t linger and headed straight into the kitchen, the door swinging closed behind me. I relished this small sliver of solitude like it was an unexpected gift. After a deep breath, shakier than I wanted, I crossed the floor and leaned against the sink, my forehead pressing into the overhead cabinet. The cool surface soothed my burning skin.

“You look tense.”

I spun around faster than a ninja ready to do battle—I had never felt the warm solace of relaxation a day in my life—only to find Nate leaning against the counter just inside the door, his arms crossed over his chest.

“You can’t be in here,” I blurted.

“Why not?”

“We can’t be in a room together…unchaperoned. You should know that.”

He chuckled. “That’s ridiculous. Why not?”

Was he from another planet? Mentally deranged?

“Did anyone see you?”

“No. They’re busy with wedding nonsense.” He pushed upright. “I promise not to harm your virtue.”

“It’s not my virtue I’m worried about.”

“Then what is it?”

“My safety.” I clamped my lips shut.

“What did you say?”

“Nothing.”

“So let’s talk about this marriage thing. You’re like, what? Sixteen? Seventeen?”

I glanced at the door. “I’m sixteen.”

“That’s too young.”

“How old are you? I’m sure you’ll be next.” I made a point not to allow the frown to appear on my face even though I didn’t like the idea of him marrying. For some reason.

“Seventeen. But there is no way they’d get me to marry. It’s crazy.”

“How could you not if that’s what they wanted?”

“Who? Them?” He flicked his chin toward the living room. “They aren’t my parents.”

“They’re not?”

He moved forward, stopping closer than propriety would allow. There was the faintest hint of dark stubble on his face. And his cheekbones were sharply cut. And his lips were full. They must be very soft...

“I’m their charity case.”

“Their what?” I laid the back of my hand against my forehead.

“I was pulled out of my home by the authorities.”

“Why?”

He released a careless shrug. “Stole something. At least that’s the way my father saw it. He chose to believe my brother over me.”

“What do they think you stole?” I glanced at the door.

“A truck. But really, I was just borrowing it.”

I couldn’t stop the burst of laughter that shot out of me, but then I slapped a hand over my mouth, halting another sound before it could follow. I dropped my voice to a whisper as I pulled out small plates. “Just borrowing it?”

“Yeah. You know. Just needed it for a quick errand.”

“What was so important?”

“I dunno. I guess when I saw my older brother coming at me with a baseball bat, I thought it better to jump into the first thing I saw with wheels and get the hell out of there.”

“Your brother was going to beat you with a bat? Why?”

“Eh. He thought I stole some money, which I didn’t. It was probably in his back pocket, but he’s too stupid to look for it.” He leaned his hip against the counter. “So I took off in his truck and went to the police station to get a restraining order, and I was put with the Stones while they…” he crooked his fingers, “investigate.”

“Why the Stones? Wasn’t there another family, a more normal family to put you with? Or are you part of their church?”

“Hell no. I wouldn’t join their church if my life depended on it. I go to their services every now and then when I need a nap or entertainment but that’s it.”

“How did you end up with them then?”

I tried to imagine Charles or Edna caring for someone in need out of the sheer goodness of their hearts, and the image just would not materialize.

“I’m not a hundred percent sure, though I did overhear them talking one night about how the church wants to improve public opinion, and taking in a temporary foster kid was how the Stones were helping establish this so-called new image.”

“Interesting.” And it was interesting. I couldn’t imagine the church and its elders cared a hoot about what the so-called heathens thought. “How long have you been with them?”

“A month. And I tell ya, did they put me with a doozy of a family or what?”

I couldn’t help but snicker, imagining what he thought about that family; probably the same he thought about mine…the same he thought about me.

But I was so much more, wanted so much more than this mountain and its domineering church. People never saw that, though. All they saw was a poor mountain girl who was so backwoods she wore handmade clothes and was going to be married off at sixteen.

I bit my lip so hard I tasted copper, but I would not cry. There was no place for tears in this home, in this life.

When Nate sidled up to me, the threat of tears dried in an instant and some other energy charged its way through my body. He was dangerous. I couldn’t get a read on him. If he was like the boys on the mountain, I would know him inside and out, his thoughts and what shaped them. How? It was simple. The church shaped all of our thoughts. There was zero leeway there.

But Nate? He was almost like a foreigner, or an alien…something altogether unfamiliar and evocative. He made me uneasy.

I turned to cut the cake and he leaned over my shoulder to watch, his chin grazing my skin. The knife fell from my hand with a clang.

“You have beautiful eyes.” His breath was warm against my cheek.

I had never been paid a compliment before.

“Are they black?”

After going through all the reasons why I shouldn’t look at him then swiftly ignoring each one, I raised my eyes so he could judge the color for himself.

“Almost, but not quite. Just dark…and beautiful. Did I say that already?” One side of his mouth pulled upward.

Was he teasing me? Surely he knew I had no experience with guys. Yes, I had attended the public school since kindergarten, but that ended all contact with anyone from town. I was allowed to go to the library after school only because no one, and I mean no one, ever haunted those shelves but me, and that was it. The rest of my time was spent on the mountain. No band concerts. No sporting events. Certainly no dances. No way. No how.

Even if he didn’t know these things about me, though, he was likely clued into the fact that I was not a normal high school girl. And something about him oozed experienced. He would be bored with me before he could turn around.

But he didn’t turn around. Instead, he reached toward me. No one had ever touched me before other than a pinch and painful squeeze from Edna. My own father didn’t even touch or hug me, preaching that physical contact between males and females of any or no relation was sinful.

Now, as his hand came closer, I had to grab the counter behind me lest I faint and hit the floor in an unresponsive lump. I couldn’t tell if his hand was headed for my face, my hair—wild now and springing from my braid—my arm…

It landed on a strand of my hair, running a finger along a wisp that had fallen free. “I’ve never seen hair this color.”

I shivered like I’d just been caressed by the hand of a demon—or an angel.

“Marlina?” Edna’s voice shot through the closed door.

I shoved the cake platter and plates at Nate and grabbed the tray with the coffee mugs. On shaky knees I pushed through the door, Nate following close behind. He sauntered into the living room and set down the platter and plates on the coffee table. Then he pulled out his phone and walked out the door without a word to anyone, leaving me stunned and confused and…abandoned.

I really wanted him to stay.

“I’ll get the coffee now,” I said, as my throat closed. Nate was a distraction—a very welcome, and handsome, distraction. Without him here, all that was left was my sad and lonely and depressing future, laid bare like the opened Bible on the side table.

But it was for the better. Edna would not approve of us alone together, and if she didn’t approve of something, her retaliation could be brutal.

Yet, I couldn’t deny the disappointment. I wanted him to touch my hair and call my eyes beautiful again. And again. And again. I allowed a soft smile as my heart beat a strong, rapid rhythm.

You have beautiful eyes.

The sentence replayed over and over in my head, the pleasure it brought coming dangerously close to showing up on my face. I was no fool, though. I knew to keep any thoughts or feelings well hidden. And believe me, I did. All while smiling inside.