...haunt me forever.

Since it's only a month until publication, I thought it would be fun to share one of my favorite excerpts from The Silent Girl. This particular exchange came to me relatively late in the drafting process. It's always lovely to find, even when you think the story is nearly done, that your characters still have new things to say. Enjoy!

As he speaks, I run my hand through his hair.

“I heard you talking on the phone about trying to hire somebody.”

“That why you came out there?”

“Yes,” I answer. “I didn’t know I meant to at first, but I wandered around a bit and then hitchhiked out that way. I left the hospital alone.”

“Why?” he asks, turning his cheek so that my hair falls over his eyes.

“I was scared.”

“Are you still?”

“Yes.” There’s no point lying about it. Besides, I think he’d know if I were. I let myself fall forward onto his chest, tuck my forehead under his chin. His hands slip down my shoulders, rest on the small of my back.

“Want to know something funny?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“I’ve been at Dovemorn almost three years,” he murmurs, his lips pressed to my forehead.

“I know.”

“But I never gave a second thought to the rumors about it being haunted. Until I walked up to the gate that day, and saw you staring back at me from the other side. Barefoot in the fog.” I melt into laughter, relaxing against his warmth. “It seemed for all the world like you were expecting me. I thought I’d better ask you in, hear you out, or you’d put some kind of curse on me, like in a fairy tale.”

“That’s the only theory anyone’s come up with so far,” I whisper, snuggling close, letting my eyes grow heavy, drawing in for a kiss. “Maybe I’m a ghost.”

“If you’re a ghost, then you never have to leave me,” he says, stroking my hair. “You can haunt me forever.”

out April 9; click here to preorder