BOOKS

When twenty-one-year-old Emily Miller flees from her abusive ex-husband, Lee, with a man she just met, an exterminator who got rid of the hornet’s nest in her backyard, she thinks she’s finally found safety. Jake Clayton gives Emily and her three-year-old daughter, Jenna, a beautiful place to live, one where neither Lee nor Emily’s mother, who has threatened to try to take custody of Jenna, can find her. Unlike Lee, Jake has a steady job, doesn’t drink (she’s never met a man who doesn’t), and doesn’t hit Emily. Isolated in Jake’s boss’s mountain cabin with only her young child and a liquor cabinet she knows she should stay away from (but doesn’t) for company, Emily starts looking into Jake’s past, trying to surprise him by finding the sisters he hasn’t seen since he was put into foster care as a teenager. But the more she learns about his past, the less honest Jake seems to be. And when she discovers that Lee hasn’t been seen since the night Emily escaped him, she begins to suspect that Jake is capable of terrifying things. But maybe she’s just being dramatic, inventing ideas because she got so used to Lee being scary? Jake is nothing like him. Sure, Jake is bossy about what he thinks Emily should do and how she should act. And he has a temper. But he doesn’t hit. And, anyway, how can she leave when there’s no safe place to go?

Richard and Michael are celebrating their three years of sobriety by moving in to Michael’s bungalow in Manhattan Beach, California. While Michael is at work, Richard impulsively makes a phone call to his ten year old daughter who is in the custody of her mom’s parents in Oregon. Richard knows he should have discussed this with Michael but they did talk about connecting with Brady when the time was right. They just hadn’t identified when that time would be. Richard, on this day, at this hour, with boxes of his belongings in chaos around him, decided now was the right time.