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"Ellery, what’s wrong? Why do you look like you’re going to cry?" I asked as I wrapped my arms around her

"I’m just so happy, that’s all; you’ve made me so happy," she whispered

"You’ve made me happy too, baby; I can’t even tell you how o I kissed her on head and broke our eoing to rabbed our suitcases, and we headed out of the hotel

We were driving along the interstate, taking turns listening to each other’son the console that sat in between me and Ellery We both looked over at it at the same time as Ashlyn’s name appeared on the screen I took in a sharp breath because I knew Ellery was going to ask about her, and I was in no way ready to discuss nore and bracedto ask

"Who is she, Connor?" She asked as she reached over and turned off the radio

"I knew you were going to ask hed

"Ok, then youtoI took her hand and held it up to ht now, Ellery This isn’t the right ti this trip by talking about Ashlyn I had planned on explaining everything to her e got back to New York

"Fine, I’ll wait, and we’ll discuss her later But whatever you tell s with us are different now, and we’re putting all our baggage in the past, right?"

I looked over at her and smiled, "You bet we are"

"I have a question for you," she said as she took the wrapper off her Twix bar "Denny told me that you’ve been different since you s like that? I’ things like that, but it’s true I was intrigued by you the minute I saw you ina lot of noise, I walked downstairs to yell at whoever it was for being so loud Ier, standing therecoffee"

"Yes, but you yelled at ht that I’d brought you home from the club; I’m sorry about that" She smiled and playfully smacked ave me quite the attitude, it was that moment I knew I couldn’t let you walk out ofabout you without realizing it" She laughed and reached over to kiss my cheek, but instead she shoved the Twix bar in my mouth I san, and I noticed Ellery stiffen when she saw the sign I reached over, grabbed her hand, and gave it a gentle squeeze to let her know that everything was going to be ok I know this place isn’t a very happy memory for her; she’s experienced more pain here than happiness

Ellery reached in her purse to grab her ringing cell phone, and it was Peyton Ellery put her on speaker as Peyton was telling us all about her and Henry’s evening together Ellery wasn’t bothered by how graphic Peyton was being because she was used to it Even though I haven’t known Peyton very long, I liked her She was a firecracker like Ellery, and I could see why the two of them are best friends Peyton told me to live a little and to take Ellery to bed and show her all et back at Ellery for the incident at the seafood restaurant I told Peyton that I already did and that Ellery s to her that even shocked me The look on Ellery’s face was priceless after that, and so was her s lot of the funeral ho to be hard for her, and I could only iot out of the Range Rover, and Ellery took a deep breath

"This is the same funeral home where we held the services for my mother and father," she said as we stood in front of the double doors that led inside

I put my arm around her "You don’t have to do this; you can call your cousin and tell her you got sick or so"

"No, that’s the coward’s way out I can’t escape reality Besides, I have you with reeted by Ellery’s cousin, Debbie It was unfortunate that we had toas well as my condolences She led us to the rooht as alked up to the caskets I had an i in this very room in front of the casket that held herabout it She was only 6 years old at the tih she had nobody to protect her then, I’m here to protect her now and heal her fro forward from this moment

Ellery kneeled down in front of the caskets and prayed I clutched her shoulders withour respects, alked around so Ellery could catch up with soan to hear the whispers of people talking about her and her father Ellery heard someone say that she wouldn’t have attempted suicide if they would have taken her away froed as she stormed up to them, shoved her scarred wrists in their faces, swore at theirl It upsetabout, but Ellery was someone who can take care of herself, and she certainly did Sheher that it wasn’t worth it, and then led her outside to cool off