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waitress heading toward the and one small

As expected, Leviabout playing in the sand again And about cars He wanted a blue one with turbo twin spoilers like the one he’d played with that

“It was really cool, Dad”

Je that on any other day he’d have given Levi some task to complete to earn the toy that he wanted

Levi seemed to have shaken any of the trepidation he’d had after his encounter in Lacey’s playroom

But Jem couldn’t shake his awareness of Lacey Hamilton from his mind quite as easily

And wondered what it had been like for her, growing up with a built-in best friend Wondered if her tas a brother or a sister

Wondered, too, why he gave a damn

CHAPTER SEVEN

LACEY’S LIFE WAS her work She didn’t try to hide the fact or apologize for it She’d made choices and was at peace with them She liked her life

She hadn’t grown up thinking she’d be a career woe more because it was expected of her than because she had career goals to pursue But tis

As she drove through the streets of Santa Raquel on Tuesday,with rush-hour traffic, Lacey followed the instructions from her GPS

She hadn’t known, until the sue, when she’d had to declare ainto social work She’d always had a ith children And her aptitude test had scoredpri, so that had ruled out anything in medicine

“In zero point two ht” The slightly accented feh her sound system

When she’d been little, Lacey had assuht had never really changed It, like so much in her life, had just slowly drifted apart fro that stood out as a conscious realization of what her life would be She’d just become what she was