“Did your girl know all this before she came the first time?” Danny asked.

“I don’t remember.”

Danny lay back on his bed, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “This is so fucked up. I’ve been waiting for this.” He dropped his hands and looked at Troy. “But this is gonna suck, isn’t it?”

Troy sighed as he lifted his plate. “It is what it is, brother. You get over it.”

And with that, he walked out of the room.

Danny stared after him before turning his gaze to Troy’s side of the cell. There were four pictures taped to the wall above his bed: one of Troy with a woman who appeared to be his mother, and the other three were of him and his girlfriend. In one of the pictures she was sitting on his lap. In another, they were kissing.

Danny stared at the images, desperate to find a flaw in their relationship, needing to discover even an inkling of discontent—anything that would explain Troy’s indifference just now when he talked about his visits with her. But the people in that picture were unmistakably happy, their affection for each other evident in their eyes.

Maybe Troy’s apathy was just a front, just something he used to keep his true feelings at bay.

Or maybe thirteen months of this shit had managed to turn the people in that photograph into fictional characters—individuals who existed on paper but nowhere else.

Is that how he and Leah were destined to end up? Danny refused to believe he’d ever be capable of indifference when it came to her.

But then again, every last one of his expectations had been refuted since he’d come here, so what the hell did he know anymore?

“The following people have been requested at the visitor’s center,” a voice crackled over the loudspeaker. “Charles Velasquez, Darrel Simpson, Daniel DeLuca, Ray Brenner, Benjamin King, and Sean Foley.”

Danny’s heart came alive in his chest as his stomach churned.

Some small, unquenchable piece of his heart desperately needed to see her. He could feel it trying to fight its way to the surface, like someone submerged under water for far too long, striving for a restorative breath. But the more tenable part of him was terrified beyond belief.

He had no idea what he was going to do once they were in the same room together. What he would say. How he would behave. There were rules now. People were watching. Who were they supposed to be under these new circumstances?

As he approached the door leading to the visitor’s center, he tried to convince himself that once he saw her, everything would make sense. He wouldn’t have to think. This was Leah. Everything with her had always been so effortless, even when he was trying to fight it in the beginning.

This day was going to change everything for him. He just needed to have faith and let it happen.

Danny recited that mantra as he approached the inmates’ entrance to the center. The guard at the door was someone he didn’t recognize, but as he got closer, he could read the name Layne on his ID tag.

He gave Danny a quick once over before he opened the door and gestured for him to enter first.

On the other side of the door was a small room with an exit that led into the visiting area, and as Danny stepped in, Layne came in behind him.

“Arms out,” he ordered.

Danny lifted his arms, staring straight ahead as Layne patted him down.

Contraband checks were so commonplace around here that Danny often wondered if there was an inmate black market he hadn’t yet become privy to. But they were always conducted before a visit, and once the visit was over, they would check him again, making sure he hadn’t been passed something from the outside that he could bring back into the facility.

“Shoes off,” Layne said as he came to stand in front of Danny.

He dropped his arms to his sides. “You want my shoes off?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it? Is English your second language?”

Danny felt his jaw flex before he reached down to untie his boots.

He’d never had to remove his shoes during a contraband check before. It would be virtually impossible for him to retrieve something from his shoe during a visit without being caught by the guards, which meant Layne was just trying to make this difficult.

As soon as Danny’s boots were off, Layne grabbed them and turned them upside down, giving them a little shake before he inspected the soles.

And then he tossed them on the floor in front of Danny.

“Pick those up.”

Danny inhaled slowly before he squatted down to grab his discarded boots. He slipped them back on and stood, keeping his eyes on the small window of the door in front of him as he waited for Layne to give him clearance.

And then he saw her.

She was standing near the civilian entrance to the visitor’s center, looking beautiful and pristine and perfect, and all at once some dormant part of him resurfaced, making him want to rip the door off the hinges and run to her.

The sight of her did something strange to his body, like the shot of Demerol he’d gotten as a child just before the surgery on his broken leg. He could sense something warm rush through his veins, making him feel heavy and sedated, but oddly enough, it didn’t do a thing to ease his pain; the hurt was still there—he could feel it—but it had temporarily lost its power over him.

Danny watched as two guards asked her to empty the clear plastic bag she carried in place of her purse, since opaque bags weren’t allowed inside the facility. She did as she was told, taking a step back and spinning her mother’s bracelet between her fingers. It was a nervous habit of hers that Danny had always found endearing, but today it made him feel like his chest was being crushed.

He watched her chew on her lower lip as she glanced back and forth between them. He watched her run her hands down the sides of her jeans as she inhaled a deep breath. He watched her standing in a windowless room full of felons as two strangers searched through her things.

And he knew she didn’t belong there.

“You’re clear,” Layne said, his eyes on his clipboard as he wrote something. “Keep your hands to yourself or your ass will be thrown back through these doors so fast you won’t even get a chance to say, ‘I’m innocent.’ Is that clear?”

Danny swallowed before he nodded.

“I said, is that clear?”

Danny closed his eyes. “Yes.”

Layne dismissed him with a flick of his head.

As Danny reached for the door, he realized his hand was trembling, and he couldn’t be sure if it was nerves or stifled rage that was responsible. With one tiny breath to strengthen his resolve, he pulled the door open.

She was still standing by the entrance with the guards as they placed items back in her bag, and Danny made his way over to one of the smaller tables and sat down. He watched her take her bag back from the guard and nod with a tiny smile before she turned to enter the room.

Her eyes landed on him instantly, and her face broke into a wide grin as she took two quick steps in his direction before she stopped and composed herself. Danny stood, drinking her in as she continued toward him, and when only a few feet of space remained between them, he reached his arms out for her.

She ran the last few steps to him and threw her arms around his neck, and Danny exhaled heavily as he circled his arms around her waist, pulling her against his body.

The smell of her hair enveloped him, making him feel like he was being ripped apart and reconstructed all at once.

She let go of him almost immediately, giving him a quick peck on the mouth before taking two steps backward.

“They told me the rules,” she said, taking another reluctant step away from him, and it felt like his insides were spilling out onto the floor.

He hated every eye in the room that watched them right now. Every guard who sat glued to their interactions like they were watching an episode of reality TV. He hated every motherfucker who refused to let him have this one moment with her.