Taking a deep breath, she returned the hellos, heading over to give a hug here and there, put her hand on a shoulder, greet a female, high-five a young. There were three staff members on duty, and she checked in with them.

“Where’s Rhym?” she asked.

“She’s been upstairs with Bitty,” the curly-haired one said softly.

“I’ll go there now.”

“Is there anything I can help with?”

“I’m sure there will be.” Mary shook her head. “I hate this for her.”

“We all do.”

Going to the front of the house, she rounded the base of the stairs and took the steps two at a time. She didn’t bother stopping to see if Marissa was in. Chances were good, given the scope of the attack, that the head of Safe Place was taking a little time off to be with her hellren.

Being mated to a Brother was not for the faint of heart.

Up on the third floor, she found Rhym asleep in a padded chair that had been pulled over next to Bitty’s door. As the floorboards creaked, the other social worker stirred.

“Oh, hey,” the female said as she sat up and rubbed her eyes. “What time is it?”

Rhym had always reminded Mary of herself to some degree. She was the sort of female who maybe wasn’t the first person you noticed in a room, but never failed to be there when you needed someone. She was on the tall end for height, a little on the thin side. Never wore make-up. Usually pulled her hair back. No male that anyone had ever heard about.

Her life was her work here.

“It’s six-thirty?” Mary stared at the closed door. “How’d we do during the day?”

Rhym just shook her head. “She wouldn’t talk about anything. She just packed her clothes into her suitcase, got her doll and her old toy tiger together, and sat at the end of her bed. Eventually, I came out here because I thought she was probably staying awake because I was in there with her.”

“I think I’ll put my head in and see what’s going on.”

“Please.” Rhym stretched her arms up and cracked her back. “And if it’s okay with you, I’ll head on home for some shut-eye myself?”

“Absolutely. I’ll take over from here. And thanks for looking after her.”

“Is it dark enough out for me to leave now?”

Mary glanced at the shutters that were still down for the day. “I think—” As if on command, the steel panels that protected the interior from sunlight began to go up. “Yup.”

Rhym got to her feet and drew her fingers through her blond-and-brown hair. “If you need anything, if she needs anything, just call and I can come back in. She’s a special little girl, and I just . . . I want to help.”

“I agree. And thanks again.”

As the other female started down the stairs, Mary spoke up. “One question.”

“Yes?”

Mary focused on the oculus window down at the far end of the hall, trying to find the right words. “Did she . . . I mean, she didn’t say anything about her mother? Or what happened at the clinic?”

Like something along the lines of My therapist made me feel as if I killed my mother?

“Nothing. The only thing she mentioned was that she was leaving as soon as she could. I didn’t have the heart to tell her there was nowhere for her to go. It seemed too cruel. Too soon.”

“So she talked about her uncle.”

Rhym frowned. “Uncle? No, she didn’t bring anything like that up. Does she have one?”

Mary looked back at the closed door. “Transference.”

“Ah.” The social worker cursed softly. “These are going to be long nights and days ahead for her. Long weeks and months, too. But we’ll all rally around her. She’ll do well if we can just get her through this part in one piece.”

“Yes. So true.”

With a wave, the female went down the steps, and Mary waited until the sounds of the footfalls disappeared in case Bitty was only lightly asleep.

Leaning into the door, she put her ear to the cool panels. When she heard nothing, she knocked quietly, then pushed things open.

The little pink-and-white lamp on the bureau in the corner was casting a glow in the otherwise dark room, and Bitty’s diminutive form was bathed in the soft illumination. The girl was lying on her side, facing the wall, having obviously fallen asleep hard at some point. She was in the same clothes she had had on, and she had indeed packed her battered suitcase—and her mother’s. The two pieces of luggage, one smaller and the color of a grass stain, the other larger and Cheeto orange, were lined up together at the base of the bed.

Her doll head and brush were on the floor in front of them, along with that stuffed toy tiger of hers.

Putting her hands on her hips, Mary lowered her head. For some reason, the impact of the room’s silence, its modest and slightly threadbare curtains and bedspreads, its thin area rug and mismatched furniture, hit her like body blows.

The barrenness, the impersonality, the absence of . . . family, for lack of a better word, made her want to turn the thermostat up. As if some extra heat from the ducts in the ceiling could transform the place into a proper little girl’s room.

But come on, the problems that were ahead were going to have to be solved by a lot more than just functioning HVAC systems.

Tiptoeing across to the bed Bitty’s mom had slept in, it seemed fitting to take the patchwork quilt off that mattress and carry it over to the little girl. With care, Mary added the layer without disturbing the sleep that was so very needed.

Then she stood over the child.

And thought back to her own past. After her cancer had made itself known, she could remember very clearly thinking that enough was enough. Her mother had died early and horribly, with much suffering. And then she herself had been diagnosed with leukemia and had to go through a very non-fun-filled year trying to beat the disease into remission. The whole lot of it had seemed so very unfair.

As if her mother’s hard time of it should have qualified Mary for a tragedy-exemption card.

Now, as she stared down at the girl, she was downright indignant.

Yes, she frickin’ knew that life was difficult. She’d learned that lesson very well. But at least she had gotten a childhood marked with all the traditionally good things you wanted to be able to look back on when you were old. Yes, her father had died early, too, but she and her mother had had Christmases and birthdays, graduations from kindergarten and elementary school and high school. They’d had turkey on Thanksgiving and new clothes every year and good nights of sleep where the only worry that might have kept someone up was whether a passing grade was going to happen or, in the case of her mom, if there was going to be enough money for two weeks of summer vacation at Lake George or just one.

Bitty had had absolutely none of that.

Neither she nor Annalye had ever spoken in specifics, but it wasn’t hard to extrapolate the kind of violence that they had both been subjected to. For godsake, Bitty had had to get a steel rod implanted in her leg.

And what had it all added up to?

The little girl here alone.

If destiny had had any conscience at all, Annalye wouldn’t have died.

But at least Safe Place had come into being in a nick of time. The idea that the resource wouldn’t have been available to Bitty when it was needed most?

It was enough to make Mary sick to her stomach.

Rhage woke up in a rush, sure as if an alarm had lit off next to his head. Jacking his torso off the hospital bed, he looked around in a panic.

Except then, as quick as the anxiety hit, it disappeared, the knowledge that Mary had gone to Safe Place calming him down sure as if she’d spoken the words in his ear. And he supposed she had. For a while now, they’d been using the beast as a kind of message board if Rhage was out like a light.

It worked—and you didn’t have to worry about having to find a pen.