Cherry Creek - Dani Matthews Page 0,8

Literally everything.

I’ve always had expectations as to what my life would be like. Yeah, life has been difficult in the past, and I knew there’d be times when it wouldn’t be easy. But I just figured I’d live with my mom until I turned eighteen, and then I’d make a new life for myself. Something better than how I grew up. I expected my future to still include my mom, even after I found my place in the world.

Instead, the proverbial rug has been pulled out from beneath me. My future, the one I’d assumed I’d have, has disintegrated. The expectations I’d had, they’re just gone. Now I’m left floundering as I try to get my feet beneath me once again. But in order to steady myself and move on, I need to know what I’m dealing with.

And that’s the problem.

I don’t know where my life will lead.

I’m on a jet flying to some town I've never heard of before. If that’s not bothersome enough, I’m on my way to live with an uncle I never knew I had. They’d told me I’d have a choice in this, but in the end, the decision had been made for me. It hadn’t mattered that I’d fought against it. The fact of it is, I’m a minor until September. If my mom wants to send me to live with a relative, she can legally do so. How could my mom have gone along with it? How could she have just signed over guardianship to Khristos Deveroux? That’s what I don’t get. Actually, he’s not my legal guardian yet, since it’ll take another week or so for the request to become legal. But even so, here I am.

I guess I can understand how my mom would think moving away would help me deal with the aftermath of Brad’s attack. Getting out of Missouri is actually a bit of a relief. But wouldn’t it have made more sense for us to leave town together, to move to some other city or town and start over? I mean, that’s what we’re best at. I think the longest we’ve ever stayed in one place is two years. So why send me off with an uncle I’ve never met until a week ago, when we could leave together?

And speaking of said uncle, where the hell did he come from? I mean figuratively, not literally. I know he came from Cherry Creek, Minnesota, because that’s where I’m heading, but mom has never, ever, said anything about a brother. She’s always insisted she’s an only child. It’s always been mom and me against the world. Her parents had her late in life and had died in a car accident years ago.

As for Khristos Deveroux, she's never mentioned him before, and I don’t understand why she’d kept it from me in the first place. My mom wouldn’t keep a rich relative a secret, because she’s the needy type.

It just doesn’t add up.

Plus, his name doesn’t even sound very American. My mom’s parents were Vauss’s. Mom claims they share the same father, and that’s how he came about to be a Deveroux instead of a Vauss. He took on his own mother’s last name rather than the Vauss name. I suppose that’s possible.

But seriously, the man came out of the blue. Literally. Four days after the attack, he showed up at the apartment. One second we’re dealing with the aftermath of Brad’s attack, and then the next, it’s completely forgotten, and suddenly my mom is practically shooing me out the door. I guess it’s easy for her to brush aside the attack, it didn’t happen to her. For me, it’s all I think about when I’m alone. I put Brad in a coma. There’s a chance he might still wake up, and if he does, they’ll assess his mental state and go from there. I know charges will be brought against him for trying to kill me. It’s an open and shut case. I still have faint bruises on my neck from where he’d choked me, and his hands had been bloody from the self-defense wounds I’d inflicted upon him.

The police wouldn’t be bringing any charges against me, and they were allowing me to leave the state once they’d been given my new contact information. If Brad wakes up, he’ll go to trial, and at that point they might need me to come back for it. Until then, I’m free to move to Minnesota.

The jet trembles with turbulence, and my mind