Nothing to Lose by Alex Flinn Read Free Book Online

happened?”
    “You know what happened. Everyone knows.”
    “They know what the newspapers say, what the lawyers choose to tell the newspapers. I’m a lawyer myself, so I know what we are.”
    “Liars?”
    This time she does smile. “Oh, no. Lawyers—good lawyers—never lie. We tell the truth better than anyone. But whether we choose to tell all the truth—well, that’s a different story. What I know is, you left. What I need to know is, why are you back? And why here, talking to me?”
    Good question. I don’t answer a second, considering the possibility of standing and heading back out the door I came in. Finally I say, “I’m not sure. I thought maybe you could help me.”
    “With what?”
    With deciding what to do. With telling me whether being here will help my mother, or if I should stay a missing person forever.
    I say, “I came back to Miami. I’ve been gone a year, and no one knows where I was.” I wait for her to ask me where I’ve been, but she doesn’t. “So I wanted to know if anyone’s looking for me.”
    “Why would they be?”
    “I don’t know. To give information. To interview me on CNN. Because I ran away, maybe, to put me in a home for messed-up kids.”
    She smiles. “Well, forget that last one. If the police spent their time looking for runaways, they’d never do anything else. I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but I will. As long as you lay low, you can stay gone forever. And I get the impression you’re good at laying low … if laying low is still what you want. Where have you been all this time?”
    “I’d rather not say.”
    “I was just concerned about whether you’re someplace safe.”
    “Safe enough.” She keeps looking at me until I add, “It’s just, why should I trust you? How do I know that what I say won’t end up on Inside Edition or something?”
    “I guess you don’t.”
    “That’s comforting.”
    “How do you ever know you can trust anyone? But everything you say here is protected by attorney-client privilege. You walked in that door, you became my client. You walk out, I can’t tell anyone what you said unless you say it’s okay.”
    I test her. “I’m a client even though I’m not paying you?”
    She nods. “But I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me, Michael.”
    I look down. “Where I am, it’s … complicated.”
    “People say I’m pretty smart.”
    “So smart you represent clients for no money?”
    She doesn’t answer that, and I know she’s waiting.
    “I’ve been traveling with the carnival,” I say. “I started working there about a week before … before Walker died. And now the carnival’s back in Miami, and so am I.” I give her a look, like that’s it.
    “Right. Why did you leave home?”
    “I had to get out of there,” I say. “Every day I thought he was going to kill her, maybe both of us. It was like playing Hot Potato with a hand grenade. You never knew when he might explode. And she wouldn’t leave. I tried to get her to ditch him, but she wouldn’t go. I felt…”
    Weak. The weight of the word is inside me. Like I have to make her, this stranger, understand or I can’t go on. But I don’t want to admit how weak I felt either. I mean, the problem should be that Mom was getting hurt, not how it made me feel, not how much I hated her for how it made me feel.
    I glance at the door again. When I look back, Angela’s looking at it too.
    “Do you want to stay here?” she asks.
    “Yes. No. I don’t know. I guess… I want to know if there’s anything I can do. If not, I should probably leave town before anyone catches me.”
    “And go where? Do you plan to stay with the carnival, just keep running away forever?”
    “I can’t think of a better alternative.”
    “I can think of several, including that group home you’re so afraid of.” She looked me in the eye. “Julian says you were a good student. Don’t you want to finish school?”
    “I wasn’t that good a student. And I don’t