Prince Charming Can Wait (Ever After) by Stephanie Rowe Read Free Book Online Page A

even looking at the woman. "Mattie." The word croaked in her throat when she saw the bony shoulders hunched over, her thin arms hugging her knees. "Mattie, sweetie, it's Emma."
    Mattie's face was buried in her knees, the thick braids of her kinky hair dangling by her ears. She didn't move.
    "Mattie," Emma tried again. "Look at me, sweetie."
    Again, no response.
    "She won't say anything," the woman said. Her brown hair was slightly messy, and the lines on her face spoke of a life of too much struggle, though her eyes were kind. "I'm afraid to go out there and get her. I don't want to startle her into falling."
    Emma glanced down at the ground so far away, and her stomach lurched. "I'll go." Without hesitating, she hoisted herself up on the windowsill and swung her legs over the ledge. "Mattie, hon, I'm going to come out there and sit with you, okay?"
    Mattie didn't move, but she didn't jerk away either.
    Holding her breath, Emma inched along the roof, along the ledge that was barely two feet wide. She reached Mattie and sat next to her. She wanted to grab her, hug her, and pull her to safety, but she didn't dare move, terrified she would spook the little girl.
    For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Emma's heart was thudding painfully in her chest, she was so terrified of saying the wrong thing and spooking Mattie. "I missed you in class today," she said finally. "We did clay butterflies."
    Mattie didn't lift her head.
    "I painted one purple with pink sparkles," Emma added, gesturing at the woman not to come out. "I named it Tom."
    "Tom is a boy's name," Mattie said quietly.
    Relief rushed through Emma when she heard Mattie's voice. "He's a boy who likes pink sparkles."
    "Boys don't like pink."
    "Tom does."
    "Tom must be a girl."
    Emma smiled. "He might be. I didn't actually ask him."
    Mattie finally looked up, and Emma's heart broke at the anguish in the little girl's eyes. Streaks of tears had dried in rivulets on her light brown cheeks. "You should have asked," Mattie said. "Butterflies like to be asked."
    Emma nodded. "You're right. I'll ask him when I go back to the center." She raised her brows. "Unless you want to talk to him?"
    Mattie looked at Emma. "I don't want to go live with Grammy and Pappy," she whispered. "But since Aunt Lucy and Uncle Roger can't keep me, they might make me go."
    Emma's heart tightened. "No one is going to send you to South Carolina—"
    "They will. I heard Chloe talking about it."
    "She was?" Emma had heard enough about the grandparents to know that wasn't a place for a child. Pappy had a temper that terrified Mattie, and Grammy wasn't any better. Emma struggled to keep her voice calm. "Oh, sweetie, it will work out—"
    "How? How will it work out?" Mattie lowered her voice to a whisper. "I hate it there. They ignore me. It's like I'm invisible. Like a ghost they can't see. One day, I sat in the barn for a whole day to see if anyone would look for me, but no one did. I even slept there, and my skin hurt from the hay prickles in the morning. No one came to find me until my mom came back from work in the morning. She cared, but she's dead. No one thinks it matters that I'm like a ghost, or that it's a bad thing. But it is."
    Emma felt like her own heart was going to fragment. "I know it is," she said. "I was ignored when I was a child, too. It makes you feel like your heart is breaking every minute of every day."
    Mattie stared at her. "Yes," she whispered. "Exactly like that. Who ignored you?"
    "My parents." It wasn't simply being ignored. It had been so much more than that, but that was as far as she would take it with Mattie, though she knew that Mattie was dealing with far more than being ignored as well. Mattie was facing longings that Emma's arid childhood had evoked in her, the ones that had led her into a marriage she thought would save her. Instead, the marriage that she'd thought would be her salvation had destroyed her...but at the same time, it had also finally given her the