“Oh, honey, I told you, I believed you. I just think you overreacted. You know, I was at a Christmas party once with the president of AMC Radio, and you wouldn’t believe where he put his—”

“Mom, I’m sorry, but I don’t want to talk about any of that right now. I actually do need your help. Just not the kind of help you’re offering.”

“Well, what kind of help do you need, then?”

“I need you to go online—since I can’t, because we don’t have the Internet—and post a message to every social media outlet that you can think of that anyone who’s evacuated from Little Bridge Island and left a pet behind needs to contact your office. Tell them to call your office and leave their name, address, type of pet, the pet’s needs, and a way we can get into their home. Make sure they don’t post this information online—they have to leave it verbally with whoever picks up at your office when they call. If there really are looters, we don’t want them knowing which houses are sitting empty and how to break into them. These people have to feel that their private information is safe with you. Then I’ll call you back in a little while to get the data you’ve collected, and we can go from there.”

There was silence on the other end of the phone. I waited tensely until finally my mother said, “Sabrina. What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about all the people from this island who evacuated and left their pets behind and now can’t get back to them because the bridge is out. You need to help me reach them before all their pets die.”

“Sabrina.” My mother’s voice was tight. She sounded furious. “That is ridiculous.”

“What? Why is it ridiculous?”

“Because those people should never have left their pets behind in the first place. Why should you go to all the trouble of helping them?”

“Because if I don’t they’ll die, Mom. And anyway, things happen. Don’t they? Like people panic and evacuate and then the bridge blows out and they can’t get back to their homes. And parents use a donor egg to have a baby and then never tell the kid, but eventually the kid finds out anyway. Do you think maybe we shouldn’t judge people so harshly for their poor decisions?”

My mom made a croaking noise. “Sabrina—”

“Most of these people were just scared, Mom. Most of them were just doing the best they could. Many of them were only thinking of their children or their family or friends. Let’s try to help them without judging them. Okay?”

“But . . . I just don’t understand. It seems like so much work. Why do you have to be the one to do it?”

I sighed. Sometimes I felt like I was never going to understand my mother, and she was never going to understand me. But that didn’t mean I didn’t love her.

“Because,” I said, “I’m here. And I’m not doing anything else. And I’m your daughter, and you have millions of followers on your social media. They, in turn, will spread the word to other people on social media, until it finally gets to the actual evacuees from Little Bridge who we’re offering this service to. And then we’ll be able to save these animals, and also prevent a possible potential health hazard. Okay? Can you just have someone do this, please? It would mean a lot to me, and I actually think it might do wonders for your reputation. It could even win you some new fans.”

“Sabrina.” My mom’s voice sounded choked. “I—”

“Mom. Could you just do it? Will you do this one thing your daughter is asking you to do?”

There was silence again over the phone. And then finally my mother said, quietly, “Yes. Yes, Sabrina, of course. Tell me again what it is you want me to do.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

The Little Bridge Electric Company continues to make progress bringing power back to its customers. Some homes have experienced saltwater intrusion and won’t be able to accept power until repairs are made. Progress will be slower in the hardest-hit areas where transmission poles were lost.

I explained it again.

“And remember,” I added when I was done. “It’s important that they don’t feel judged for having left their pets behind. If they do, they won’t call in. We want to save as many animals as we can, so the why of how it happened isn’t important.”

“I got it,” my mother said. “No judgments.”

“No judgments.” I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me. “Will you do it today? Like right now, when you hang up?”

“I’ll call Shawna right now and have her do it.” Shawna was my mother’s longtime—and long-suffering—assistant. “And, honey—”

“Yes, Mom?”

“I . . . I like you like this.”

“Like what?”

“So . . . passionate.”

“What?”

“It’s true. You haven’t seemed actually to care about anything since . . . well, in a long time.” She tactfully avoided mentioning Caleb’s—and Kyle’s—name. “Except running away. You cared about that.”

I smiled wryly. “Thanks, Mom.”

“But now for the first time in quite a while you seem to care about something else . . . helping others, which, if I remember correctly, was why you went to law school in the first place—”

“Mom,” I said in a warning voice. “Don’t get your hopes up. I’m not going back to law school.”

“I know, I know. I’m just saying, at least you’re doing something that you feel passionate about, and not just wasting your time waitressing—”

Someday, I really needed to tell her about my paintings. But this was not the day.

“—even if I’m not very happy about where you’re doing it. Did you know that most deaths from hurricanes occur after the storm has passed?”

“I do know that, Mom,” I said. “Thanks. That’s why I really appreciate whatever help you can—”

“Sabrina.”

I looked up at the sound of the deep voice calling my name to see Drew Hartwell leaning against the door frame to the library. As always, he looked good. Good enough to make my heart give a flip inside my chest. He’d found a new clean linen shirt—did he keep a collection of these in every place he’d ever lived?—though he’d buttoned it as haphazardly as all the others, revealing far more tanned chest and abdominal muscles than should be legal.

In one hand he held the bowl of hurricane dip I’d made. Beneath his arm was tucked a bag of chips.

But on his handsome face was an expression of urgency.

I could not imagine what kind of chip-oriented emergency necessitated my getting off the phone, but his raised eyebrows and frown seemed to indicate that there was one.

“Uh, Mom,” I said, “I have to go. This is the only phone line in the house, and I think someone else needs to use it.”

“Oh, of course, honey. But I want you to know that I’m still coming tomorrow, or at least as soon as they can get that runway cleared.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, as Drew rolled a chip in the air, indicating that I needed to speed up the conversation. “Okay. Bye-bye now.”