Beautiful Confusion (New Adult Romance) Room 105 Read Online Free Page B

The average stay was six to eight months, but some people required longer care. It was impossible to know how long Abby would be here.
    I noticed her sitting off by herself. She preferred the company of her make-believe people to the other residents.
    “Hey, sis,” I said, and sat next to her. Abby appeared fresh and clean, her short blonde hair tucked neatly behind her ears. At least she’d gotten the concept of bathing regularly since she’d moved into The Manor. “You look nice.”
    “Thank you.”
    Before our conversation turned stagnant, I glanced at the flowers. African lilies decorated the walkways, and combinations of annuals and perennials, like lavender, poppies, and hibiscus, made a colorful presentation. “It’s always so pretty in the garden.”
    “I like it.”
    “It’s good that you’re living at The Manor for now.”
    “It’s okay. It’s better than Carol always peering at me from beneath her lashes. She can’t be trusted.”
    It was useless to argue with Abby’s paranoia, especially when Aunt Carol was the subject of it, but I couldn’t stand for Carol to seem like a villain. “She’s always taken good care of us. And she loves you, Abby.”
    “She still can’t be trusted.”
    I sighed. “I think she can.”
    “She doesn’t watch you the way she watches me.”
    “She’s protective of both of us.”
    “It’s not the same.”
    That was true. But I didn’t have Abby’s illness, thank heavens. At least now I knew that I was sane. Funny, how meeting someone who resembled the warrior had helped me tackle my fears.
    “Guess who’s here?” Abby said.
    Obviously it was one of her people: Bud, Face, Dingo, or Smiling Seven. “I can’t begin to guess.” Any of them could have showed up. “Why don’t you tell me who it is?”
    “It’s Seven. Do you want me to tell him hello from you?”
    “You can tell him whatever you want.” Smiling Seven was inspired by Nikki Sixx, the bass player for Mötley Crüe, and the very first character Abby had ever created. When she was little she used to sit on Mom’s lap and watch their videos. Then, a few years after our parents died, Smiling Seven began to appear.
    But he wasn’t an adult then. He was young, just a couple of years older than Abby was at the time. He loved rock and roll, and wanted to grow up to be a musician, so whenever he appeared, they would spend countless hours listening to music and dancing around her room.
    But there was more to him than met the eye. Right from the start, Abby claimed that he “knew” things that other people didn’t know. According to my sister, he had psychic abilities and had earned the name Smiling Seven because he had a secret smile that boosted his power.
    Nowadays, she described him as tall and lean and dangerously handsome, with messy brown hair and a boatload of tattoos. He’d become a musician, of course, and was working on his career.
    I often worried about his influence on her. I suspected that she’d always had a bit of a crush on him, and he was just too wild for a girl like Abby. I wished that she hadn’t created him, but I didn’t have any control over her delusions.
    She gestured to the empty space in front of her, where I assumed our visitor was standing, lording over the garden like the hot commodity he supposedly was. “Seven thinks that being at the loony bin is fun.”
    “You shouldn’t call this place that.”
    Abby waggled her fingers, waving at her hallucination. She and Seven were always waving at each other. “I didn’t call it that. He did.” She paused as if she were listening to him speak his clairvoyant rhetoric. “He’s trying to get a reading on you. He thinks something is up.”
    I squinted into the sun, where Seven was supposed to be. He was notorious for threatening to reveal what he knew, which never turned out to be anything. “There’s nothing to read.” Nothing except my meeting with Duncan, and I wasn’t going to let on about that.
    “I’ll