I was raised to believe in things you can’t see.
It is the foundation of everything. I am taught to accept the unacceptable. To embrace the terrifying.
To give everything to my family.
To my church.
To my god.Because I have a purpose. I have been trained for my calling for as long as I can remember. As an acolyte for the Gathering of the Sun, I am taught that my life isn’t my own. I worship. I serve. And when the time comes, I will greet my fate with open arms and a sin free heart.
People call us a cult.
We are judged. We are ridiculed and reviled. Pastor Carter tells me they will be lost when the end comes. So we hide ourselves away from their sick and dangerous world. And my soul is safe because I follow the path.
I am the perfect disciple. I am confident in my devotion.
Until doubt arrives wearing the face of a boy I never expected to love.
Bastian doesn’t follow the path. His destiny is his own. He paints me a picture of a beautiful world. His words contradict everything I have been told.
He invites me to live when I have been prepared to die.
He gives me something new to believe in.Love becomes the ultimate crisis of faith and now I am torn between two futures.
One that saves my soul.
And one that saves my heart.
*Blurb contains spoilers for Ashes of the Sun*
Everything I had been raised to believe is a lie.
Prayer became the voice of dishonesty.
Manipulation was disguised as faith.
Abuse was masquerading as devotion.And the man I worshipped as a leader, as a father, has been revealed to be a monster.
The only choice I have is to run.
To leave The Gathering of the Sun behind me and try to build a new life in a world I have been told is full of evil and corruption. A world that will destroy me.
Love will be my guide. Bastian will help me search for the girl I could have been. The girl who was erased by the people claiming to be my family.
But hope is a fragile thing. Holding onto it in the face of fear and doubt feels almost impossible. Because even the sun can’t keep the clouds at bay.
And I’ve learned the only thing I can do is walk into the storm.
Awww…Bastian
Keep reading to see the full Love Note!
Sara,
The sheets beside me are cool when they used to be warm. You’re not here. I know that sleep is impossible for you, just as it’s impossible for me. How can you rest when your whole life has been turned upside down? I listen to you toss and turn at night, your memories terrorizing you on a constant loop. You try to cry quietly, but I can hear you.
Sometimes you let me comfort you and I feel a little better. A little saner.
But the times you pull away drive nails into my already fractured heart.
I’m sorry for things I had no control over. I’m sorry for all the ways you’ve been hurt. I want to promise you the world. I want to give you all the things you never dreamed you could have. One day maybe we can have something that looks like normal.
But for now, I’ll wait for you in an empty bed and hope you come back. That this isn’t the time you leave and go back to that life you’re finding it so hard to run away from.
Hope and fear sometimes feel a lot like the same thing. Particularly when it comes to loving you, Sara.
You came into my life like a sunrise. Slowly. Steadily. Falling for you felt inevitable. And now here we are trying to write the next chapter.
I don’t know what will happen next. I can only love you and hope it’s enough.
There’s that word again.
Hope.
You’re mine, Sara. Since the start.
-Bastian-
The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Contemporary and Paranormal romance including The Find You in the Dark and Bad Rep series as well as the upcoming stand alone romance, Reclaiming the Sand, and a dark new adult series for Gallery Books.
A. Meredith spent ten years as a counselor for at risk teens and children. First working at a Domestic Violence/Sexual Assault program and then later a program for children with severe emotional and mental health issues. Her former clients and their stories continue to influence every aspect of her writing.
When not writing (or being tortured with all manner of beauty products at the hand of her very imaginative and extremely girly daughter), she is eating chocolate, watching reality television that could rot your brain and reading a smutty novel or two.
A. Meredith is represented by Michelle Johnson with the Inklings Literary Agency.
Awe. This is sad and heartwarming at the same time. Absolutely causes me to want to read the book.