Copyright © 2020 by Brittany Tarkington
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the author, email addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the email address below.
Pub91 Publishing
brittanyntarkington@gmail.com
Ordering Information:
Quantity sales. Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. Orders by U.S. trade bookstores and wholesalers. For details, contact the author at the email address above.
Printed in the United States of America
Tarkington, Brittany.
The Autumn Leaf: A Novel/ Brittany Tarkington
ASIN: B07JQXJ4VG
1. Romance 2. Contemporary 3. New Adult
Cover by: Mayhem Cover Creations
Formatting by: Under Cover Designs
Editing: Wordsmith Editing
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The Hazed Series
Hazed
Unfazed
Ruined
The Lies We Tell
The Forever Series
Forever Careless
Forever Reckless
Coming Soon:
Damaged (Book 4 of The Hazed Series)
Grove
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About Brittany Tarkington
For Avery, thank you for always giving me grace while writing.
Jeanetta, thank you for always dropping everything to read and encourage me.
Aubree, you’re the best hype man on this planet.
One
It was a great day to become a teenage runaway. As a trailer park resident, the statistics were believable. The police would look around locally; they may even throw up some flyers for good measure. It would end shortly, and they would assure my father that this was normal and that I would come back. I had seen it happen, but he would know differently.
Where is it? Panic punched through me as I searched my room.
I ripped a drawer open frantically. My anxiety was out to play, and she was an ugly bitch. He knew. He had to know. Why did I come back here? It was a trap. Twirling around the room, I brought my hands to my head. Unvoiced screams bottled in my lungs were ready to rip into the air.
“WHERE IS IT?” I demanded. Only this time I heard movement. Crouching down like an animal ready to attack, I waited.
Sunlight shone through the cracked, broken blinds and my safe gleamed brilliantly. Of course. I crept over and twisted the combination. There it was, peaking at me from under the silver revolver. I grabbed the picture, shoving it into my back pocket, and hesitated.
I did not know who I was when I bought the pistol. I was not a violent person. My fight or flight instinct had kicked in the day I went underground and purchased the numberless gun. I had recently been mugged, but it was nothing close to what I endured in this house of horrors.
I closed the safe, securing it before I left. I had no need for it now. No one would hurt me again. I would not allow it.
“Autumn,” he slurred.
I tensed. Every fiber of my being revolted as I thought of him getting in the way of this. I threw my backpack on, only looking back to see that the door was locked. I opened the window, climbed on top of my table, and vaulted from the musty room.
I ran. I did not even stop when I reached the edge of the woods. I kept on—branches slapping me in the face, twigs threatening my clumsy feet. I ran past the hiding place where I went as a child. When I was eight years old, I watched Forrest Gump with my brother. My parents had left us alone for the night, and it was the only thing we had.
After the movie, I found a meadow. I did not know who God was, and He did not turn Jenny into a bird, but I got on my knees and asked Him to. After three times of trying without anything happening, I gave up on the whole idea. Although I still hid in the meadow after that day, I never flew off as a bird.
I busted through the forest on the opposite side of town. Looking at the busy road, I decided to keep walking by the tree line. My heart was pounding in my chest, but I tried to look as calm as possible. I did not want anyone to see a frantic girl running beside the road. The last thing I needed was to be taken back to that place again.
Thunder clapped above me, and I looked up, seeing the distant rain clouds. I could make it to the bus station before it hit. I picked up my pace, crunching on the dead leaves below me, spotting red ones in the mix.
When I was a girl, there were some happy times. My mother told me on the first day of fall, she had a dream about a girl with hair the color of autumn leaves. She was strong and confident. She believed it was a premonition telling her everything would be okay. I became her Autumn. Though the leaves fall, I will rise.
I wasn’t superstitious. I didn’t believe in anything. Hell, I didn’t even believe in myself most days, but something about my fierce red hair and the season I was born made me want to believe that I was destined to be more than I was born into.
I saw the familiar building ahead. I had passed it too many times to count, wondering when I would finally buy a one-way ticket out of here. The parking lot was peppered with cars and buses. Just as
