She sipped her wine, eyes glinting.
If she couldn’t tearRosedown with the truth, she’d do it with suggestion.
The kind that stuck harder than fact.
AndBrianaknew how to work a room.
She’d chosen her spot carefully, near enough to the bar that anyone waiting on a drink could overhear just a note of her conversation withMarlene, but far enough back that it looked private, intimate.Itwas theater, every drop of it, and she played her role like a woman born for the stage.
Marlene, bless her nosy little heart, was leaning forward, her pearl necklace gleaming under the light.Shesmelled blood, andBrianawas more than happy to give her the faintest taste.
“You don’t mean…”Marlenewhispered, her eyes wide.
“I don’t mean anything,”Brianasaid smoothly, her tone laced with the same false innocence she’d been perfecting since high school.“Ionly think about the community.Howwe all depend on each other.Coffee, fellowship,Sundaymornings after church—it’s all connected, isn’t it?”
Marlene’s lips pursed thoughtfully.“Itis.”
“AndRose, well… she’s done a wonderful job building that shop.Iadmire her grit.Butsometimes grit hides other things.Painfulthings.Thingspeople might rather forget.”
Marlene reached for her glass, nearly sloshing the wine down her sleeve.“You’vegot me on pins and needles,Briana.”
Briana gave a demure laugh, the kind meant to look like she was brushing it all aside when she was really feeding the flame.“Oh,Ishouldn’t say another word.Wouldn’twant to add to the rumor mill.Youknow how this town can be.”
Marlene nodded slowly, though her expression told a different story.Thegossip column she typed up every week was the most widely read part of the county paper.Ahint fromBrianatonight would ripple out bySundaymorning, carried from pew to pew, whispered over casseroles at fellowship lunch.
Exactly asBrianaintended.
By the timeBrianaleft the club, her heels clicking confidently against the brick walkway, the match had been struck.
And the next morning,the first whisper hit.
It wasn’t loud, not at first.
A woman at the farmers market leaned toward her friend asRosepassed by, murmuring behind her hand.Theireyes darted away too quickly whenRoseoffered a polite smile.
At the coffee shop,Rosecaught a group of teenagers pausing outside her window before ducking in.Theirlaughter seemed sharper, though no words were clear enough to grab hold of.
Even at the church parking lot, whereRosehad parked to drop off muffins for a fundraiser, the hush fell thick when she walked past two women arranging flowers for the sanctuary.Oneof them offered a too-bright “Goodmorning!”but her eyes flickered with something sharper.
It was subtle.
But it was spreading.
CHAPTERTHIRTY
Rose felt it in her bones.
She’d always been able to read a room.Asurvival instinct, honed through years of keeping her head high while life tried to chip away at her.Shecould sense when laughter was genuine, when kindness was real, and when a conversation shifted the second she walked out of earshot.
By noon, the whispers were everywhere.Notenough to confront, not enough to pin down, but enough to knot her stomach tight.
She carried mugs to the dishwasher and heard it in the hush of conversation at the corner table.Shestepped ontoMainStreetfor a delivery and caught the subtle arch of brows, the way voices softened when she passed by.Itwas like walking through fog—she couldn’t see the shape of it, couldn’t catch a word outright, but she knew it was there, thick and clinging.
Back at the coffee shop, she wiped down the counter twice, her rag catching on the same scratch in the wood.
The scratch had been there since the first week she opened.Adelivery man had dragged in a heavy box, set it down too hard, and left the gouge.She’dmeant to fix it, but after a while it became familiar, like the wrinkles in her favorite quilt—imperfections that belonged to her.Today, though, it snagged at her every time she dragged the rag across, pulling her back to the same spot again and again.
Tasha noticed, leaning over from the pastry case where she’d been helping arrange lemon bars and pecan tarts for the afternoon rush.
