I tucked the phone away like it was volatile and pushed inside.
The Stag was midmorning quiet, that lull between coffee crowd and lunch. The fire had kept the room gently warm. Someone had left a scarf on a hook with little silver bells stitched to the fringe; it chimed when the door swung shut behind me.
Callum looked up from a stack of invoices, eyebrow cocked. “You look like a man who either robbed a bank or contemplated feelings.”
“Can’t it be both?”
He grinned. “I’ll put on coffee.”
“I’ve already had two.”
I laughed and tossed my jacket at the hook. It missed. He didn’t tease me for once.
He watched me with that brotherly look that says the roast will come later.
“You all right?” he asked.
“I might be,” I said, surprised to hear it and more surprised to mostly mean it.
I moved behind the bar, wiped a clean counter because muscle memory demands ritual when the heart goes weird. Callum pretended not to watch me pretend. I pulled my phone back out under the register’s shadow.
The message waited, seemingly ordinary yet dangerous. A small, steady ask instead of a grand, doomed plea.
Riley had said brave tells the truth and lets the other person decide.
I hit send.
The whoosh was inaudible over the hum of the heater, but I felt it anyway
I set the phone face down and reached for the day’s prep list, hands grateful for something to do.
“Want me to handle the order from the bakery?” Callum asked. “Lydia’s on a tear about cheesecakes, our cook doesn’t want to budge on his own recipe.”
“I don’t get it.”
“She wants Graham cracker crust, and he wants crustless.”
I chuckled. “Must be nice.”
“It is.” He studied me for another second, a smile ghosting up. “You’re doing it, aren’t you?”
“Doing what?”
“Trying,” he said simply.
“Yeah,” I said, feeling the word lodge somewhere good. “I guess I am.”
Outside, the town went on being itself. Reckless River was bright and ordinary, festive and flawed. Inside, I grabbed a bowl, tipped sugar over red berries, and worked them until they shone.
If my phone buzzed, I didn’t jump. Not at first.
When it finally did, it rattled the wood just enough to feel like a heartbeat.
I didn’t look.
Not yet.
Steady, I told myself.
