“Something you’ll need,” she replies, her tone final. “And don’t tell anyone where you got it.”
Her gaze flicks briefly to the journal still resting in my lap, the one with the pomegranate pressed into its cover. “That too. Some things find you for a reason.”
I don’t argue. The bundle is heavier than it looks as I slip it into my purse, my thoughts already spiraling, trying to piece together what I’ve just been handed.
Courtney’s composure is slipping now, her eyes moving toward the door, then back to me, as if she’s suddenly aware of how exposed she is.
“He’s powerful,” she says quietly, almost to herself. “Be careful.”
It sounds less like a warning and more like a prayer.
Before I can respond, she turns and disappears into the back room, the curtain falling closed behind her.
I don’t stay.
The hallway feels colder when I step back into it, the air heavier, as if something followed me out. By the time I reach my car, my hands are trembling, the pomegranate journal tucked under my arm, the weight of the silk-wrapped bundle pressing against the inside of my purse like something alive.
I sit there for a moment, the engine still off, breathing through the sudden rush of nausea that climbs up my throat. The pieces are shifting again, rearranging themselves into something darker, something more dangerous than I anticipated.
Phillip has a daughter.
Whitney had her card.
And now I have whatever Courtney thought was worth risking everything to give me.
I start the car, the engine turning over with a low, steady growl, and pull back onto the road toward Tigertail.
Toward home.
Toward the place that used to feel like a sanctuary and now feels like something else entirely.
My own version of paradise that’s turned into a prison.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“Babe!”
Bennett’s voice carries through the house the following morning, warm and familiar, threading its way into the quiet space between sleep and waking. I stretch slowly, the remnants of last night clinging to me in fragments, then push myself upright. Sunlight slips through the blinds in thin, golden lines, catching on the edges of the room as I pull on a satin nightgown and move through the bathroom before heading downstairs.
“Morning,” I say, rising onto my toes to kiss him as I step into the kitchen.
“Mm, morning.” He smiles against my lips, his hand landing absently on my hip before he turns back to the open fridge. “I thought we had eggs. I was going to make you avocado toast and bring it to you in bed, but?—”
“Sorry,” I cut in lightly. “I hard-boiled them all yesterday. I was going to make deviled eggs for brunch.”
“That actually sounds better,” he says, already adjusting, pulling out feta and pickled onions before reaching for the avocado on the counter. “We can still do toast.”
I move automatically, taking slices of multigrain bread from the drawer and sliding them into the toaster, the small domestic rhythm grounding in a way I didn’t realize I needed. For a moment, it almost feels normal again. Almost.
But my mind drifts.
Back to last night.
To the journal now tucked into my bag upstairs, its presence lingering in me like something unfinished.
DAUGHTERS OF PERSEPHONEhad been written across the first page in deep crimson ink, the letters sharp, deliberate, as if they had been carved rather than written. The paper was thick beneath my fingers, the edges uneven, deckled, as though each page had been handled, considered, claimed.
It wasn’t written like a story.
