The words came out raw.Unplanned.He hadn't known he was going to say them until they were in the room, and then it was too late to take them back.
Harper stood slowly.She held his gaze the whole way up, like she was testing whether he'd look away first.
"Good night, Caleb."
"Good night."
He watched her walk to the bedroom.The door closed with a soft click.
Caleb sat alone with the chess set and the album and the ghost of a sentence he shouldn't have said.Black was still winning.He wasn't sure that was a metaphor anymore.
He stretched out on the couch, stared at the ceiling, and listened to the silence on the other side of the bedroom door.
Chapter 8
The mailbox still had a faded bumper sticker on its side: Support Local Journalism.
Harper sat in the passenger seat of Mitch DeMario's truck and studied Edward Marsh's house through the windshield.The sticker was sun-bleached, peeling at the corners, but someone had left it there.A small act of defiance, or maybe just forgetting.She wasn't sure which was sadder.
"You want me to come in?"Mitch asked.
"No.Wait here."
"I don't like it."
"I know."Harper reached for the door handle."But he's more likely to talk if it's just me.Two strangers make it feel like an interrogation."
Mitch shifted in his seat.He had the patience of a man who'd spent years waiting in worse places than this, but his eyes kept tracking the empty road behind them.
"Fifteen minutes," he said."After that, I'm coming to the door."
"Twenty."
"Fifteen.Non-negotiable."
Harper almost smiled."Fine."
She climbed out of the truck and walked up the cracked concrete path.A wind chime hung motionless near the door.The yard was overgrown but not abandoned—someone still mowed, just not often enough.
She knocked.
Footsteps, slow and heavy.The door opened six inches to reveal a face that matched the house—weathered, tired, holding together through habit rather than hope.
"Mr.Marsh?"
"Who's asking?"
"My name is Holly Warren.I'm a writer working on a book about small-town journalism.I was hoping to talk to you aboutThe Blossom Springs Herald."
His hand tightened on the door frame.The Herald.She could see the name land on him like something heavy.
"The Herald'sbeen dead two years."
"I know.That's what I want to understand."
He studied her through the gap.Harper let him look, kept her posture open, her expression neutral.She'd done this a hundred times—stood on doorsteps asking strangers to trust her with their stories.Some said no.Most said yes, eventually, because people wanted to be heard.
"You're not from around here," he said.
