Page 186 of When Love Takes Root

I looked down.

A clean floor stared back at me and minded its business.

“I’m making sure I got everything.”

Calista’s eyebrow lifted. “Girl, unless that dust got a resurrection ministry, it’s gone.”

Cassia pointed at the broom. “Put it down before you start naming the bristles.”

I tightened my hand around the handle because letting go felt too much like admitting I needed to sit down. “Y’all came to help me close or to audit my sweeping technique?”

Leilani tilted her head. “We came because you texted one sad purple heart at two seventeen this morning. You don’t get to send a cry-for-help emoji during demon hours and expect me not to pull up. That wasn’t a text; that was a flare.”

Calista nodded. “A single emoji after midnight is a wellness check.”

Cassia’s voice softened. “Especially from you.”

The broom handle shifted in my grip.

Tears had already gathered, hot and stubborn, blurring the row of products lined across my station. I leaned the broom against the cabinet before my hands betrayed me and pressed both palms flat against the counter. The cool laminate steadied me more than I wanted to admit.

Mascara clung to the corners of my eyes. My lip trembled once before I caught it between my teeth.

I looked away first.

Leilani set the bowl down. “What happened with Josiah?”

His name moved through the room like somebody had unlocked a door I’d been bracing my whole body against.

I tried to breathe around it. “I messed up.”

Nobody spoke.

That was worse than questions.

I turned from the mirror. “Kayden was rude at dinner. Not regular teenager rude. Not moody because his mama had a man at the table rude. He was cruel. And Josiah sat there and took it with more grace than most grown men deserve to claim.”

Calista’s eyebrows dropped. Cassia’s hands folded in her lap. Leilani’s face lost the little smirk she kept ready for emergencies.

I kept going because stopping would’ve made me cry. “Then Maya’s outlets were sparking, and Zuri told on her, and Josiah checked them. He found enough wrong to make me sick. He came back Friday and fixed them. JJ and Kayden weren’t there. I could barely look him in the eye.”

Leilani whispered, “Celeste.”

“I sent him away.”

Calista blinked. “You did what?”

“I told him I couldn’t do us.”

Leilani sat forward so fast the chair squeaked. “You told the man who fixed your child’s electrical hazard and respected your grief that you couldn’t do y’all?”

“Leilani.”

“No, I need to understand the ministry of foolishness in full context.”

Cassia shot her a look, but her mouth pressed like she agreed and hated that she agreed.

I rubbed my forehead. “I panicked.”