When Lottie finally leaves to take Mason to Holler for a bit, because the clubhouse is crawling with tension and she wants to know what’s being said inside those walls, I’m alone in her kitchen with nothing but my thoughts and the buzz of my phone.
I’ve got texts from Elijah.
Where are you? Are you okay? Please call me.
I don’t answer. I can’t decide if the fact that he’s checking on me is sweet or suspicious, because my brain is poisoned by fear now. I hate that. I hate that Hell has turned every kind gesture into a potential trap.
A knock hits the front door, hard enough to make me flinch.
I stand there for a second, heart pounding, listening. Another knock, slower, like whoever’s out there knows I’m inside.
I walk to the door and look through the peephole.
Oaks.
My breath catches so hard it hurts.
He ain’t in his cut. He’s in jeans and a dark shirt, sleeves pushed up, inked forearms tense like he’s been clenching his fists for hours. His hair is still damp like he showered. But he looks like he slept even less than I did.
I unlock the door before my pride can argue.
He steps inside and the whole kitchen feels smaller, like the walls are listening. His gaze sweeps over me fast, like he’s checking for bruises he didn’t cause. Then his eyes land on my face and stay there.
“You eat?” he asks.
The question is so simple it almost breaks me.
“No,” I admit, voice rough.
“Lottie here?”
“She went to the clubhouse to see Holler,” I say, and then the words tumble out because I can’t stop them. “Are they looking for her? Are they saying she fell in? Are the cops…”
“Breathe,” he cuts in, low. Not soft. Controlled.
I try. My lungs don’t listen.
Oaks shifts closer, not touching, but near enough I can smell him, his soap and smoke from the clubhouse. His eyes don’t soften, but something in them steadies like a hand pressed to the back of my neck.
“They’re searching,” he says. “They haven’t found her.”
My throat closes. “They think I killed her.”
His mouth goes hard. “They think a lota shit.”
“That ain’t a no,” I whisper.
His eyes flash, and for a second I see the animal in him, the part that would bite a rumor in half if it could. But he doesn’t do that. He takes a breath like he’s swallowing something.
“I know what happened,” he says. “I know you didn’t plan it. I know you ran for help.”
I cling to that like a life raft. “Then you believe me.”
He holds my gaze too long.
And in that fraction of a pause, I feel it. The smallest shift. Not accusation. Not disbelief.
Doubt’s quieter than that. Doubt is a question you don’t want to ask but can’t stop turning over in your head because the stakes are too high.
