I didn’t say anything. Couldn’t, for a moment.
Because the woman sitting across from me didn’t look like a criminal. She looked like someone who loved Rose.
I felt the ground shift under my certainty.
What if I was wrong?
What if the timeline was a coincidence? What if Taylor really had set up TKM on his own, three months before he ever met Denise, targeting the ranch through public records or word of mouth? What if Denise’s too-fast crisis response after Taylor’s firing was just what it looked like, a competent woman in shock, defaulting to action because action was all she knew?
The thought sat in my stomach like a stone.
“How are you holding up?” Denise asked, breaking the silence. “With the photographers and everything?”
“Managing,” I said.
“It must be strange. Always having cameras on you. I couldn’t live like that.” Her expression was sympathetic. Warm. “I know Rose is stressed. I just want to make sure she’s okay.”
“She’s tough.”
“She is. But tough has limits.” She gave me a look that sat halfway between empathy and assessment. Then she stood, gathered the groceries for Rose, and disappeared down the hall toward the office.
I stood at the kitchen sink and talked myself down.
Olivia’s evidence was solid. The TKM timeline didn’t lie. Companies don’t register themselves three months before a convenient boyfriend shows up to be the fall guy. And Denise’s cracked-door phone call, that clipped voice in the dark,it’s actually working in our favor, that wasn’t the voice of a woman who loved Rose. That was the voice of someone running a play.
I followed her toward the hallway. Not obviously. Just drifted close enough to hear.
The office door was open.
“—ran into Carol Miller at the grocery store,” Denise was saying. Her voice carried the careful weight of someone delivering bad news gently. “And Dave Garcia at the post office. And honestly, Rose, a few other people too.”
“And?” Rose’s voice. Flat. Braced.
“They’re worried about you. Everyone is.” She was quiet for a moment. “Some of them... look, I don’t want to upset you more than you already are. But people are talking. About the photographers. About what’s happening here. And some of them, not everyone, but some, think maybe the ranch has become...”
“Become what?”
“Too much.” Denise said it softly, like the words hurt her to deliver. “That’s not me talking, Rose. That’s what’s out there. Carol said something about the ranch being ‘a spectacle now.’ Dave mentioned property values. And I heard, secondhand, so take it for what it’s worth, that a few people think you should consider your options.”
Silence.
“I’m not saying they’re right,” Denise added quickly. “I would never say that. You know how much I believe in this place. I’m just telling you what’s out there because you deserve to know. You shouldn’t be blindsided by it.”
More silence. Then Rose’s voice, barely above a whisper: “Thanks for telling me.”
“Of course. That’s what I’m here for.”
I heard the creak of a chair. Denise coming around the desk, probably. Then the soft rustle of a hug.
I stepped back from the hallway. Walked to the kitchen sink and gripped the edge.
Consider your options.
The woman who’d told me the colic story with real emotion in her voice had just walked into that office and planted the idea of giving up. Wrapped it in concern. Served it like medicine.
Rose’s brother,Fury, arrived without warning.
I was crossing the yard around four when a black pickup truck came up the drive too fast, kicking gravel, and skidded to a stop near the main house. A man got out. Tall, dark-haired, built like someone who’d played sports seriously and never entirely stopped. He moved like a person looking for something to hit.
