Warning

Briar found Perpetua in the estate's winter garden, deadheading roses with small silver shears, as if eighteen years of secrets were nothing more than clutter to be pruned away with the rest of the dead growth.

"I know what you did," Briar said, no preamble left in her.

Perpetua didn't look up. Snip. A spent bloom fell into her basket. "You know what a grieving mother in a flower shop told you," she said. "Grief makes people say strange things, sweetheart. It's not the same as knowing."

"Delphine had a stillbirth. You brought her a living baby that same night. And your own daughter had one too — except there's no death certificate for hers."

Now Perpetua looked up, and for one unguarded second, something moved behind her eyes that wasn't denial at all. It was almost pride.

"You're a clever girl," she said softly. "I used to hope that would matter to somebody in that house besides me." She set down the shears with deliberate care. "Whatever you think you've found, digging it up won't put anyone back where they came from. It will only take things away from people who've finally gotten used to having them. The Colvilles have a mortgage on that shop, did you know that? A very generous, very quiet arrangement that could be revisited at any time."

"Is that a threat?"

"It's arithmetic," Perpetua said, and picked the shears back up. "Some things, once broken, are kinder left broken. Go home, Briar. Eat your birthday cake. Let old women keep their gardens."

Briar left rattled but unbowed, already composing the next call to Marlowe in her head — a lawyer, maybe, or a journalist, someone who couldn't be quietly paid into silence the way Delphine had been.

She never made the call.

Her phone rang first, Marlowe's name on the screen, her voice cracked open with panic before Briar even said hello.

"Someone broke into the shop last night. Nothing's missing from the register, nothing from the till—" Marlowe's breath hitched. "Just the hall closet. Just my mom's box. It's gone."