Page 167 of Bound By Crimson

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Their faces were blank, their movements mechanical as they set a silver tray down by the window.

Tessa lingered for a breath longer, her gaze flickering briefly toward Lyric—something soft and uncertain behind her eyes—before she followed Bernarda out.

The door clicked shut, sealing Lyric in silence again.

She stared at the tray.

Toast. Fruit. A soft-boiled egg. The scent made her stomach clench.

She forced herself to eat anyway. Not for her.

For him—Noah.

Small bites. Slow, dry swallows. Her throat protested every motion, but she kept going. She needed the strength.

She wiped her hands and grabbed her phone, unlocking the screen with shaking fingers.

No signal. Just like always.

Her eyes flicked toward the window, then to the garden beyond it.

If she was going to reach anyone—Kai—she’d have to go to the back wall.

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Outside, the garden air wrapped around her—thick and wet, heavy as a second skin.

Even in March, the North Carolina air clung to everything—the roses, the hedges, her own lungs.

It wasn’t like New York, sharp and crisp.

Here, the heat smothered slowly.

Lyric drifted along the garden path, trying to quiet her mind, trying to breathe.

She rounded a bend and froze.

Walter.

He was clipping roses by the maze, his shears moving methodically through the blooms.

For a moment, hope sparked painfully in her chest.

Walter had been kind before.

Loose-lipped.

He had told her things—about the poisoning, about the whispers that clung to the Thornwick name like mildew.

Maybe he would talk again.

Maybe he would help.

She approached slowly.

“Walter,” she said, her voice low and tentative.

He stiffened immediately.

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