Page 226 of Money Reigns
Then he turns.
And walks out.
Just…leaves.
I stare after him, stunned.
My throat tightens.
Sue sets the pies down on the counter, wrapped and boxed. “Need help carrying those out, honey?”
I shake my head.
Swallow hard.
“No, I got it.”
I try not to rush, try not to look like I’m chasing him.
But I am.
I get outside just in time to see him shut the trunk of a sleek black rental.
He gets in.
Doesn’t look back.
Doesn’t see me.
And drives away.
I stand there on the curb, hands full of pies, heart full of something I can’t name.
He didn’t even look at me.
Chapter forty-nine
Olivia
Tuesday
The morning light is pale when I peel back the curtains. It slants through the frost-slicked glass, cool and silver, catching on a swirl of breath that ghosts the window from where I’ve leaned too close.
Outside, the world is quiet beneath a soft crust of snow. The porch steps of Baker’s Inn are still crooked, the sag I used to leap over as a kid now half-buried under a shoveled path. A ladder leans against the side of the building abandoned and two men in thick coats are brushing fresh paint along the doorframe despite the chill. Another is scraping ice from the columns, steam rising from his thermos on the stoop.
And then, movement.
Quick and familiar.
There arechildrenout front.
Three boys and a girl, all bundled up in coats and hats, tossing a snowball back and forth with mittened hands too big for their fingers. One kid slips, laughing, before clambering back to his feet with a puff of breath in the cold.
And they are all playing—withhim.
War stands near the sidewalk, jacket zipped halfway, a knit beanie pulled low over his ears. His gloves are off, stuffed in a pocket, fingers red from cold but nimble as he packs a snowball,loose and soft, before lobbing it gently at Tyler; the boy from two houses down. Tyler shrieks, catches it wrong, and fumbles. War kneels, showing him how to form a tighter one, not too wet. Another kid joins. Then another.
He doesn’t make it a show. Doesn’t try to win the kids over. He just…plays.He ducks when they ambush him, laughs when they get him good, teaches them, quietly, easily, how to aim better, how to pack snow without freezing their fingers. His mouth shapes the words, his breath visible in the cold, his posture relaxed, open.
