“Yes.”
August looks up. “Can I go?”
“No,” every adult in the room says at once.
He frowns. “Rude.”
Derby Jr. in training. God help us all.
Amelia looks at me.
Not Sophie.
Me.
Fear is there. So is trust, thin as thread but real enough to see.
“You really think this is the best thing?” she asks.
I think the best thing would be Jeremy Vale tied to a chair in a room with no windows.
I think the second-best thing would be putting Amelia and August somewhere no one could find them until the world got tired of hunting women who run.
I think taking her to a bar so gossip can chew on her name sounds cruel.
But I also know men like Jeremy thrive in silence. They grow teeth in private. They turn hiding into proof.
So I tell her the truth.
“I think if he wants to make you look scared and trapped, we show him you can walk into town with your head up.”
Her eyes hold mine.
“What if I can’t?”
“Then I walk beside you while you fake it.”
“And if I fall apart?”
“Then I get you out.”
“And if people talk?”
I smile a little. “Darlin’, they live in Hell. Let them burn their tongues.”
Her lips curve.
Small.
Brave.
Sophie steps beside her and says the words that seal the day.
“If Jeremy wants to tell a story, we tell one louder.”
The room goes quiet around that.
Amelia looks at the women, the groceries, the kid on my floor, the brothers outside, then me.