Derby leans close enough that only I hear him. “You don’t owe her more than truth.”
I touch the skin behind my ear. “That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”
His face hardens with understanding.
Then he walks out.
The clubhouse door closes behind him, and suddenly the old jail feels larger.
Lottie looks at the chair across from her. “You sitting or looming?”
“I learned looming from bikers.”
“You need more practice. Your shoulders aren’t judgmental enough.”
I don’t sit.
Not yet.
I stand across from her at the kitchen table, both hands at my sides, and try to see the woman clearly. Not Lottie who brought groceries. Not Lottie who teased Derby and tucked August into safety. Not Lottie who drove me across the country with snacks, cash, and a mouth sharp enough to cut through panic.
The other Lottie.
The one with a crown tattoo.
The one who called Hot Mama. The one who knew how to disappear a woman and child before dawn. The one who might have made a call that ended with Jeremy’s car wrapped around a tree.
“I need to ask you something,” I say.
Lottie sets her mug down. “I figured.”
“Did you set up Jeremy’s accident?”
The word accident tastes wrong.
Lottie doesn’t blink.
She looks at me for a long moment, then turns her mug slowly in both hands.
“Accidents happen.”
My stomach drops.
“No.”
Her brows lift.
“No pretty little sayings. No old-lady riddles. No outlaw poetry.” My voice shakes, but I keep it sharp. “I asked you a question.”
Lottie sighs. “Bad men drive bad roads.”
“Lottie.”
“Sometimes a woman prays, and the road answers.”
The old jail goes so quiet I can hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen and Derby’s boots shifting somewhere outside.
My skin goes cold.