Page 172 of Tessa and Nash

I need Maeve, because if I don’t say some part of it out loud soon, I might crack straight through the middle.

I push open the café door.

Warmth rushes over me in a wave of espresso and cinnamon.

Laura looks up from behind the counter and squints at me. “That bad, huh?”

I exhale. “Worse.”

She jerks her thumb toward the back corner. “Maeve’s already here.”

I nod. I can predict her schedule so well, thank goodness. I know exactly when she has lunch, and where.

Maeve is curled around a mug when I reach the booth, cardigan sleeves pushed up, and the moment she sees me, she sets her cup down. “Oh no.”

I slide into the seat across from her and drop my gloves onto the table. “That’s exactly how I feel.”

Maeve leans forward. “What happened?”

I laugh once, brittle. “My uncle congratulated me.”

She blinks. “That’s… layered.”

Laura appears with coffee before I can ask.

“Drink first,” she says. “Talk second.”

I wrap both hands around the mug.

Maeve waits.

She has seen me at twelve, seventeen, and twenty-two. She knows the shape of my silences better than anyone alive.

So I start with the ugliest part. “He thinks I helped stall Nash’s plans.”

Maeve’s face softens instantly. “Oh, Tessa. I mean, I know that’s what all of this started with, but…”

I nod.

“And the worst part,” I add quietly, “is that I didn’t know how to tell him he was wrong without telling him why.”

Maeve exhales. “Because then he’d know.”

“Yes.”

“That you’re not on his side anymore.”

I look up at her. “I don’t know what side I’m on anymore.”

“You’re in the middle of it,” Maeve says finally.

I laugh without humor.

“You’re trying to hold family history, land disputes, town politics, and a cowboy who’s in love with you all at once,” she continues. “Of course you feel like you’re losing your mind.”

I look away.

Maeve watches me carefully. “You haven’t talked to him since his confession?”