A week later he told her they had to attend the summer social at Whitfield Manor. “People talk if we don’t show,” he said, gaze fixed on his coffee like it might offer answers.
Lydia understood what he didn’t say. They were already a story in town: the lonely rancher who bought himself a wife, the big woman who must be grateful for any scrap of shelter.
Showing up together would be proof that the arrangement was “working,” which in Juniper Hollow meant nobody had to look too closely at the cruelty holding everything in place.
Lydia agreed because refusing would make her the villain, and she was tired of being punished for taking up space.
Whitfield Manor was a showpiece ranch house with manicured grounds, a ballroom bolted on like an ego, and a hostess named Victoria Whitfield whose smile had never met a limit it didn’t want to enforce.
Lydia wore a dark green gown that had been her mother’s, altered and re-altered until the seams begged for mercy, and she held herself upright the way you hold a heavy bucket: not because it’s easy, but because spilling would mean more work.
Caleb wore a pressed shirt and clean trousers, looking uncomfortable in his own skin, like a man dressed for someone else’s idea of respectability.
The room turned toward them when they arrived, eyes quick as flies. Victoria greeted them with poison-sweet cheer and announced games “for charity,” which meant games designed to showcase delicate femininity while everyone watched Lydia fail.
Threading needles. Arranging flowers. And then, with a bright clap of her hands, the waltz.
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