Chapter 36: The Whole Town

Mara's POV

I walked down my own lane with my hands in my pockets and my heart going hard.

Behind me, Chan and Hyunjin followed three paces back, hoods down, as I'd asked.

The woman with the microphone stopped when she saw me coming.

She was about thirty, with a good coat and a cameraman jogging at her heels.

"Ms. Larkin," she said. "Thank you. Is it true that you're in a relationship with both men?"

The crowd at the gate had gone silent.

There were a hundred of them, maybe more.

Girls in Blue Hour hoodies, a grandmother in a wheelchair, two boys holding a banner, a man with a baby on his chest.

Rory's truck sat across the lane with Rory leaning on the bonnet.

Odette had arrived at some point, in her apron, with a tray of cinnamon buns balanced on one hip.

I looked at all of them, and I took my glasses off, and wiped them on my shirt, and put them back on.

"Yes," I said.

The reporter blinked.

"Yes?"

"Yes, to both. They're my partners, and I'm theirs. We're all adults.

"I'm forty-nine, I keep a lighthouse and make prints, and I'm not the least bit ashamed."

A girl at the front gasped.

Someone behind her started to clap, and stopped, unsure.

"Ms. Larkin, the company's statement described you as a woman who has sheltered troubled men before. Do you have a response?"

The cameraman swung the lens to my face.

Four weeks ago I would have gone inside and shut the door.

"I do," I said. "It's accurate.

"I had a younger brother. He drank, and I covered for him.

"I hid him from our father and his boss and the world, until the night I stopped answering my phone.

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