She Was Only the Estate Gardener Until the Mafia Boss Discovered Who Taught Her to Fight
“And it’s my knife.”
“I can have you gone before lunch.”
Tamsin’s jaw tightened.
Then Nico added quietly, “Willow Row Farm. One hundred forty acres. November thirtieth.”
Everything inside her stopped.
He knew.
Her grandmother.
The debt.
The deadline.
“That,” Tamsin said, “is a threat.”
“It’s information.”
“It’s a threat wearing an expensive coat.”
Theo looked down to hide something that might have been a smile.
Nico did not.
Tamsin’s fear turned strangely clean.
“I’ll answer your questions. But my grandmother’s farm stays out of this room.”
“You’re bargaining with me?”
“I’m telling you the one thing you don’t get to use.”
A long silence followed.
Finally Nico said, “Done.”
She blinked.
“The farm is off the table.”
“You mean that?”
“I don’t say things twice.”
“That must make apologies difficult.”
Theo coughed.
Nico’s mouth almost moved.
Then Tamsin noticed the lemon tree again.
“You’re killing that.”
Nico stared.
“What?”
“The lemon tree.”
“This conversation is not about horticulture.”
“It has root rot.”
He looked at the yellow leaves.
“My mother planted it before she died.”
Tamsin softened.
“How often do you water it?”
“Every night.”
“There’s the problem.”
“I thought living things required water.”
“They also require air.”
For the first time, Nico Basano looked less like the man people whispered about and more like a tired son standing beside the last thing his mother had touched.
“It can be saved?” he asked.
“Yes.”
The phone on his desk rang.
Theo answered.
His expression changed.
The attacker’s last outgoing call had gone to an internal number at Cypress Rise.
Someone inside the estate had told him exactly where Nico would be.
Someone had opened the orchard gate.
Kel wanted to handle the investigation.
Nico said no.
That afternoon Tamsin showed Nico and Theo the gate.
She crouched in the damp leaves.
“The attacker came through here.”
“How can you tell?” Nico asked.
“The hedge is broken inward.”
She moved farther.
“He used this to keep the gate from locking.”
A small wooden wedge lay beneath the iron rail.
Tamsin picked it up.
“Pear.”
Theo frowned.
“You’re sure?”
“I cut the tree it came from.”
There was one ancient pear tree inside Cypress Rise.
A limb had come down during an ice storm the previous winter.
The wood had been stored in an estate shed.
Only four people had access.
Tamsin.
Theo.
The kitchen manager.
Kel’s security team.
Nico looked toward the mansion.
For the first time, suspicion had moved inside the walls.
That night, Tamsin found a new pair of leather gardening gloves waiting on her greenhouse bench.
Size six.
Exactly right.
No note.
Near midnight she returned to check a heater and found Nico sitting on an overturned crate with his mother’s lemon tree in his lap.
He had removed it from the pot.
The roots were black.
He looked offended.
“You were right.”
“I usually am about plants.”
“Apparently I drowned my mother’s tree.”
“Good news. Plants are more forgiving than people.”
She sat beside him.
Together they cut away the rotten roots.
For almost an hour, he was simply Nico.
No guards.
No reputation.
No whispered stories.
Then he said, “My heart has been skipping.”
Tamsin stopped.
“What?”
“For months.”
“Have you seen a doctor?”
“He says stress.”
“Anything else?”
“Sometimes lights look yellow around the edges.”
Tamsin’s hand froze around the pruning knife.
Yellow vision.
Irregular heartbeat.
She thought of the foxglove bed behind the greenhouse.
And Serena Basano.
Nico’s stepmother.
Every afternoon at four, Serena personally brought Nico tea.
Always from the same blue china set.
Always with a homemade “heart tonic.”
Tamsin said nothing yet.
Not without proof.
Instead she told Nico about Vic’s envelope.
“You still have it?”
“Yes.”
“Open it.”
“Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because he was mine before he became part of whatever this is.”
Nico considered that.
Then nodded.
“When you’re ready.”
The next morning at 6:40, Tamsin opened Vic’s letter.
By the second sentence, she could barely breathe.
Tam,
If you are reading this, someone has finally asked where you learned.
I am sorry.
Behind the greenhouse wall at Cypress Rise stands an old pear tree.
Three feet below the third root facing south, I buried a tin box.
Give it only to Nicolo Basano.
It contains the truth about his father.
Aurelio did not die from his heart.
I taught you to stand, not to fight.
I hope you learned the difference.
Tell the boy I was afraid.
Tell him I am sorry.
Roots first.
V.
A knock hit the cottage door.
Theo stood outside.
His face was gray.
“The man who attacked Nico is dead.”
Tamsin gripped the letter.
“How?”
“They found him in the estate cold room.”
Theo looked toward the main house.
“Kel says his heart stopped.”
Across the yard, through the study window, Tamsin saw Nico standing alone.
His hand was pressed against his chest.
Part Two
They went for the box at midnight.
By then Serena had already ordered the old pear tree removed at dawn for “drainage repairs.”
That was enough for Nico.
Not proof.
But enough.
The pear tree stood twisted against the greenhouse wall, ninety years old and almost bare.
Tamsin had pruned it twice a year since arriving at Cypress Rise.
She knew every branch.
She had never thought to look beneath it.
“Third root south,” she whispered.
Theo kept watch near the road.
Nico watched the orchard.
Tamsin dug.
The ground was hard with frost.
At nearly twelve-thirty, her trowel struck metal.
She scraped away the dirt.
A rusted biscuit tin appeared beneath the root.
But the tree had grown around it.
One thick root crossed the lid.
“I’ll have to cut it,” she said.
Nico crouched beside her.
“Do it.”
“That root feeds half the tree.”
“Tamsin.”
She looked at the old bark.
Roots first.
Vic’s words.
For years she had believed he meant strength.
Now she understood.
Sometimes the thing that kept you alive could also be the thing hiding what would destroy you.
She took out a small saw.
Halfway through the root, a flashlight swept between the trees.
“Who’s there?”
One of Kel’s guards.
A dog moved beside him.
Nico stood.
“Stay down.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“I didn’t ask you to leave. I asked you to finish.”
The guard’s flashlight found Nico.
“Mr. Basano?”
The guard lifted his radio.
Tamsin moved.
Her hand closed over his wrist.
“Breathe.”
He lost the radio.
“Turn.”
His knees folded.
“Give.”
She lowered him facedown onto the grass and tied his wrists with garden twine.
Nico looked at the knot.
“Is that tomato twine?”
“It’s reinforced.”
“It’s green.”
“Would you prefer ribbon?”
Despite everything, he almost laughed.
A second voice sounded in the orchard.
Nico looked toward the lights.
“Get the box.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll handle it.”
The next guard appeared with his weapon drawn.
Nico stepped calmly into view.
“Sir?”
“Put that down.”
“Mr. Dunmore said nobody comes into the orchard.”
“Then Mr. Dunmore forgot who owns it.”
The guard hesitated.
Nico glanced at the old pear tree.
“You’re upsetting my gardener.”
The absurdity of the sentence stunned the guard long enough for Tamsin to wrench the tin free.
She and Nico reached the greenhouse at two in the morning.
Her hands were bleeding.
His were shaking.
Inside the box lay a sealed letter.
An old laboratory report from Albany.
And a chipped blue-and-white teacup.
Nico stared at the cup.
“My father’s.”
“You’re sure?”
“There were twelve.”
His voice went hollow.
“He always used the chipped one.”
Tamsin unfolded the lab report.
Residue from the cup had tested positive for cardiac glycosides consistent with concentrated digitalis.
Foxglove.
The next morning Nico read Vic’s final letter alone.
When he emerged, he handed it to Tamsin.
Nicolo,
Your father died from what was put in his tea.
By the third evening I knew something was wrong. He complained that the lamps looked yellow. His heart fluttered.
Every afternoon his wife brought him tea.
She used my honey.
If anyone investigated, my name would be on the jar.
I took his cup after he died and had it tested.
Serena found out.
She showed me bank transfers in my name and told me she could make the police believe I killed him.
Then she told me you would be next.
I ran because I thought disappearing would keep you alive.
I was wrong to leave you with her.
Look at the flowers behind the greenhouse.
Look at who pours the tea.
V.
Nico stood at the window.
“She raised me.”
Tamsin said nothing.
“She tied my shoes when I was eight. Stayed beside my bed when I had scarlet fever.”
His voice cracked.
“She held my hand at my father’s funeral.”
“And she brings you tea.”
He turned angrily.
“A dead man wrote a letter. We found a cup buried in dirt. That proves poison existed. It doesn’t prove she poured it.”
Tamsin felt the accusation beneath his words.
“You think I’m part of this?”
“I think I need facts.”
“You’re allowed to need facts.”
“Then stop looking at me like I’ve betrayed him.”
“You’re betraying yourself.”
His face hardened.
She immediately wished she could take it back.
But the words were true.
Theo drove the cup and report to an independent laboratory in Albany.
At noon, Serena entered Nico’s study carrying tea.
Tamsin was watering the lemon tree.
Serena smiled.
“Would you leave us, dear?”
Tamsin looked at Nico.
He gave the smallest nod.
She stepped into the hall.
Ten minutes later Nico emerged.
The cup was empty.
Tamsin stared at it.
“You drank it?”
“Not all of it.”
“You drank it?”
“I needed to know.”
“That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard.”
“I have heard worse.”
“Nico.”
His face changed.
His hand went to the wall.
The color disappeared from his skin.
Tamsin caught him before he hit the floor.
He tried to speak.
Nothing came out.
Then his body convulsed.
The next hour became sirens and shouting.
At the hospital in Poughkeepsie, the emergency physician told Tamsin that Nico had dangerous arrhythmias and signs consistent with poisoning.
They stabilized him.
Barely.
Theo never reached Albany.
Kel’s security men forced his car off the highway.
He survived with two broken ribs.
The evidence disappeared.
By Wednesday morning, Serena controlled the estate.
She moved with terrifying softness.
Nico’s meetings were canceled.
Outside advisers were told he had suffered a cardiac episode.
Tamsin was fired.
Kel personally delivered the letter.
“Your employment is terminated immediately.”
He stood inside the greenhouse doorway with two men behind him.
Tamsin read the page.
“You forged his signature badly.”
Kel smiled.
“You have until noon.”
“What happens if I stay?”
“You’re intelligent enough not to ask.”
He stepped closer.
“I knew there was something wrong with you the morning I saw you in that rose bed.”
“No. You knew there was something wrong with your plan.”
His smile vanished.
She left.
Not because Kel had won.
Because Nico’s last lucid words at the hospital had been for her.
“Go home.”
She thought he was pushing her away.
Then he gripped her wrist.
“Roots first.”
So she went to Walton.
To Willow Row Farm.
Her grandmother found her crying behind the barn.
Not politely.
Not quietly.
Tamsin cried like a person who had spent fifteen years believing control was the same thing as strength.
Her grandmother sat beside her on an overturned bucket.
When Tamsin finally stopped, the old woman said, “This Nico fellow. You love him?”
Tamsin laughed through tears.
“I have known him for four days.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“I don’t know.”
“Good.”
“What?”
“People get stupid when they think knowing is required immediately.”
Tamsin leaned against her shoulder.
“I left him there.”
“You came home because he told you to.”
“Same thing.”
“No.”
Her grandmother looked toward the orchard.
“Sometimes standing means staying.”
She looked back at Tamsin.
“Sometimes it means knowing when to go get help.”
The answer arrived the following morning.
A black sedan came up the farm road.
Theo climbed out slowly, bruised and bandaged.
He carried a folder.
“The lab kept a digital copy of Vic’s old report,” he said.
Tamsin stared.
“And the hospital drew Nico’s blood before Serena’s people could interfere.”
Theo handed her the pages.
Digitalis.
Again.
Not enough by itself.
But there was more.
Mrs. Abate, the estate kitchen manager, had called Theo.
For six months Serena had personally taken dried foxglove material from a locked medicinal cabinet used by the estate’s horticultural program.
Mrs. Abate had seen her.
So had another employee.
Kel had falsified maintenance logs on the orchard gate.
And the attacker’s phone records tied him to Kel.
Tamsin looked at Theo.
“Where’s Nico?”
“Back at Cypress Rise.”
“They released him?”
“Serena transferred him to a private physician.”
“That sounds terrible.”
“It is.”
Theo’s eyes hardened.
“Saturday is the harvest dinner.”
Every major family connected to Nico’s organization would be there.
Serena planned to announce that Nico was too ill to continue.
Her biological son, Dario, would be put forward as the new head.
Tamsin understood.
“This was never just about killing Nico.”
“No.”
Theo shook his head.
“It was about replacing him.”
Part Three
The harvest dinner began at seven.
At seven-twenty-three, Tamsin Row entered Cypress Rise through the greenhouse.
She wore clean jeans, work boots, a dark wool coat, and Vic’s grafting knife in her pocket.
No dress.
No disguise.
She came as exactly what she was.
The gardener.
The conservatory beyond the dining hall glowed with candlelight.
Eight powerful men sat at the long table with their wives, advisers, and attorneys.
At the head sat Nico.
He looked pale.
But alive.
Serena sat to his right.
Dario sat to his left.
Kel stood near the doors.
A blue china cup rested beside Nico’s hand.
Tamsin stopped in the doorway.
Kel saw her first.
His expression changed.
“You were told to stay off this property.”
Nico turned.
For one terrible second she could not read his face.
Then he said, “She works here.”
Serena smiled.
“Nicolo, darling, you’re confused.”
“No.”
His voice was weak but steady.
“My gardener.”
Tamsin walked into the room.
Kel moved toward her.
Nico said, “Touch her and I will consider it an attack on me.”
Every head turned.
Kel stopped.
Tamsin reached the table and placed Theo’s folder beside Nico.
Serena’s smile remained.
“What is this performance supposed to accomplish?”
“Nothing,” Tamsin said.
“I’m only good with plants.”
She looked at the cup.
“But plants are enough.”
Serena’s eyes sharpened.
Tamsin continued.
“Foxglove contains cardiac glycosides. In controlled medicine, related compounds can be useful. In the wrong dose, they disrupt the heart.”
A murmur moved around the table.
Serena laughed softly.
“So now the gardener is a doctor.”
“No.”
Tamsin looked at Nico.
“But I know what grows behind my greenhouse.”
Kel stepped in.
“That’s enough.”
Another voice answered from the hallway.
“No. It isn’t.”
Theo entered.
Two state investigators came behind him.
Kel’s hand moved toward his jacket.
Half the room rose.
“Don’t,” Nico said.
Kel froze.
Theo set a second folder on the table.
“The hospital confirmed digitalis exposure in Nico’s blood.”
Serena did not move.
“The same compound,” Theo continued, “was found twelve years ago in Aurelio Basano’s teacup.”
Dario stared at his mother.
“What?”
Serena looked at him.
“Sit down.”
“Mom.”
“Sit.”
Tamsin had never heard a mother speak to a grown son with such cold command.
Mrs. Abate appeared in the doorway.
Her hands were trembling.
Her voice was not.
“Mrs. Basano took foxglove from my locked cabinet every week.”
Serena slowly turned.
Mrs. Abate swallowed.
“Every Monday since March.”
“No.”
Serena smiled.
“You’re mistaken.”
“I watched you grind it.”
Silence.
Dario stood.
“You told me Nico was sick.”
Serena looked at him sharply.
“You told me he wanted me to take over.”
“Dario.”
“You said he was dying anyway.”
Kel suddenly moved.
Not toward the door.
Toward Tamsin.
He crossed the distance fast, one hand reaching inside his coat.
Tamsin saw the shoulder turn.
Saw the weight shift.
Saw everything Vic had taught her.
She stepped in.
Caught the wrist.
“Breathe.”
Kel cursed.
She turned.
His weapon never cleared his jacket.
“Turn.”
She folded his arm against the joint.
He dropped to one knee.
“Give.”
He hit the carpet.
Hard.
Tamsin held him there.
Nico stared down at his security chief.
“Funny,” he said quietly. “You never liked gardeners.”
One of the investigators removed Kel’s weapon and handcuffed him.
Then everyone looked at Serena.
She sat at the table, silver hair perfect, hands folded.
Her eyes settled on Nico.
“I wanted you to have it.”
Nobody spoke.
Nico looked almost ill again.
“Have what?”
“Everything.”
Her voice was gentle.
“Your father was going to destroy us.”
“My father?”
“He found your uncle’s hidden accounts. He was going to cut my family out. Send me back to Newark with nothing after I had given that house twenty years.”
“So you killed him.”
Serena’s eyes filled.
And somehow the tears made it worse.
“I protected you.”
Nico stared at her.
“You poisoned my father.”
“I kept his empire from collapsing.”
“You framed Vic.”
“He was loyal enough to disappear.”
Tamsin’s grip tightened around Kel’s wrist.
Serena looked at Nico with unbearable tenderness.
“You were a boy. You needed stability.”
“I was twenty-six.”
“You were still my boy.”
Nico flinched.
Dario whispered, “And me?”
Serena turned.
“What about you?”
“You were going to make me head of the family.”
“For your own future.”
“After murdering him?”
“I was preventing weakness.”
Dario’s face collapsed.
“No.”
Serena’s eyes hardened.
“You always were sentimental.”
That did it.
Not the evidence.
Not the officers.
Not Kel in handcuffs.
Dario stepped backward as if his mother had struck him.
Outside, blue and red lights swept across the windows.
Serena rose.
For forty years she had moved through Cypress Rise as though the house belonged to her more completely than brick or blood.
Now an investigator approached.
She held out her wrists.
Before they led her away, she stopped beside Nico.
He could not look at her.
“You’ll understand one day,” she whispered.
Nico’s voice was barely audible.
“No.”
He finally met her eyes.
“I understand now.”
She left.
Kel went with her.
The great harvest dinner ended without dessert.
By midnight, Cypress Rise was silent.
Tamsin found Nico in the greenhouse.
Of course.
He sat beside the lemon tree.
Fresh soil surrounded its roots.
One new green bud had appeared near the top.
Tamsin noticed it immediately.
“You saved it.”
Nico looked at her.
“You saved it.”
“I gave instructions.”
“I followed them.”
“That must have hurt.”
“Deeply.”
She smiled.
Then neither of them knew what to say.
Four days of terror had somehow been easier than quiet.
Nico stood.
“I owe you an apology.”
“Yes.”
He blinked.
“I had prepared a speech.”
“You can still give it.”
“I accused you of lying.”
“You were scared.”
“That does not make it acceptable.”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“I used your grandmother’s farm against you.”
“Yes.”
“I mistrusted the man who saved my life because believing he betrayed us was easier than admitting I never looked hard enough.”
Tamsin’s eyes stung.
“He thought he failed you too.”
Nico looked toward the dark orchard.
“Maybe you can tell him we were both wrong.”
They stood quietly.
Then Nico reached into his coat.
He held out an envelope.
Tamsin frowned.
“What is that?”
“The note on your grandmother’s mortgage has been purchased.”
Her face changed.
“No.”
“I knew you’d say that.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
“You promised the farm was off the table.”
“It is.”
“Then why are you holding my grandmother’s mortgage?”
“Because I bought the bank.”
Tamsin stared at him.
“That is the most mafia answer anyone has ever given me.”
“It was a small bank.”
“Nico.”
He held up a hand.
“Listen before you throw me into a flower bed.”
She crossed her arms.
“The debt remains.”
She blinked.
“I did not pay it.”
“What?”
“You and your grandmother will make the same monthly payments you can afford. No balloon payment. No foreclosure. No tricks.”
“Why?”
“Because you refused charity before I even offered it.”
“I would have.”
“I know.”
He handed her the document.
“You keep your farm by paying for it. You simply get enough time.”
Tamsin looked down at the paper.
Her throat closed.
“That’s still a favor.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know how to repay you.”
“You already did.”
His gaze moved toward the house.
“You gave me twelve years back.”
“No. I gave you the truth.”
“Exactly.”
She folded the envelope.
Then she looked toward the orchard.
“The pear tree may not survive.”
“I know.”
“I cut one of its main roots.”
“I watched.”
“It could take years.”
Nico nodded.
“Then it takes years.”
The simplicity of the answer broke something open inside her.
He stepped closer.
“Tamsin.”
“What?”
“Do you remember the greenhouse?”
“Unfortunately.”
“I asked you something.”
Her heart changed rhythm.
She remembered.
May I?
Not tonight, she had said.
Ask me when it’s quiet.
It was quiet now.
No guns.
No shouting.
No secrets buried beneath roots.
Just rain beginning softly against the greenhouse roof.
Nico stood close enough that she could see exhaustion beneath his eyes.
“May I?” he asked.
Tamsin thought about it honestly.
“Yes.”
He kissed her carefully.
Not like a mafia boss.
Not like a man who owned anything.
Like someone who understood that permission was a gift.
When they separated, Nico rested his forehead lightly against hers.
“I have one problem.”
“That sounds ominous.”
“You work for me.”
“I do.”
“I’m told this complicates things.”
“Who told you?”
“My attorney.”
“Fire him.”
A laugh escaped him.
A real one.
Tamsin smiled.
“No. Don’t fire your attorney.”
“Good. He’s expensive.”
The following spring, the old pear tree bloomed.
Not everywhere.
Only on one side.
The side above the root Tamsin had cut produced nothing.
But the northern branches opened in hundreds of white blossoms.
Tamsin stood beneath them early one April morning.
Theo came through the orchard carrying two coffees.
“You were right,” he said.
“Usually am.”
He handed her one.
Nico appeared beyond the roses.
No guards followed him.
That part had taken months.
Some habits healed more slowly than trees.
The criminal case against Serena and Kel moved through the courts. Evidence from the hospital, staff testimony, financial records, and the revived investigation into Aurelio’s death had finally given authorities what Vic had never possessed alone.
Proof that could survive daylight.
Dario left the Basano organization entirely.
Mrs. Abate still ran the kitchen and still complained that everyone was too thin.
Theo had adopted the dog from the orchard after discovering that it preferred greenhouse naps to security work.
And Willow Row Farm remained in Tamsin’s grandmother’s name.
Every month, Tamsin mailed the payment herself.
Nico had tried once to automate it.
She threatened him with a shovel.
He never suggested it again.
Tamsin had also changed Cypress Rise.
The foxglove bed was gone.
In its place grew bee balm, lavender, asters, and wild bergamot.
Pollinator plants.
A small wooden hive stood near the southern wall.
On the first warm morning in April, bees moved through the pear blossoms.
Nico stopped beneath the tree.
“You did that for him.”
Tamsin looked up into the white branches.
“For Vic?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
She watched a bee disappear inside a blossom.
“I did it because he would have hated being turned into a monument.”
Nico smiled.
“He did hate attention.”
“You really knew him.”
“I did.”
“And so did you.”
That truth no longer hurt.
Not in the same way.
Tamsin reached into her pocket and took out Vic’s grafting knife.
The brass collar caught the morning sun.
Nico touched the worn initials his father had stamped there decades earlier.
“He taught both of us,” Tamsin said.
“Different things.”
“Maybe not.”
She looked at him.
“He taught me you don’t win by being stronger.”
Nico nodded slowly.
“He taught me the most dangerous man in the room is the one who has nothing left to prove.”
“Sounds like him.”
“He also taught me to drive.”
“How badly?”
“I put a truck through your pear-tree wall.”
Tamsin stared.
“That was you?”
Nico looked offended.
“It was twenty-seven years ago.”
“I have spent two years wondering why those stones don’t match.”
“Tamsin.”
“You destroyed a historic orchard wall.”
“I was eleven.”
“Criminal behavior starts young.”
“You are enjoying this.”
“Immensely.”
Theo’s laughter carried from the greenhouse.
Nico slipped his hand into hers.
For a man who had spent half his life surrounded by people, he had once believed needing anyone made him weak.
Tamsin had believed something similar from the opposite direction.
She had made herself invisible because invisible people were harder to hurt.
Vic had known better than both of them.
Roots first.
Strength was not the absence of dependence.
A tree survived because of what connected it to the earth.
A person survived for much the same reason.
Nico looked toward the restored rose walk.
“You know, there is one mystery I still haven’t solved.”
“What?”
“How someone works on my property for two years without me noticing her.”
Tamsin squeezed his hand.
“I worked very hard at it.”
“And now?”
She looked at the greenhouse, the new hive, the wounded pear tree blooming anyway.
Then at the man beside her.
“Now I think I’m done hiding.”
Nico leaned down and kissed her temple.
Above them, petals loosened in the breeze.
White blossoms drifted over the old garden where one man had died, another had nearly died, and a woman everyone had mistaken for only a gardener had finally learned the last lesson her teacher had been trying to give her.
Standing your ground did not always mean fighting.
Sometimes it meant telling the truth.
Sometimes it meant walking away.
Sometimes it meant staying after the danger was gone and allowing yourself to be seen.
Tamsin watched a bee settle on the nearest flower.
For the first time in years, she did not think about surviving the next month.
She thought about summer.
THE END.
