Chapter 6 - The Rose Branch Falls
The white rose branch slipped from Tabitha’s hand.
It fell against the path with a soft scrape of leaves and thorns.
Tabitha looked down at it as if it had betrayed her too.
Paige noticed the torn petals.
Her father had hated seeing rose branches broken carelessly.
He always said roses were strong, not invincible.
People confused the two.
Paige understood that sentence differently now.
She had survived Calvin leaving.
Survived Tabitha’s public smiles.
Survived Kyle’s patronizing condolences.
Survived walking through this estate after her father died and hearing every room ask where he had gone.
But survival was not invincibility.
Her hand shook around the phone.
Penelope heard the silence.
“Paige, breathe.”
Paige did.
Once.
Twice.
Tabitha seized the moment.
“You’re falling apart.”
Paige looked at her.
“No. I’m feeling things you don’t understand.”
Tabitha’s nostrils flared.
“You think grief gives you moral ownership of this place?”
Paige’s eyes sharpened.
“No. My father did.”
Tabitha stepped forward too fast.
Paige stepped back once, not in fear, but to keep space.
“Careful,” Penelope said through the speaker.
Tabitha heard it and stopped, teeth clenched.
The recording continued.
Morning light struck the cream stone mansion behind them. Its balconies and arched windows looked untouched by the ugliness unfolding in the garden.
Tabitha pointed toward the house.
“Calvin invested years into this family.”
“He invested in proximity.”
“You don’t know what he sacrificed.”
Paige’s voice turned cold.
“He sacrificed me first.”
Tabitha’s face twisted.
For one second, she looked almost pleased by that.
Then she remembered the phone.
Too late.
Paige saw the satisfaction before it vanished.
So did the recording.
Penelope remained silent, perhaps listening, perhaps waiting, perhaps building whatever legal shape these words would become.
Paige looked toward the garden gate.
Tabitha looked there too.
Escape had become tempting.
But leaving meant abandoning the envelope.
Staying meant speaking near the phone.
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Tabitha was trapped between greed and fear.
Read Chapter 7 👉 Because Tabitha wanted the mansion, but the sealed envelope made her afraid to leave Paige alone with the roses.
