Tainted Innocence

Chapter 5

Lila's POV

The bus stopped with a hiss, as if it was tired of carrying other people’s secrets. The dry, unending heat of Arizona wrapped over me and pulled the last chill of St. Louis out of my bones. I stepped down with a paper bag in my hand, which held everything I hadn’t sold.

Bernard’s store was on the edge of Main Street, painted a bright turquoise that wouldn’t fade. Before the doorbell rang, I could smell the lilies. Cool air mixed with green stalks and wet ground inside.

He looked up from the bar. He was tall and thin, with sun-browned skin, hair tied back, and pollen on his apron. His eyes were kind, like a safe harbor.

He started with “Lila Carter,” but then he spotted my warning glance. I gently corrected him, “Quinn.”

“Just Lila Quinn.”

He nodded, and something in his eyes flickered, maybe sadness or understanding.

“Okay, Miss Quinn.”

“You look like you need a drink of water and eight hours of sleep.”

He gave me all of them and a key with a metal tag fashioned like a flower on it.

“Room upstairs. Don’t worry about the creaky step, it keeps burglars honest.”

The room was small, the bed narrow, and the window looked down on the roof of the greenhouse. It still smelled like dirt and soap, clean and alive.

I felt the quilt, which had been sewn by hand and had irregular seams. My chest finally relaxed enough for me to take a complete breath for the first time since the wedding turmoil.

By nightfall, Bernard had me putting tulips in a vase and showing me how to cut stems underwater. His voice broke the silence I had been carrying with me.

“You have a steady hand,” he added.

“I’m good at acting like I’m not shaking.”

He smiled. “Just act like you need it. Flowers don’t judge.”

The town outside smelled like rain on heated asphalt as he bolted the door that night. I leaned against the upper window frame and watched the headlights sweep the deserted street.

A man in a dark suit stood next to a black automobile across the street, holding a camera. The flash only lasted a second before darkness took him again.

I blinked, sure it was just a trick of the light, but the flash’s echo burned behind my eyes long after I went to bed.

The months went by like a ribbon, slowly, gently, and with the light shining on them. My belly got round when I wore borrowed gowns. Bernard joked that I moved like I was carrying the moon.

He let me spend hours in the greenhouse, where sunshine came through the glass in golden squares and the air smelled like life beginning.

People came and went, like the bride choosing lilies and the farmer’s wife buying seed packets. Each person left behind a piece of their tale that I kept.

The store was more than a place to hide, it was a heartbeat and a hum. At night, Bernard poured tea and joked about how I arranged each flower like a sermon on color.

He stated one night, “You’ve turned this place into a cathedral of petals.”

“Better than a marble prison,” I said, and he laughed so hard that the flowers shook.

I would put my hand on the baby as she kicked and murmur to her about freedom and sunlight. The jasmine vine climbing the greenhouse wall after rain smelled like hope.

One customer stopped and commented, “You smell like spring, sweetheart.”

I smiled and felt bad. Bernard called from behind the desk, “That’s her natural perfume, trouble and miracle mixed together.”

For a short while, everything seemed normal and safe. The phone stopped ringing with numbers I didn’t know, and the nightmares ceased. On the weekends, I painted and read design books until the words got blurry.

Rumors about the world outside of Arizona grew.

One afternoon, I went outside with the trash and saw a familiar shape across the street. It was the same dark suit and the same stillness. He was leaning against the coffee stand, stirring his drink for too long. His eyes were veiled beneath tinted glasses, even though it was cloudy.

Our eyes met for a second, and my heart dropped.

I pretended to mess with the trash can, went back inside, locked the back door, and didn’t tell Bernard anything. But the taste of safety transformed to metal in my mouth.

That night, I dreamed again of camera flashes that were as brilliant as lightning and erased the faces of people I loved. The heat of the evening finally dissipated, and rain hammered on the roof while we counted the money. Bernard hummed out of tune, happy.

He put the keys in his pocket and remarked, “The shipment comes early tomorrow.”

“Sleep. You look like you’re already half asleep.”

He flipped the sign to “CLOSED” and led me to the stairs. I stood at the glass door for a long time, watching water trickle down the pane in shaky lines. Streetlights turned into halos. For a moment, tranquility felt real again.

Then a low whisper cut through the rain. A man’s voice, nearby, talking on the phone from the alley next to the store.

“Found her. The girl from Carter.”

The words were easygoing, practiced, and almost loving.

My skin got frigid. I tried hard to see, but the alley was a dark hole. The voice got quieter as the rain and a truck went by.

From upstairs, Bernard called, “Are you coming, Sunshine?”

I said, “Right behind you,” pushing calm into each word. My hands shook as I pulled the drape across the pane and slid the bolt.

The small room above smelled like wet dirt and lavender soap. I put on an old T-shirt and attempted to calm my breathing. The baby moved, slowly rolling under my ribcage as if it knew I was scared.

I muttered, “It’s okay,” but my heart didn’t trust me.

The walls turned white when lightning struck. For a second, something moved outside the window, a shape, the shine of metal. Then it was dark again.

I stepped over to the lamp and hovered my fingers over the switch, thinking about whether turning on the light would make me safer or easier to see. I picked light. The light bulb lit up and stayed that way.

The relief lasted only a second before spotlights raced over the room, bleaching everything. They stopped, with the engine running.

I ducked below the sill, my heart racing. The shutter of a camera clicked softly but surely through the thin glass. The light went away. On damp asphalt, tires hissed away.

I stayed down on the floor with one hand over my stomach until the silence got too much and the clock ticking seemed like footsteps going up the stairs.