Behind me, one of the shelter women clears her throat.
“That’s not exactly how it happened,” she says carefully.
Gianna’s head snaps toward her.
“What do you mean?”
“You weren’t there,” the woman says, and though her voice is soft, it does not shake. “Lainey was.”
A ripple moves through the hall.
Gianna laughs lightly.
“I was coordinating from upstairs.”
The second woman shakes her head.
“No,” she says. “You weren’t.”
Silence tightens.
Ezra’s jaw flexes faintly as he looks between them, and I can see the calculation in his eyes as two narratives collide in front of him.
He could shut this down.
He could correct it.
He could speak.
Instead, he says nothing.
The silence stretches.
And something inside my chest goes cold.
Because silence in a moment like this is not neutral.
