Jack’s POV
Something wasn’t right.
I felt it the second I walked back into the cottage. The air was different—tense, heavy with the kind of silence that presses in on the skin. Jennifer sat at the edge of the bed, knees pulled to her chest, eyes wide and glassy as if she’d seen something I hadn’t.
“Jennifer?” I said her name carefully, as if any wrong sound might make her shatter.
She flinched. Not much—just a twitch of her shoulders, but I caught it. Her arms tightened around her knees and she looked at me without really looking at me.
“What happened?”
She shook her head quickly, strands of hair falling into her face. “Nothing.”
The lie was obvious. It clung to her voice, thin and brittle, like glass about to crack. I took a step closer, but she shrank back instinctively, pressing
