Page 54 of Midnight at the Magnolia

How she’s already planning escape routes, though she thinks I don’t notice.

“Look at how she reads you,”Lauren’s memory presses.“Like a threat assessment. Like someone trained.”

“Ethan,” she says warmly, her voice like honey. “I wasn’t expecting you until later. Is everything okay?”

I take a deep breath, the familiar scent of her perfume—vanilla and jasmine—filling my senses. It’s the same scent that lingers on my pillows, that I associate with comfort and love. Now it feels like a betrayal. Another piece of her carefully constructed cover.

“You’re stalling,”Lauren chides.“Just like you stalled with me, right before everything fell apart.”

“Darling, I’ve been up all night trying to make sense of this.” My voice sounds strange to my own ears, strained and desperate. “Please, don’t make me regret trusting you. We need to talk, Celeste. In private.”

A flicker of something—fear? guilt?—crosses her face, but she nods, leading me to the back office. I watch her walk, my detective’s mind never stopping its relentless analysis:

The silent precision of her steps.

How she keeps me in her peripheral vision.

The calculated distance she maintains.

The way her hand brushes her thigh where a weapon might be concealed.

“She moves like I did,”Lauren whispers.“Like someone trained to kill.”

As soon as the door closes behind us, the sounds of the busy diner muffled to a distant hum, I turn to her. The small roomfeels claustrophobic, the walls seeming to close in. Every instinct screams danger, but I can’t tell if it’s professional awareness or heartbreak talking.

“Celeste, I’m drowning here. Throw me a lifeline of truth.” My voice cracks on her name. Even now, knowing what I know, it feels like a caress. “Where were you really two nights ago, around midnight?”

Celeste’s brow furrows, her fingers fidgeting with the hem of her apron. Another tell I’ve categorized: she only fidgets when she’s planning something. “I was here, doing inventory. Why?”

“Notice how smooth the lie comes,”Lauren’s voice whispers.“Like mine did, at the end.”

I pull out the security camera image, the paper crinkling loudly in the tense silence. My hands shake slightly—from exhaustion, from fear, from love, I’m not sure anymore. “Because this shows someone entering the diner at that exact time. Someone who moves an awful lot like you.”

She stares at the image, her face paling. My detective’s mind captures every micro-expression:

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