Free The Slow Burn of Silence (A Snowy Creek Novel) by Loreth Anne White

he’s vowed to keep it that way.
    As I wait for the truck to warm, I try again. “Why won’t you tell me the reason you hit Missy?”
    Silence.
    Frustration bites. I concentrate on keeping my voice level. “It would really help to know what upset you like that, because then we can deal with it—”
    “They’re bitches,” she snaps suddenly.
    I count to twenty, then say, calmly, “So they said something that provoked you, something that made you mad?”
    Quinn glowers in sullen silence at some arbitrary spot on the glove compartment.
    “Look,” I soften my voice, “I really do want to help you. Please tell me what went down on that field, because if those girls said something hurtful, that’s bullying, and we can’t just pretend it never happened. It’ll only fester.”
    My niece turns her face abruptly away and stares out the window. Her knuckles are white and tight over the backpack on her lap.
    I suck in a deep breath. Take it easy. She’s had a rough time. One wrong move now could send everything backwar d . . .
    “Okay, maybe we can talk about it over dinner. Let’s get some takeout. What would you like?”
    She remains mute. The heel of her Blundstone begins to kick at the base of the seat.
    “Pizza?”
    Silence.
    “Fried chicken?”
    “Not hungry.”
    I decide to let this ride, just a little. Maybe Quinn will be more receptive later tonight. Or tomorrow. It’s the start of Thanksgiving break—there’ll be no school for a week. Perhaps I could take time off work to just be with Quinn, do something special. A trip maybe. Conflict tightens in me. It’s a tricky time to be away from the paper with all the potential advertising contracts in the works, with the winter season and big turkey sales ramping up. Banrock is also going to be breathing down my neck now that he owns almost half my company.
    That deeper, darker fear snakes through me again— a dark-haired stranger on school grounds. Jeb out of priso n . . .
    “That man who stopped the fight,” I say. “Have you seen him before? Or was today the first time?”
    She keeps her head turned away. The kicking grows louder, more rhythmic.
    Tension knifes deeper. “The teachers described him as having black hair and wearing a black leather jacket. They said he was crouched down, talking to you, but as soon as they approached, he hurried away and disappeared into the trees.”
    The kicking of her Blundstone boot intensifies. The sound hammers inside my skull.
    “Missy and Abigail told Mrs. Davenport he followed you to the store earlier, and that you returned with a bag of candy. Is that true? What did he say to you?” I hate the pitch entering my voice.
    The interior of the truck cab is warming. I wait a few more moments mostly because I don’t know what the hell to do. The more I think about it, the more I worry it could be Jeb.
    “Did you talk to him on the way to the store?”
    Silence.
    “Tell me, Quinn!”
    She spins round, her eyes flashing. “They’re bitches! They’re all liars ! He hasn’t been following me—he was just walking past the school when it happened. He’s not a bad man!”
    Perspiration prickles over my brow. I take a deep, slow breath. “Did he buy you the candy, then? Did he ask you questions?”
    “So what if he did? No one does anything nice for me. He’s a nice man.”
    “Did he ask where you live?”
    Silence, heavy and dark, boils back up around her like an invisible cloud.
    I reach forward and ram the truck into gear, reminding myself she’s lost her parents in a horrific fire. She’s been uprooted and forced to live with a young aunt she doesn’t even know that well. New town, new school. New friends. Ripped out of her life. Floundering.
    We both are.
    And suddenly I feel so alone, so unequipped. None of my peers have kids this age. Trey is gone. I have the big house, a business I don’t fully understand yet. I miss Sophia and Peter. I miss my dad. The overall sense of loss is deep, a chasm in my