Chapter 16
T he scent of lemon balm hit me before I even made it to the back porch.
It was mid-afternoon and oppressively hot—one of those heavy Charleston days when the air clings to your skin like wet cotton and every movement feels like a negotiation.
My mom had the big ceiling fans spinning lazily on the screened-in porch, lemonade sweating in a glass pitcher on the table, and two of her friends perched in wicker chairs like birds of prey in floral linen.
Growing up on Johns Island, I’d learned early that the heat wasn’t the only thing that pressed in on you.
Politics had a way of doing that, too—pressing, dividing, defining.
My parents were proud, vocal progressives in a region that leaned hard in the opposite direction.
They owned the local nursery, yes—but they also hosted fundraisers for Democratic candidates, volunteered at Planned Parenthood, and kept NPR playing on the back porch like it was gospel .
We were never ostracized—Charleston charm didn’t allow for that—but we were different.
The neighbors waved politely, but their kids went to private schools with honor codes that leaned toward the evangelical.
I played with those kids. Had sleepovers in houses where we blessed every meal and said ma’am and sir like it was currency.
I learned how to nod along when someone said marriage was between a man and a woman, how to laugh politely when someone called liberalism a disease.
There were good people on both sides of the aisle—I still believed that.
But my parents’ friends stuck close, like a school of fish navigating deeper water.
They were louder, sharper, more open in their living rooms than they ever were at city council meetings.
By the time I left for Penn, I’d imagined I’d never come back. I was going to make my life in a city—maybe D.C., maybe New York. Somewhere that didn’t smell like pluff mud and magnolia. Somewhere I didn’t have to explain that yes, I was from the South, and no, I didn’t vote like it.
But then came grad school. Then came a teaching offer from the College of Charleston too good to pass up. Then came roots I didn’t expect to replant.
I told myself it was temporary.
It wasn’t.
Now, I lived twelve minutes from the house I grew up in, surrounded by the same oaks, the same moss-draped roads, the same genteel judgment dressed up in hospitality.
“Zara!” Mom called out as I rounded the corner, her voice honey-sweet and a little too loud. “You made it, honey!”
I pasted on a smile. “Told you I would. ”
She stood to kiss my cheek, then pulled me into a half-hug before ushering me toward the open seat. “You remember Miss Tina and Miss Gloria, right?”
“Of course,” I said, nodding at the women, both of whom looked at me with the kind of expressions that said they’d been talking about me the moment before I arrived.
“How’s your column, dear?” Tina asked, sliding her sunglasses down her nose just enough to examine me over the frames. Her pearls gleamed like a threat.
“It’s … busy,” I said carefully, taking a seat. “This week especially.”
“Oh, we know,” Gloria said with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “That article of yours is everywhere. My niece sent it to me the moment it went live, said it was making the rounds in her office.”
“That’s flattering,” I murmured, reaching for a glass of lemonade I didn’t particularly want.
“Course, we couldn’t help but notice what it was about,” Tina said, leaning forward like she was about to deliver a prayer request—or a dagger. “All this talk about that escort service—what’s it called again, Glor?”
“I think they’re calling it Alpha something,” Gloria supplied, her voice syrupy. “Alpha Men?”
“Alpha Mail,” I corrected before I could stop myself. “Like a pun.”
“Right,” Tina said with a smile sharp enough to draw blood. “Pun or not, it’s just plain scandalous. Don’t you think?”
I took a slow sip of lemonade. “I think what’s more scandalous is how quickly everyone assumes women are being duped instead of making deliberate choices.”
“Well, deliberate or not,” Gloria said, “I read they’re recruiting here in Charleston. Imagine that. Right under our noses. Young women being flown off to who knows where to be”—she glanced toward my mother, voice dropping to a whisper—“used.”
My mother shifted beside me. “Now, I don’t know about all that,” she said, trying to sound neutral and failing spectacularly. “But I will say, I was surprised to see your byline on something so ... provocative.”
“It’s not new,” I said. “I’ve written about sex work and power dynamics for years.”
“Yes,” Gloria said. “But never with this much heat behind it. There’s chatter, you know. At church. The club. Your name’s come up more than once.”
My stomach turned. I knew how this town worked. Whisper campaigns in Charleston were like humidity—thick, inescapable, and always worst when you pretended not to notice.
“And what are they saying exactly?” I asked, trying not to sound defensive.
Tina raised a brow. “That you seem awfully well-informed for someone writing hypothetically.”
The air shifted.
My mom gave a tight smile and changed the subject—asked whether the new lemon balm in the herb garden had taken root. But the damage was already done. The implication hung in the air like a thundercloud.
I made polite conversation. Asked about their grandkids. Let myself be pulled into a discussion about new signage for the nursery’s weekend market. But inside, I was unraveling.
Not because I’d been caught.
Because I hadn’t.
Because these women were circling, sniffing, but they hadn’t found the meat of it yet.
They didn’t know that I’d been writhing beneath a man whose name I hadn’t known until the plane ride home.
That I’d let him touch me like I was his to worship.
That I was seeing him again tonight and already imagining the feel of his breath on my neck.
They didn’t know that Alpha Mail wasn’t just a controversy I was covering. It was a fire I’d walked into willingly.
After the women left—kisses on cheeks and tight-lipped smiles all around—I helped my mom water the porch plants and refill the hummingbird feeder. She didn’t mention the gossip again. But when I said I needed to get home, she didn’t argue.
“You’ve got plans tonight,” she said as she rinsed her hands in the sink.
I hesitated. “I do.”
She didn’t look at me. “Is it with him?”
The question was soft. Not judgmental. But not innocent either.
“Yes,” I said finally.
She nodded. “Is he ... good to you?”
My throat tightened. “I think so.”
My mom turned then, drying her hands on a linen towel. “Zara, I know I can’t tell you how to live your life. You’ve always been strong-willed. Fierce. Like your daddy.”
“But?” I asked, because I could feel it coming.
“But this town doesn’t always give second chances. Once they decide who you are—especially as a woman—it’s hard to change their minds.”
I nodded slowly. “I know.”
She stepped forward and touched my cheek. “Just don’t let someone else write your story before you’re ready to live it. ”
I swallowed. “I’ll be careful.”
She smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “No, honey. I hope you’ll be bold. Just … know the cost.”
I left not long after, heart heavy and head pounding. The drive back to my townhouse felt longer than usual, like every red light was a reminder. I couldn’t get over how the neighborhood looked exactly the same, but I felt different.
Like I was walking through the same world in a body that wasn’t mine anymore.
By the time I pulled into the drive, the sun was beginning to lower in the sky. I sat in the car for a minute, staring at the front door like it might open on its own.
I had two hours until Ronan.
It felt like the whole world would be watching.
My imagination? Maybe.
But paranoia had a way of blooming fast when the gossip vines started growing.
I stepped inside, dropped my bag by the door, and kicked off my sandals with a little too much force.
The townhouse was cool, dim, and still—the kind of stillness that lets every thought echo louder than it should.
My phone buzzed as I climbed the stairs.
Another email. Then another. A missed call from a producer I didn’t recognize.
A voicemail from a student needing advising.
A text from a colleague: “This piece is going to make waves. You okay with that?”
I didn’t respond to any of it.
Instead, I walked into the bathroom, turned the water on hot, and stripped off the afternoon like it was a costume I was done performing in.
The shower hissed to life, fogging the mirror and softening the light.
I stepped in and let it scald me. Let it steam the porch gossip and the guilt from my skin.
I washed my hair slowly, deliberately, like it could help me remember who I was before all of this—before him.
But even then, even under the weight of water and eucalyptus, I knew I wasn’t trying to go back.
I was preparing. Becoming.
I shaved carefully—ankles, knees, thighs.
Lotioned every inch of skin with the same patience I used to reserve for interviews and student recs.
Slid the glass bottle of rose oil across my collarbones.
Used the nice body scrub I always saved for special occasions, even though I’d long since stopped believing in the kind of special that came with champagne and long dinners.
This was a different kind of occasion.
By the time I stepped out, the sun had dipped low enough to stain the bathroom window amber. I wrapped myself in a towel and padded barefoot into the bedroom, ignoring the blinking laptop, the texts that kept appearing like a drumbeat I refused to march to.
I was clean. Smooth. Soft in all the right places.
And terrified.
But somewhere under the fear, under the heat still coiled in my belly from just thinking about him, I also felt still. Certain.
This was mine.
And if it all blew up tomorrow—if the whispers turned into headlines and the headlines turned into professional collapse—I wouldn’t be destitute.
I’d been frugal for years. I lived below my means.
I had savings. Investments. A backup plan, like any good Southern woman raised by parents who knew the system would never quite be on their side.
I could weather the storm. I might not land on my feet, but I wouldn’t break on impact .
And anyway, what was the alternative?
To spend my whole life writing about fire while never stepping close enough to feel the heat?
I walked to the closet and ran my fingers along the dresses—floral, linen, academic, a little self-consciously feminist. But none of them felt right. None of them felt like they belonged to the version of me who had been hunted through the underbrush and then held like a secret.
I finally settled on something I’d bought on impulse last fall and never worn. Silk. Midnight blue. Slit up one side, fitted through the waist, thin straps. It was elegant enough to pass for respectable and sinful enough to undo me if he touched me just right.
Perfect.
I slipped it on, let the fabric cool against my skin, then turned toward the mirror. My face was flushed, my pulse visible at my throat. I reached for mascara, brushed it on with a steadier hand than I felt. A swipe of lip balm. Tiny gold hoops. A spray of perfume behind each ear.
Not armor. Not disguise.
Just … readiness.
I still had forty minutes.
But I couldn’t sit still.
So, I paced. Sipped water. Checked my phone only to set it down again. I wasn’t going to read the reactions. Not now. Not tonight. Let them argue. Let them pick it apart. The version of me they were debating didn’t exist—not really.
And the man I was seeing?
He didn’t exist for them at all.
Just for me.
I grabbed my clutch, checked the time, and took one last breath before stepping into the thick Charleston twilight.
Ronan would be waiting.
And this time, I wasn’t going to lie to myself about what I wanted.