Mystery of the Missing Love Stone

1. Scarlet Sage

Scarlet Sage

By mid-May, everyone and everything in Sweetheart Haven gets dressed like a lovesick pageant queen except me.

Pink ribbons are wrapped around the old iron lampposts.

Flower baskets appear beneath every shop window.

Restaurants add sweetheart specials to their menus, and tourists pour in three weeks before the Month of Heart festival officially opens, because people love folklore, as long as it comes with matching souvenirs and a chance at lasting love.

Personally, I blame the legend. Nothing changes a town faster than becoming famous for romance.

I balance a stack of borrowed museum records against my hip and shoulder open the side door of Sweetheart Haven’s Heritage Hall before the air conditioning can fully quit on me.

The museum sits inside one of the oldest buildings in town, a converted boarding house with uneven hardwood floors, stubborn windows, and an air-conditioning unit that rattles constantly while accomplishing very little.

Inside, the air smells like old paper, polished wood, and the faint mildew every Florida building eventually surrenders to. The front desk sits beneath a massive festival banner that reads Celebrating 100 Years of Lasting Love.

Myrtle Vane stands behind the counter sorting pamphlets into exact stacks.

She has been running the Sweetheart Haven Historical Society since before I was born, yet she manages not to look a day over fifty.

Her silver-blond hair is pinned into a low twist that survives humidity better than the rest of us.

She glances up when I walk in.

A small pause follows. Her lips purse, and her nose wrinkles as though something foul entered the room. She takes in my green eyes and red hair with the same careful disapproval she gives mislabeled artifacts. Her expression adjusts quickly, though not quickly enough to hide the judgment.

“Morning, Scarlet.”

“Morning.” I set the records down one stack at a time, reluctant to let them go.

It has been a solid seventy-two hours of documents about the construction of the Everlasting Fountain and handwritten tourism proposals from the decade Sweetheart Haven realized people would pay money to kiss beside a swamp if the story came wrapped in enough flowers.

Myrtle flips through the top folder. “You finished with the tourism pamphlets already?”

“For now.”

Her brows rise. “That quickly?”

“They repeat themselves after 1972. After that, it’s mostly weather complaints and warnings against courting unreliable alphas.”

“That advice still feels relevant.”

“True.”

The corner of her mouth twitches before settling again.

We stand there for a second, in the kind of silence Sweetheart Haven specializes in: polite, measured, full of things nobody wants to say directly.

A pack wanders through the front exhibit behind me and stops at the large glass display holding the town’s most famous attraction, the Love Stone. Fun fact: it’s not a stone, and people tend to find that disappointing.

Every child in Sweetheart Haven grows up hearing about the Everlasting Pack and the alpha who carved the original token while their omega suffered through a dangerous heat.

The story claims the stone helped anchor the pack, while her body burned hot enough to threaten the bond.

Sussanah lived because of her pack’s protection circle, and according to the myth, her alpha’s devotion granted her a long life.

The town built an economy around the Everlasting Pack.

During the month-long festival, packs leave flowers at the fountain to honor the original lovers, eat honey cakes for abundance, swim in the springs, and exchange carved sweetheart stones as courting gifts.

Packs complete the Sweetheart Challenge to court their omegas and be granted an abundant bond.

They come from three states away to stand beneath festival lights and promise each other forever, in a town that claims forever holds better here.

The object beneath the museum lights is shaped more like an old river tooth than anything mystical.

A symbol curls across its surface, worn shallow with age.

Tourists touch the replica beside the case and swear their bonds feel stronger afterward.

Sweetheart Haven encourages that belief aggressively.

Myrtle closes the folder. “You putting all this in the new book?”

“Some of it.”

Her fingers smooth over the cover. “Be careful how you write about the festival this year.”

I lean one elbow on the counter. “You worried I’m going to expose the dark history of commemorative sweetheart mugs?”

Her expression remains flat. “I’m worried people are already nervous.”

My humor fades.

Sweetheart Haven survives on the belief that bonds formed here last. Lately, forever has become less reliable.

The Bennett bond collapsed last winter. Before that, the Thompsons separated after almost twenty years.

Two more fractures followed the spring equinox festival. Each one became a town emergency.

Myrtle lowers her voice. “Juneberry took a lot of heat after last year’s challenge.”

I look toward the museum windows. Festival banners sway outside in the morning air. “I know.”

“She cared about that pack.”

“I know.” My throat tightens before I can stop it.

Junie cared. Everyone knew it. The Sweetheart Challenge is supposed to introduce unattached omegas to compatible packs through a month of festival dates and ridiculous public courtship rituals.

At the end, nobody has to choose anyone.

Junie chose to bond her childhood sweethearts anyway while half the town watched like they were witnessing fate.

Three months later, the bond failed before it fully settled.

People blamed stress, incompatibility, and fear. Nobody blamed me out loud but they didn’t forget that I’d warned her either.

Myrtle watches me. “You probably shouldn’t have said anything before the ceremony.”

My fingers press lightly against the ache beneath my breastbone. The ache in my chest has been with me so long, I mostly register it as background. It’s the low pull of my omega instincts, waiting for care I stopped expecting long ago.

“I didn’t realize honesty counted as a public service violation.”

Her eyes sharpen. “You know that isn’t what I mean.”

I know exactly what she means.

I wish I could explain that I don’t predict these things. Sometimes I simply know when what I’m looking at isn’t true. The proof usually comes later. The problem with being right too often is that people eventually stop treating it like coincidence and start assuming it’s a character flaw.

I straighten and place the final folder on the counter. “Anything else you need?”

Myrtle hesitates. “No.”

I nod once and leave before either of us makes the conversation worse.

Downtown Sweetheart Haven hums with festival preparation.

Tourists drift between shops, carrying iced coffees and paper maps.

Vendors arrange booths around the square.

Someone tests speakers near the kissing stage beside the fountain, which feels unnecessary more than a week before the festival opens.

A group of teenage omegas rush past me in matching flower crowns, laughing with the easy lack of restraint that comes from knowing someone waits for them at the end of the day.

One notices me. The others glance over, and their conversation lowers as they cross the street.

My body feels the loss of their warmth before my mind can dismiss it. A faint hollowing opens beneath my sternum, old enough to be familiar.

It isn’t envy, exactly, but more of a habitual kind of grief.

I’ve had it long enough that I mostly don’t notice it anymore.

It’s the awareness that they can reach for affection without calculating whether the contact will end too quickly.

They expect comfort because experience has taught them to.

Other omegas complain when a packmate travels for a weekend, but I’ve trained my body to treat deprivation like weather. It’s unpredictable but survivable.

I keep walking, trying my best to ignore the way my skin crawls.

The fountain sits at the center of town, wrapped in fresh flowers and polished stone. The fountain’s oversized Love Stone replica is where tourists leave offerings during festival season.

Over time, the town layered new sweetheart traditions over older ones until nobody could tell which parts had always existed and which were invented by a tourism committee. That is the danger of stories. Eventually, folks stop caring whether they began as truth.

An uneasy sensation brushes across my skin, and I slow. Roses, budding peonies, and magnolia blossoms cover the fountain’s ledge. Tucked among them is an unusual flower that catches my eye.

I move closer before I fully realize I’m doing it.

The lilies sit carefully arranged between the prettier flowers, like somebody wanted them to belong there, but swamp lilies are not the kind of offering made on an altar of love.

Nobody uses swamp lilies during sweetheart season.

The wrongness of them catches beneath my skin before I can explain why.

“Scarlet?”

I look up.

Mrs. Delaney stands nearby, balancing shopping bags against one hip.

She owns the town’s ice-cream shop, is a chronic gossip, and is a surprisingly talented crocheter.

Mrs. Delaney’s scarves are famous for staying warm long after they should and feeling a little too much like being held.

Honey has bought me two over the years. Both disappeared within days of coming home with me.

“You all right, honey?”

“Fine,” I answer automatically.

Her eyes flick toward the flowers before returning to me. They carry the same careful hesitation, subtle but familiar. “Well,” she says lightly, “festival preparations always stir people up.”

“Apparently.”

She nods and continues across the square.

Movement near the fountain catches my attention.