Velvet Chains
" Vivienne said.
Another long silence, heavier this time, and when Colleen spoke again, her voice had lost every trace of the calm, patient control that had carried her through thirty-one years of careful planning.
"I need to check something," she said. "I'll call back within the hour."
The line went dead.
She called back in forty minutes, and this time, her voice carried something Vivienne had never expected to hear from her at all: genuine, unguarded fear.