As Briony looked around, she found every woman slowly squeezing another’s shoulder, hand, wrist, support vining among them all. Octavia and Jellica and five other women she didn’t know were holding tightly to one another, as if they could all infuse Cecily with what she needed to stand up and sit back down on Collin’s lap. It almost felt like magic—this connection, this contact. Tears pooled in Briony’s eyes at the thought.
