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Edwin was an enthusiastic lover, eager to please and to pleasure. He kissed Briar all over, even the strange red bumps she’d first noticed on her skin that morning. His mouth was slow, then teasing, and he brought her to her peak—once, twice—as they made love.
After, they fell back on the mattress in a sweaty, sticky-sweet tangle. “You taste like honeysuckle,” he whispered in her ear before dozing off.
Those would be her husband’s last words.
Briar roused in the morning to find Edwin staring past her head, pupils blown wide yet unseeing. Unmoving. Unbreathing. She clasped his clammy shoulder and shook him hard, calling his name with increasing panic, but his head simply rolled from side to side on the pillow.
She must have screamed for help: she reached the door, dressed in a shift she didn’t remember putting on, just as it swung open. The village healer—her next-door neighbour—was...