Chapter 7 - THE RUMORS THEY SENT OUT ANYWAYEven without charges, damage travels faster than truth.

Within forty-eight hours, people in the neighborhood were whispering.

I heard it at the coffee shop.

At the hardware store.

From a man walking his dog who avoided eye contact but still asked, “Everything worked out with that little misunderstanding?”

Vanessa’s recording had never gone public in full, but someone had clearly been talking.

A community message-board thread appeared asking whether “outside renters” should be allowed to perform repairs in private homes without supervision. Another post described a “disturbing incident involving a young man who took advantage of three women living alone.”

No names.

No need.

Elena printed the threads and handed them to Detective Rowan Pike, the officer now leading the case.

Pike was patient in the way dangerous men in suits can sometimes afford to be patient.

He interviewed me again, formally took my phone timestamps, then quietly asked one question.

“Did any of them ever ask you about your house?”

I thought back.

Yes.

Samantha once joked that my place “dragged down the property values.”

Vanessa asked whether I had a long lease or planned to “move on once I got back on my feet.”

Clare had asked whether I ever pictured myself buying a house someday.

At the time, they felt like different conversations.

Now they sounded like the same one wearing different clothes.

The rumors hurt, but they helped too.

They proved motive: the three women needed me distrusted. If I looked unstable, dishonest, or predatory, it became easier to explain why I shouldn’t be taken seriously in a probate dispute or a property negotiation.

I lost a freelance repair referral because of it.

Then I lost a design interview after the hiring manager mentioned “some neighborhood trouble” she had heard through a relative.

That night I nearly packed my car and left.

Elena found me sitting on my porch steps with half my toolbox loaded in the trunk.

“You can still go,” she said.

I looked at the house.

The faded trim.

The sagging porch.

The gutter I kept meaning to fix.

“They almost got me arrested in someone else’s kitchen.”

“Yes.”

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“They’re still winning.”

“No,” Elena said. “Winning would be you leaving before the hearing.”