Chapter 1

The evening air on the estate was clotted with humidity and the sweet, cloying scent of expensive champagne. I arrived early and slipped away from the main house while the bridesmaids were still circling their third round of prosecco, their laughter spilling through the French doors like smoke from a hidden fire. I needed quiet. Air that didn't taste like floral perfume. So I wandered to the back terrace—a wedge of manicured lawn hemmed in by towering hedges. I found him there. Standing at the stone balustrade, his back turned, silhouetted against the bruised purple of the twilight sky. My father. He seemed taller than I remembered, or maybe it was the way he carried himself now—a rigid stillness I'd never noticed when I was a child. He wore a white linen shirt unbuttoned at the collar, revealing a dark dusting of hair on his chest, and tailored trousers that fit the curve of his hips like they were made for him. At fifty-two, he hadn't aged so much as deepened, the way good wood darkens with time. I'd known he would be here. I checked the guest list the moment it arrived and found his name at the top.