Chapter 1

During what might have been my last spring, I agreed to keep seeing Elias Hart, the man Roman had chosen for me. If nothing else, maybe it would convince him I was no longer a mistake he needed to correct.

Roman came home to the DeLuca estate in Westchester that night for the first time in weeks. He stood in front of the study fireplace with the sleeves of his black shirt rolled to his elbows, turning an unlit cigar between his fingers. He had never smoked around me. Even after six months spent rationing every scrap of warmth, he still kept that habit.

“How’s Elias?” Roman asked without looking at me. “How many times have you seen him?”

“Four.”

“Has he proposed?”

I nearly laughed. Elias was a friend guarding a secret, not a suitor. He had never even held my hand. But Roman sounded so calm, as if he were checking on a deal that had finally closed.

“He’s getting close.”

Roman’s fingers stilled around the cigar.

I didn’t want to waste the first real conversation we’d had in months, so I described the wedding I used to let myself imagine. “If it happens, I want winter anemones hanging from the glass ceiling. No white diamond, either. I want an oval stone the color of honey. After the ceremony, no convoy of luxury cars. Just an old blue convertible and the Hudson River all the way north.”

His expression darkened with every detail. “Enough. As long as you’re willing to start a life of your own, that’s all that matters.”

He returned the cigar to its case as if he needed both hands free to force out the next words. “Your parents entrusted you to me, Mara. I was your guardian. That doesn’t simply disappear. You’ll always have a room here.”

I looked at the two boxes stacked beside the door. My clothes, books, and the photographs my parents had left me were already on their way to Switzerland. A few old things remained in the bedroom so no one would notice I was leaving.

“You don’t need to keep a room for me. I probably won’t be living in New York again.”

Not probably. Whether the operating-room lights came on for me a second time or not, I wasn’t coming back.

The neuro-oncology center in Zurich had agreed to perform an awake craniotomy and screen me for a personalized vaccine trial. In two days, I would leave New York on the same morning Roman was supposed to marry Sienna Caruso.

Roman looked up, a question gathering behind his eyes, but I spoke first. “What flowers does Sienna like?”

“Burgundy ranunculus.” The answer came without a pause.

My chest tightened, though I kept my smile in place. “Does she like antiques or jewelry?”

“She doesn’t need anything. Don’t send a gift, and don’t bother her.”

He thought I might ruin the wedding. Fair enough. Six months ago, I had followed him through this house demanding to know why he could sit beside me all night when I had a fever but couldn’t admit that losing me would hurt.

Now I could barely remember the words we had thrown at each other.

The tumor was taking language, time, and familiar roads. Yesterday, I had stood in the kitchen for ten minutes because I couldn’t remember what the coffee maker was called. But I still remembered what Roman looked like when he loved someone carefully. He memorized flowers, dress sizes, flight numbers, and wishes mentioned only once.

Sienna had him. She didn’t need anything from me.

I only wanted to settle what I owed the DeLuca family before I left.

The sharp smell of something burning filled my nose. The neurologist had warned me that it wasn’t real. Irritation in my temporal lobe caused phantom smells, often seconds before a seizure.

I gripped the back of a chair and waited for the black spots in my vision to clear.

Roman moved toward me. “What’s wrong?”

“Low blood sugar.”

He lifted a hand toward my forehead, then stopped inches from my skin. The same hand that had led me away from my parents’ funeral curled into a fist and dropped to his side.

“Get some sleep,” he said.

I went upstairs without telling him it was the last time I expected to hear anything like concern in his voice.