Then he turned and walked back inside, leaving me alone in a backyard that could've doubled as a private park.
I stood there for a moment, hands in my pockets, staring at the yachts and the water beyond them, trying to process what the hell my life had become in the last twenty-four hours.
This was as off-kilter as I'd felt in a long time.
Maybe ever.
No. That wasn't true.
After my dad—thatwas the hardest.
Everything after that had been a slow descent into something darker, something necessary. I'd learned to live with it. To function. To be useful.
But this? This felt different. Like the ground had shifted beneath me and I hadn't noticed until I was already falling.
I shook my head and started walking, following a stone path that wound through the lawn toward a set of perfectly trimmed hedges. The air smelled like salt water and something floral I couldn't name. The humidity pressed against my skin, thick and warm, a reminder that I wasn't in Riga anymore.
I rounded the hedges and nearly collided with her.
A woman. Blonde. Wide-eyed. Looking like she'd just stumbled into a museum exhibit she didn't have a ticket for.
And drop-dead gorgeous.
The thought hit me before I could stop it, sharp and unwelcome.
She had that kind of beauty that didn't need effort—soft features, clear skin, hair pulled back in a way that lookedaccidental but probably wasn't. She wore a sundress that moved when she did, and for half a second, I forgot how to think in complete sentences.
Something stirred in me. Something I hadn't felt in so long I'd assumed it was dead.
I tamped it down hard, blaming this place. Dominion Hall. The steak. The bourbon. Maybe they pumped in psychedelics like Vegas casinos supposedly pumped in oxygen.
She noticed me at the same time I noticed her, and her eyes went even wider.
Then she smiled.
Shy. Genuine. Like she didn't know she was supposed to be careful around strangers.
We met in the middle of the path, going opposite directions, and for a second neither of us moved.
"Oh—hi," she said, breathless. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—I was just—there's this flower, just down the path, and I didn't even know they could be grown here, which is silly because obviously theycanbe grown here if they'rehere, but I just?—"
She stopped, her cheeks flushing pink, and I couldn't help it.
I smiled. Just a small one. A rarity.
"I don't know the first thing about flowers," I said.
Her face lit up like I'd given her permission to keep talking. "Oh, I knoweverythingabout flowers. Well, not everything, but a lot. My family's in the flower business. We grow them on Wadmalaw Island, and we have a shop downtown, and?—"
She stopped again, looking embarrassed. "Sorry. I'm babbling."
"You are," I agreed.
But instead of being annoyed—instead of finding her juvenile or silly—I found her strangely enchanting. Like the last innocent person on Earth had just been dropped in front of me, and I didn't know what to do with that.
I wondered again about mind-altering gases.
Then I went stern, because that was safer. "Flowers are a waste of money," I said flatly. "They die before you can get them in a vase."
