PROLOGUE
ELIZABETH BENNETstared at the phone on the table as though it were a long-forgotten object that had suddenly developed the ability to demand attention.
It rang again.
The sound was intrusive in a way that felt personal—sharp, insistent, entirely out of proportion to the quiet hum of the space around her. A character on the television laughed, bright and canned, and she glanced up for half a second before returning to the problem at hand.
October light pressed against the windows, thin and colourless, like the day had already decided not to improve.
Elizabeth did not move.
She was halfway through a turkey sandwich she no longer wanted and three paragraphs into the fourth version of an article she had been certain—certain—was finished the night before.
The Cost of Taste: Who Decides What’s Worth It.
At midnight, she had liked it.
At eleven-thirty the next morning, she was prepared to delete the entire thing and begin again out of spite.
The phone continued to ring.
Elizabeth rubbed at her eyes with the heel of her hand, as though she could press the sound out of existence. The call did not respond to this strategy. It rang again. Louder, somehow, for being ignored.
She looked at the number.
Unknown. New York area code.
She almost let it go to voicemail.
She had developed a disciplined relationship with unknown numbers over the years. They were, in her experience, rarely associated with anything she wanted. They offered extended warranties, vague opportunities, and occasionally people who insisted she had filled out forms she had never seen.
The phone rang again.
Elizabeth exhaled, long and slow, like someone agreeing to a minor inconvenience she fully intended to resent.
Then she reached for it.
“Hello?”
“Hello, is this Elizabeth Bennet?”
The voice on the other end was calm. Professional. Practiced in the particular art of sounding steady for other people.
“Yes.”
“I’m calling from Brooklyn Methodist Hospital. You’re listed as the emergency contact for Charlotte Fitzwilliam.”
Elizabeth sat up.
“Yes.”
She said it before the woman had finished the sentence.
“I’m very sorry to tell you this, but Charlotte Fitzwilliam has been in an accident.”
Elizabeth sat up.
“Yes.”
