The cold hit me the moment we stepped outside. Not sharp enough to shock. Just enough to remind me that the warmth in there had been constructed.
Adrian moved ahead toward the valet. My mother drifted after him, still glowing. She looked younger than she had in years, her shoulders loose, the worry she always carried quietly absent from her face.
My father stayed behind.
He watched them for a moment, then turned back to me. Deliberately. Carefully. The way he moved when he was afraid of disturbing something he didn't fully understand.
"Walk with me," he said.
We moved to the edge of the courtyard. Snow-dusted stone. A fountain murmuring somewhere behind us. He rubbed his hands together the way he always did when he was thinking harder than he wanted to show. His coat was too thin for
