It was a heavy thing to say, the kind of thing this family always circled back to whenever Marianna's name rose between us. Cordelia's eyes reddened at once. Alaric pushed to his feet and turned his back to the room, the way he always did, as though he could not bear to speak another word about the daughter who had broken his heart past all mending.
I did not dare meet Julian's gaze when it drifted, for just a moment, to me. Even after all these years, the simple weight of his eyes set my pulse hammering and stole the breath clean out of my chest. He was beautiful in a way that had never stopped undoing me.
A servant pressed the warm glass into my hands. I lowered my eyes at exactly the right moment. And when the three of them had sunk to the very bottom of their grief, I offered the rig
