Chapter 1
One
LIANA
Six Years Later
It’s five a.m. on a Thursday morning, and I’m awake in my shop already working.
The stems are heavy in my hands, cool and firm under the running water as I cut each one at a sharp diagonal angle, listening to the soft snick of the shears. The work is methodical, quiet, and the only thing I trust.
Warm yellow light spills from the single Edison bulb hanging over my zinc-topped worktable. The old cast-iron radiator hisses in the corner, a steady tick that keeps time with Piaf on the record player.
I settle each stem into the bucket. The water turns cloudy, then clear. The peonies are barely open, tight-fisted and pale pink. By afternoon, they’ll be huge, spilling over the edges of whatever vase holds them. I like them best this way, where I can anticipate how beautiful they’ll be.
My grandmother’s gardening apron is tied around my waist. The canvas is soft from years of wear, stained along the hem with soil that will never fully wash out.
I wore this apron the night Magnus Thornton’s pack raided my family’s home six years ago, and I’ve kept it ever since.
I yawn loudly as I work. I haven’t slept. Again.
The nightmares come less often now than they did in the first year, but they come harder when they do.
I woke at three a.m. with my heart hammering against my ribs and the sheets damp with sweat.
I lay there in the dark listening to the radiator tick in the apartment above the shop until I couldn’t stand it and came downstairs to work.
The last peony goes into the bucket. I wipe my hands on a dish towel and push through the curtain into the front room.
Morning light cuts through the divided-pane windows in long, clean bars. The mahogany counter catches the light along its sanded edge. The brass bell over the door hangs still. I love the sound it makes. A small, clear note that says someone is here and wants what I grow.
I tidy the tulips in the front cooler, rearranging the yellow ones so they face the light. The chalkboard sign on the front door reads CLOSED. I flip it to OPEN.
I step outside. The morning air is cool. I pick up the piece of chalk from the whiskey barrel beside the door and rewrite the standing board in my looping handwriting.
Today: PEONIES. RANUNCULUS. ANEMONES. GARDEN ROSES. TULIPS. EUCALYPTUS.
I stand back and look at it. The letters are even. The colors are right. This is the life I built. Four hundred square feet of Brooklyn brick and every inch of it mine.
Suddenly, the back door bangs open. “Lia! You’ll not believe the absolute fucking nightmare that just walked into my bakery at five in the goddamn morning.”
Mira.
Flour in her hair, a chopstick holding her dark chestnut bun in place, a streak of white across her left cheekbone.
She’s wearing her cream sweater under the embroidered Brioche the traffic on Atlantic was insane, there was this delivery truck that just stopped in the middle of the…”
“Toby. It’s fine. They’re not broken.”
He thrusts the buckets at me like they’re on fire. Then, just as he’s backing toward his car, he stops and reaches into his messenger bag. Produces a small white envelope, slightly crumpled.
“Oh. I almost forgot. This was at the door when I got here this morning. Stuck in the mail slot. Looked important.”
He hands it to me.
The envelope is heavy. Cream-colored paper, the kind that costs money. My name and the shop address are printed on the front in clean black ink. In the upper left corner, in dark green letters:
FROSTWOOD HOLDINGS, LLC / 1 FROSTWOOD TOWER / NEW YORK, NY 10004.
I stare at it.
Mira leans over. “Frostwood. Wait…isn’t that the...?” She squints up at the skyline visible over the rooftops of Brooklyn.
I follow her gaze.
Frostwood Tower rises forty-seven floors of black glass and brushed steel, looming over the city.
“Yeah,” she says. “That’s them.”
Toby, oblivious, shuffles his feet. “Cool. Okay. Anyway. Liana. You look beautiful today. As always. I’m gonna go now.”
He climbs back into the van as it screeches away.
Mira watches him go. “That boy is going to die alone.”
“Mira, be kind. He’ll find someone just like him.”
“I am being kind. I said he would die alone, not painfully.”
The envelope feels expensive and foreboding in my hand.
“You want me to come in with you while you open it?” Mira asks.
I look at the envelope. At the green letters. At the tower across the river.
“No,” I say. “I think I want to open this one alone.”
Mira squeezes my arm. She goes back to the bakery, her slippers whispering against the concrete.
I carry the buckets of flowers and the envelope back inside Marsh Florals. Flip the Back in 10 sign back to OPEN.
I set the buckets down by the cooler. The garden roses need conditioning. The anemones are still tight. I should get to work, but first I open the envelope.
The paper inside is the same heavy cream stock. Frostwood Holdings letterhead debossed in dark green at the top. The text is crisp, black, merciless:
Dear Ms. Marsh,
On behalf of Frostwood Holdings, LLC, I am writing to inform you that Frostwood Holdings has acquired the property located at 247 Hicks Street, Brooklyn, New York, as part of a planned redevelopment for the Cobble Hill block.
Your current lease, as transferred from the previous ownership, is set to expire 90 days from the date of this letter.
Frostwood Holdings will not be renewing your lease in its current form.
However, in good faith, we would like to offer you a one-time relocation buyout of $75,000 in exchange for the early voluntary termination of your existing tenancy and the full release of any future claims against the property.
This offer is generous and exceeds the market rate for a business of your scale.
I would appreciate the opportunity to meet with you in person to discuss the terms of this offer. Please contact my assistant at the number below to schedule a meeting at your earliest convenience. I would prefer to resolve this matter promptly.
I look forward to a productive conversation.
Sincerely,
Ezra Frostwood
Chief Executive Officer
Frostwood Holdings, LLC
I read it again. Then a third time.
Ninety days.
I am going to lose it all in ninety days. Marsh Florals is the only thing I have in this entire world after my family was murdered. It’s my only safe space built from money I stole from Magnus during his funeral.
I was safe enough. But only for a little while.
My hands shake as I move automatically. I close the shop. Lock the door. Flip the sign to CLOSED. Walk up the narrow stairs to my little apartment above the shop, each step heavier than the last.
In my bedroom, I curl into my bed onto my side, tears falling down my face. Pressing my forehead into the pillow, I listen to the silence of the shop below me.
I feel alone.