Chapter One—Lorna
THE PERFUME ARRIVES at eleven in the morning, tucked inside a plain white box with no return address. I’m at the kitchen island reviewing next month’s content calendar when the front desk calls about the delivery.
I haven’t ordered anything in weeks. Ordering means putting my name, address, and unit number into another database, then trusting every person with access to that database.
I used to order clothes, books, skin care, and groceries without thinking about any of it.
Now I have one assistant send office purchases to a commercial mailbox, while anything personal waits until I can buy it myself.
Gerald brings the package upstairs instead of sending one of the younger concierge staff.
He’s sixty-two, retired from the postal service, and has worked in our building for almost five years.
He stops outside the open door with the box held away from his body.
“No card. Local courier brought it about ten minutes ago. I had the desk write down the company.”
I reach for the box, then stop before taking it. “Did the courier give a sender name?”
Gerald shakes his head. “Nothing except your name and unit number. The desk has the delivery slip if you want it.”
“I do. Thank you.”
“I’ll make you a copy.” He passes me the package carefully. “Do you want me to wait while you open it?”
The offer makes my throat ache more than the box does. Gerald started asking after an arrangement of white lilies arrived six months ago with no card and a florist who refused to identify the purchaser. He doesn’t know everything but knows enough. “I’ll be okay.”
He studies me for another second before stepping back. “Call downstairs if you need anything.”
I close and lock the door, then carry the package to the island. My phone is already beside my laptop. I photograph the box before setting it down, then take pictures of the label, seams, courier sticker, and undamaged corners. The process takes less than a minute now.
I put on nitrile gloves, and the spreadsheet is open before I touch the tape. Date. Time. Delivery method. Packaging condition. Contents. Reference to known personal information. Possible source. Action taken. Forty-one rows are beneath the headers.
I slide a pair of scissors under the tape. The cardboard opens without resistance. White tissue paper fills the box, folded neatly over something rectangular. I photograph the tissue before moving it aside.
A bottle of Maison Crivelli Iris Malikhan rests underneath.
For several seconds, I only look at it.
The perfume was discontinued two years ago.
I wore it almost every day for three years before production stopped, then searched resale sites for another two months after the last bottle in my bathroom ran out.
Chris knew how much I liked it because he once bought three bottles for my birthday after hearing me complain that I couldn’t find it locally.
That was before it disappeared from stores entirely.
I pick up my phone without touching the bottle and photograph the label through the glass. The amber perfume reaches almost to the neck, which means the bottle is either unopened or barely used.
I mentioned the perfume publicly once. Eighteen months ago, during a video about products I wished companies would bring back, I held up my empty bottle and named it among five things I missed. The segment lasted less than a minute. Anyone could find that video.
Finding this bottle is different. I spent weeks trying. A collector might have one. A fragrance reseller might know where to locate another. Whoever sent it had to remember the name, search for a bottle, buy it, and arrange delivery without identifying themselves.
I add a new row to the spreadsheet. Forty-two.
Despite the gloves, my fingers move easily over the keyboard while I enter the courier company, delivery time, condition, and contents.
I copy the file number from the photographs into the last column.
The routine helps because every box becomes data once I document it.
Data can be saved, compared, and handed to police.
It doesn’t ask me whether I’m overreacting.
The perfume stays where it is, but I move the box to the small closet in a guest room I’ve been using to store the evidence. After that, I strip off the gloves, breathe deeply for a few seconds, and contemplate pouring a vodka.
No, I’m not going to add drinking to the list of things that can be used to question me. Instead, I pick up my phone and call Chris. Four rings pass before the connection clicks.
“Chris Aldren’s line.”
Fenton.
I close my eyes for a second before turning toward the windows. The harbor stretches beyond the glass, bright beneath the late-morning sun. “It’s Lorna. I need Chris.”
“He’s in a working session for the Highfield closing.” Fenton’s voice carries the same pleasant professionalism he uses whether he’s confirming a flight or canceling dinner reservations. “They’re scheduled until twelve-thirty. I can have him call as soon as they break.”
I look back at the open package. “I need to speak to him sooner if possible.”
He doesn’t commit to that. “Is something wrong?”
“I received another delivery.”
There’s a brief pause. “Do you know who sent it?”
I grimace as I give the standard answer. “No.”
“What is it?”
The question catches me. “Why?”
He sounds as smooth as ever. “I thought I might be able to help identify whether it came through one of the corporate gifting lists.”
“It’s personal.”
“Understood.” Nothing changes in his tone. “I’ll tell Chris you need him.”
“How soon?”
“I’ll interrupt if they take a break. Otherwise, it should be within two hours.” He doesn’t bother to sound apologetic or regretful. Just brusque and businesslike.
Two hours. My husband is in Denver discussing a transaction worth more than some small countries produce in a year. I’m in Charleston staring at a discontinued perfume someone hunted down to prove they know what I used to wear. “Tell him it’s about the stalking.”
“I will.” He sounds sympathetic, but I don’t buy it.
I end the call before Fenton can ask anything else.
His name remains on the screen for a second before my phone returns to the call log.
I’ve known him for two-and-a-half years.
Chris hired him through the staffing agency the firm uses for executive placements, and within months Fenton was managing travel, meetings, household vendors, and half the practical pieces of Chris’s life.
Then Chris gave him access to his personal phone. The explanation sounded reasonable at the time. Chris spent hours every day in meetings, on planes, and touring properties. Fenton could screen incoming calls during closings or overnight travel, then flag anything urgent.
I hadn’t understood that eventually I’d become one of the incoming calls. I’d become someone to screen rather than Chris’s wife. I return to the island and scroll through the spreadsheet while I wait.
Flowers. A scarf. A book I’d picked up in a store and put back.
A framed copy of a photograph I’d posted only to a private account.
A restaurant menu with one entrée circled, the same thing I’d ordered there with my assistant three nights before receiving the “gift.” Two messages quoting sentences I’d said in videos that had never gone live because I’d cut them during editing.
Some incidents could be explained individually, but forty-two of them can’t.
The first police officer I spoke to said public figures attract strange attention.
The second suggested I stop posting my location in real time, which was something I hadn’t done in years.
Chris paid for Willa after a package arrived containing photographs of me leaving a Pilates studio, and she believed the pattern was worth investigating.
Chris thought hiring her had handled it. That was his way of solving the problem.
My laptop chimes with a message from Brooke, one of my assistants, asking whether I approved the revised newsletter schedule. I try to put the perfume out of my mind and do what needs to be done.
For the next hour, I work. I review copy for a sponsored cookware post, send notes on a video edit, approve two newsletter graphics, and answer a question about next month’s reader survey.
Revenue is ahead of projections this quarter.
Newsletter subscriptions are up eleven percent.
Our direct sponsorship calendar is booked through January.
Three years ago, I had notes in a folder on my phone.
Now, I have two full-time assistants, a freelance video editor who works almost exclusively for me, and an audience of more than two million people across platforms. The company pays me more in a good year than modeling did during several of my busiest ones.
Chris knows the broad version. Lorna has her platform. Lorna has meetings. Lorna has a team. I don’t think he knows what the company earned last year. The realization isn’t new enough to interrupt my work but thinking that he doesn’t care enough to ask brings the same faint sting of pain.
At one-fourteen, my phone rings. Chris is finally calling. I answer immediately. “Hi.”
“Hey.” Road noise fills the background. “Fenton said you called about another package.”
I glance at the clock on my laptop. Two hours and fourteen minutes. “A bottle of perfume.”
“What perfume?”
“Iris Malikhan. The one I used to wear.”
Chris is quiet for a second. “I remember that.”
The answer catches me off guard enough that my shoulders loosen. I’ve gotten too used to him forgetting all the little details he once remembered. “They stopped making it two years ago. I tried to find another bottle after mine ran out.”
“I remember that. Could it be from a company you’ve worked with?”
I hesitate. “I’ve never worked with Maison Crivelli.”
“Maybe a distributor, then. Didn’t you do some beauty partnerships last year?” He sounds helpful and is in problem-solving mode. I should appreciate that more.