I parked in the brick courtyard and walked up the stone steps.

The heavy oak door was opened by Harris, my mother’s butler for thirty years.

“Good morning, Mr. Adrian,” he said, taking my coat. “Your mother is in the conservatory.”

I walked through the high-ceilinged hallways, my boots silent on the Persian rugs.

The air smelled of beeswax, lemon polish, and my mother’s expensive French perfume.

Eleanor Whitmore sat at a small iron table, surrounded by white orchids and ferns.

She was pouring tea from a silver pot into a delicate porcelain cup.

She did not look up when I entered.

“You are precisely on time,” she said, setting the pot down with a soft click. “I expect nothing less.”

“We need to talk about Maren,” I said, standing at the edge of the glass room.

My mother took a slow sip of her tea, then placed the cup on the saucer.

“That name has not been spoken in this house for eight years,” she said. “Why bring up the past now?”

“Because the past was built on a lie, Mother,” I said.