Chapter 1

My fiancé and my youngest junior sister were carrying on behind my back, treating the Soothing Incense recipe my family had passed down for seven generations as if it were already theirs.

In front of me they played the devoted couple and the sweet little disciple, while behind me they stole ingredients, swapped out exhibit pieces, and had already worked out how to throw me out on the street the moment we signed the marriage papers.

Standing before the hidden compartment in the study, I held the voice recorder and listened to every filthy calculation, and a thin, mocking smile curved my lips.

This swindle carried out in the name of love was due for its final act.

1

An autumn afternoon, in the back courtyard of the Henson Atelier.

I was crouched by the bamboo rack sorting incense wafers when Barnaby Harding arrived carrying a box of candied fruit.

He set the box on the stone table, lifted the lid, and smiled at me, all warmth. "There's an old-name shop down at the corner. Stood in line half an hour to get these."

I wiped my hands, ate one, and asked, "Don't you have to be at the office today, watching over the new-drug filing? Didn't R&D say last week they were slammed around the clock?"

He gave me a crinkle-eyed smile. "No matter how busy things get, I still have to spend time with my fiancée."

"By the way, Lucille Henson, once we sign the papers, what do you say we register the Soothing Incense recipe as a company patent?"

"I'll run it through the pharmaceutical mass-production channels and take our family craft nationwide. That beats being stuck in this little courtyard making wafers by hand, and it would honor what our ancestors handed down."

My brow drew together. The Soothing Incense was the root of the Henson Atelier, passed down seven generations. The family rule was plainly written: the recipe was never to leave the family, let alone be turned out by the ton in a factory.

I was just about to refuse when I heard quick footsteps rushing in from beyond the courtyard.

"Lucille, Lucille, I'm so sorry!"

Penelope Pruitt ran up with her eyes red, wearing the most pitiful look. "I went into your study just now to get rice paper for printing the incense catalog, and when I was moving the stool I knocked over the camphorwood box with your recipe in it. All the pages spilled out onto the floor..."

"I've already picked everything up, but a few of them got their corners creased. Yell at me, please. How could I be so clumsy?"

Something dropped in my chest.

The camphorwood box sat on the very top shelf, right next to the warning sign I'd put there on purpose. What business did she have touching it at all?

Before I could say a word, Barnaby reached over and ruffled Penelope's hair fondly, then turned to me with a smile. "That's my fault. I sent her to get a partnership document out of my briefcase, and she was in such a rush she got careless."

"It's nothing. A couple of creased corners, that's all. You can still read the writing."

"Once we're married, I'll rent a private safe-deposit box at the bank just for it. We'll lock the recipe in there, no one can touch it but you, and I'll hand you every key to keep. How's that?"

His gaze was open and sincere, and the discomfort that had just risen in me suddenly felt petty.

I sighed and looked at Penelope, whose eyes were still red. "It's fine. Just be careful next time. Don't go poking at the things on the top shelf. If something falls and hits you, that's no good either."

Penelope's tears turned to a smile at once. "Thank you, Lucille. I'll be careful, I promise!"

Toward evening, as I was gathering in the incense, old Hal Finch came in with a basket of prepared ingredients on his shoulder. He glanced at Penelope's departing back, then looked at me, opening his mouth as if to speak and then holding back.

"Hal, if you've got something to say, just say it. No need to stand on ceremony with me."

I tucked the incense wafers carefully into the paulownia-wood box.

Hal set the basket down and lowered his voice. "Miss, a recipe passed down in a family is the root your ancestors left you. You have to hold it tight in your own hands."

"An outsider is an outsider in the end. Even with a bit of a family tie, their heart isn't one with yours."

I smiled and pressed the lid of the wooden box shut, locking it. "Hal, Barnaby is my fiancé. We'll be one family soon."

"Penny was the last disciple my mother took in before she passed. She's half a sister to me. Neither of them is an outsider."

Hal opened his mouth, then in the end only sighed, shook his head, and carried the empty basket away.

I stood in the dusk, looking at the incense box in my hands, and for reasons I couldn't name, a thread of unease slipped through me.