Chapter 1

At five in the morning I rushed over to do the bride's makeup, and she mentioned one request in passing.

"Hon, my husband has a scar on his left shoulder. Find a way to cover it up for me."

I paused. Oliver James had a scar on his left shoulder too.

She swiped open her phone.

"Look, this is our new place."

"He's so good to me. He can't stand to see me suffer even a little."

I listened with half an ear, doing the math on how much I'd have left after this job.

Oliver was working out of town. He hadn't been home in a month.

Last night he'd texted that the wind had knocked down his tent.

I wanted to buy him a good down jacket.

"Hon, let me show you the scar."

The bride held her phone up.

"See if you can cover it."

The moment my eyes landed on the photo, I froze.

That seven-centimeter crooked scar on the groom's left shoulder.

It was exactly like Oliver's.

Before I could react, the door swung open.

...

One look, and the powder puff dropped out of my hand.

It was Oliver.

"Hon! What are you doing here?"

Ann Henson laughed and rose, hurrying over to him.

"You're not supposed to peek at the bride before the makeup's done."

Oliver dropped his gaze and gently smoothed the loose hair at her temple.

"Just one look."

The instant his eyes lifted and met mine, I saw the panic in them.

I opened my mouth to speak.

But he got there first, polite and distant.

"And this is?"

Something twisted hard in my chest.

Ann took his arm and introduced me with a smile.

"This is the makeup artist I told you about, the really good one I found online!"

Oliver nodded faintly, careless.

"Someone off the internet. Can she really be better than the celebrity makeup artist we could hire?"

"Oh, stop!"

Ann gave him a playful punch. "How can you say that right in front of her?"

She turned back, took my hand again, her eyes crinkling.

"Don't mind him, hon. He just loves me too much. He wants to pile everything that's best right in front of me."

"I said a normal place was plenty, but he insisted on buying me a four-hundred-eighty-square-meter oceanfront condo."

She swiped her phone and held the screen up to my face.

Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows was a whole stretch of ocean turned gold by the setting sun.

An ocean like that. Not one inch of sunlight would ever reach that half-basement apartment of mine, not in a lifetime.

"It may be by the water, but it's climate-controlled twenty-four hours a day. He's terrified I'll catch the slightest chill."

My hand stopped on the eyeliner.

To keep Oliver from getting cold, I'd spent every last cent on an air conditioner.

Standing in the stairwell, apologizing to my landlord over and over, signing the repayment guarantee for the thirtieth time.

So all that time, he'd been sleeping in a climate-controlled oceanfront condo.

So from start to finish, I was the only one who'd been cold.

Ann waved her fingers at me again.

"An Osman gemstone diamond ring. A man only gets to commission one in his whole life."

The ring blazed under the lights.

Much brighter than the light in that basement of mine.

We used to squeeze onto the couch in that basement, splitting a single bowl of instant ramen.

He always said he wasn't hungry, pushed all the noodles over to me, then drank down every last drop of the broth.

A wedding was playing on the TV.

Red carpet, diamond ring, petals falling everywhere.

He watched, transfixed, then said out of nowhere.

"Beryl Sullivan, once I've got money, I'm going to marry you the right way, with everyone watching."

I laughed and burrowed a little deeper against his chest.

"Okay. I'll wait for you."

Later he stripped off that work vest washed pale from wear and took the lowest job there was, as an enforcer.

Living on the knife's edge, dragging himself through year after year.

The last time he came back, he was covered in blood, but he'd carried the most beautiful ring in the whole world home against his chest.

I cried and tried to drag him to the hospital.

He wouldn't go. He dropped to one knee and pushed the ring onto my finger.

"Beryl, I've finally married you."

Ann's voice pulled me back.

"Hon, did you know, to commission this brand you have to live locally in France for a full month, and pass round after round of asset verification before you even qualify."

I stood there stunned.

At last I knew where he'd gone this past month.

I picked the powder puff up off the floor and forced down the sting at the tip of my nose.

As I lined her eyes, Ann remembered something else.

"Oh, right, hon!"

"This lady's really something. She can even cover that scar on your shoulder."

"You've always found it disgusting, haven't you?"