She wanted a competent, aggressive man to run her chaotic inherited estate; I wanted a ladder out of hell.

But her ladder came with one fatal condition: I had to arrive unencumbered.

No baggage.

No past.

I made my choice.

The memory of the day I packed my bag is carved into the inside of my skull.

Coraline had been at our wobbly kitchen table, knuckles white on its edges as she rode out a wave of morning sickness, and between us on the scratched laminate lay a black-and-white sonogram.

Two small shadows.