Prologue: The Last Summer
The smell of salt air and expensive sunscreen always tasted like happiness.
Twenty-two-year-old Elena was a blur of messy braids and sun-kissed skin, dangling her legs off the side of her father’s yacht. She was laughing—the kind of deep, ugly, unreserved laugh that made her stomach ache. Her father was currently losing a high-stakes game of "Go Fish" to her mother, who was cheating shamelessly.
"Business is war, Arthur," her mother chirped, hiding a card under her thigh. "You taught me that."
"I taught you integrity!" her father bellowed, though his eyes were crinkled with adoration. He looked at Elena. "Lainey, help me. Your mother is a shark."
Elena grinned, reaching for a slice of watermelon. "I’m staying neutral. I have a career in art history to think about. I don't do 'war.'"
"You have the heart of a poet," her father said, pulling her into a one-armed hug. "Stay that way. Don't let the world make you hard, Elena. Just be happy."
That was the last thing he ever said to her that made sense. Two hours later, the sky turned a bruised purple. The engine stalled. The rogue wave didn't look like a wave; it looked like the hand of God reaching out to reset the board.
When the rescue boat found Elena clinging to a piece of driftwood three miles off the coast, the "fun, exciting girl" stayed in the water. The girl who loved art and laughter had drowned.
The woman who climbed onto that rescue ship was made of salt and stone.
