Chapter 4

The next morning, I arrived at Laurent’s private scent room at eight fifty-eight.

Alexander was alone beside a long oak table. Winter light lay across twelve empty places, but there were no test bottles yet. The silence made me aware of my borrowed coat, my sleepless eyes, and the fact that everything I owned now fit inside one suitcase at my mother’s vacant flower shop.

“Before we discuss the assessment, there is something you should see,” he said.

He unlocked a wall safe and removed a small archival box. Inside rested a square glass bottle sealed with dark wax. The…