To them, I was still the struggling little sister who couldn’t measure up to Garrett and his middle-management job at an insurance company.

The irony was so thick you could spread it on toast.

Tonight, I received an invitation to Garrett’s engagement party.

Last minute, of course—probably my mother’s idea. A guilt invitation so she could tell her friends that the whole family was there.

I almost didn’t come.

But something pulled me here.

Maybe curiosity.

Maybe some small, stubborn hope that things had changed.

They hadn’t.

I stood in the entrance of my own hotel wearing jeans and my favorite boots, my hair still smelling faintly like the countryside because I’d driven through Milbrook on my way here—just to remind myself where I came from.