The restaurant was called Marigold & Ash, the kind of Boston place where the lighting was gentle, the wineglasses were delicate, and people spoke as though good manners had been printed right onto the menu.
My daughter, Emily Whitaker, sat across from me with her hands wrapped around a glass of water she had not touched. She was twenty-eight, beautiful in an exhausted way, with brown hair falling over one shoulder and a smile she had been forcing since we arrived. Beside her sat her husband, Brent Callahan, a broad-shouldered man wearing an expensive watch and a small cruel smirk that appeared whenever anyone else spoke too long.
