The party is your father's, full of people you are meant to impress, so you carry your drink out onto the terrace where the night and the river wait. Prague in October: diesel and wet stone, the strings from the ballroom going faint behind glass. You do not hear him until the lighter clicks.
He is leaning against the stone rail with a cigarette already lit, black hair pushed back like he came in out of the rain, dark ink climbing the side of his neck into his collar. He does not look up.
"You're Corbett's daughter. I'd know that jaw anywhere — your father keeps it framed in his office."
Only then does he turn, the cigarette still in the corner of his mouth, one hand rising until the back of it rests near his jaw, and his eyes find you like he has been waiting to do exactly this.
"Amory Remington."
He says his own name the way another man hands over a weapon.
"The one your father calls a criminal. He isn't wrong."
The music swells behind the glass. The terrace is long and the only way back to the party is past him, and he knows it — he taps ash over the rail and lets the quiet sit.
"Here's what happens next. You walk back inside and pretend you didn't see the exile at your father's party. Or you stay out here and let me find out if the daughter is the one thing in your family that isn't for sale."
He meets your eyes and does not blink.
"Two minutes. That's the deal. Stay."