“It would seem so.” Though to hear Sebastien and Father over the holidays, it sounded as though Seb’s passions lay more in this “garden project.” Max had no idea what that meant. He probably hadn’t been paying attention at some point. He couldn’t give a damn about Father, but he didn’t used to be the kind of person who ignored his brother.

“Okay, how about this?” Dani said. “Let’s make a plan to each do one small thing toward our resolutions this week. First week of the new year—baby steps toward divorce and job.”

He could get behind this. But the phrase new year made him remember his point in calling her. He pulled his phone from his ear momentarily to check the time. It was quarter past six. “Oh, damn it.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I got distracted by my ‘woe is me’ routine. And by telling the true story of the Depraved Duke. I was going to make you do a countdown.”

“Eh, it’s fine.”

“All right, well, this is our year, then?”

“Yes. The year of divorces and jobs,” she said through a chuckle. “Doesn’t sound that glamorous when you put it like that.”

“It’s going to be good.” For the first time in a long time, he believed it—that the future was going to be good.

She yawned. “I’m gonna go to bed.”

He felt like he could probably sleep now. He wished he could get the artist out of his room, but he could hardly wake her and ask her to leave. Perhaps he would go sleep on the sofa. “Happy New Year, Dani.”

“Happy New Year, Max.”

Chapter Seven

When he got back to Riems, Max invited Sebastien to the cottage for lunch.

“What’s wrong?” Seb said after they tucked into slices of tomato-leek galette.

“Why does something have to be wrong?”

“You’ve never invited me here for a meal before. So either there’s something wrong or you want something from me. And usually when you want something from me, you text. I’m left to conclude that something is wrong.”

Well, that stung. But Max could not deny any of it. He hadn’t intended it, but that hardly mattered. He studied his brother. They had been close as children, conspiring to run wild on the mountain any time they could escape the schoolroom—and Father. It had been easier to dodge Father in the early years. Father ascribed to the philosophy that children should be neither seen nor heard, so apart from dinner every evening, the boys had rarely crossed paths with him. When they weren’t doing lessons, they’d been free to play “two-man up-mountain footie,” which football-crazed Max had invented, and the pretend games Seb preferred without parental interference.