was standing near the roped entrance to the high-speed express elevators that served only the Skyline Level. She was wearing a dramatic, sweeping crimson silk gown with an asymmetrical shoulder, covered in ostentatious diamonds that I recognized instantly from the depths of the Oakridge family safe—antique pieces that had belonged to my late grandmother.
Our mother Eleanor stood beside her. She wore austere high-necked charcoal satin. She held herself rigidly erect, her neck held high with the brittle, desperate, terrifying arrogance of a monarch who knew her empire was constructed