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“Whoa, who are you and what have you done with Liz?”
“I know, I know,” I say quickly. “I’m not sure why I even said that.”
“I think I know,” Anna says in a sing-song voice.
“Shut up! No, you don’t! He’s still driving me up the fucking wall, and just because he looks good in every piece of clothing he puts on does not mean I have any… feelings.”
Anna intones, “Me thinks the lady doth protest too much.”
“I doth protest the exact right amount!” I exclaim. “Rhett has been a nightmare this entire trip, and it’s only about to get worse. I’m going to try my best, but the closer he gets to cut off, the worse he’s going to act. Just watch.”
“Oh I will,” Anna says. “Gleefully from the sidelines. But of course, always rooting for the home team,” she adds quickly.
“You better,” I say. “Or I’ll fly down there and… and… rub coca leaves in your ears.”
“So violent and so specific.”
“It’s what Rhett is bringing out of me,” I say, and Anna tactfully doesn’t point out that I’m always like this.
I change the subject quickly. “So enough about me. What’s going on there? Spare no detail.”
Anna launches into stories about winding cobblestone streets and ancient architecture, of drinking pisco sours in terracotta courtyards with Cole and day trips to mountaintop lakes. I’m happy for my friend — beyond so — and her stories do bring me out of my current stresses to some degree. But I also can’t help wondering when it will be my turn to find that peace. Over the years, my hectic work life and unreliable boyfriends had always felt like an in-between stage, a hill to climb before finding my equilibrium. But as each new year brings more of the same, I’m starting to worry that I’ll spend the rest of my life in the climb, and that by now it’s too late to turn around.
* * *
After hanging up with Anna, I feel better, more focused. She’s right in one regard: I do believe that I can get this job done. So that means I need to quit fooling around and go to work. Which, in turn, means I need a game plan. Rhett is a distraction and as much as I’d rather ponder where exactly he could have gone off to and worry about this evening, there will be no dinner at all if I can’t get us back at the Alencars’ table.
To do that, I have to figure out who’s in charge of seating and demand an explanation. It’s a good plan. For one it gets me out of this hotel room, and for two it doesn’t have anything to do with wrangling Rhett into a tuxedo like getting a toddler dressed for Easter service. Which of course I can’t do because I don’t have the legal or physical power to force Rhett into doing anything, and that means that if he comes back in the same foul mood he left in, I’ll have to go to the dinner alone which will be incredibly embarrassing because why the hell would I, an account manager, be here helping Sloane Westing invest in technology?!
Okay, okay, Liz. One step at a time. One problem at a time.
I grab a jacket, stop, and chuckle to myself as a thought occurs to me. For one problem, at least, I have an answer. If any of the high-powered executives or billionaires at the table tonight ask where Rhett is, I’ll tell them that he’s shitting himself senseless after a bad kabob. In nicer terms of course.
I have no idea who to call about the seating chart but that doesn’t matter. Demands made in person are harder to ignore anyway. All I need to do is investigate a bit and before long I’ll stumble over someone who will have some answers (and, if history is any indicator, who will be less than pleased to be bothered by me).
I head downstairs to the hall where the dinner will be held later. Just as I expected, the place is abuzz with activity as hotel and conference staff scurry about moving tables, fixing centerpieces, and putting out place cards.
These are the last minute touches on what was obviously a lot of work. There is no banner over the stage à la a middle school dance or tacky self-improvement conference. The banquet hall is decked out in the latest in tasteful style: muted colors trimmed with gold. As if these people need any more reminders as to how rich they are.
The stage seems to be where the action is. A woman around my age is directing traffic with a quasi-religious fervor. Behind her is a giant rolling cork board stuck with note cards. I’ve hosted enough events to recognize a seating chart.
My eyes narrow like the Terminator on the young woman. My target. I would have preferred a man, but I can make it work.
I slip through the chaos, trying to avoid carried tables and flung chairs and people walking without looking as they shout instructions over their shoulders. No matter how much money is thrown at an event, the last-minute crush is always stressful. I almost manage to make it the entire way without incident, but at the last moment my luck runs out.
I dodge around two men carrying a ladder on their shoulders and run directly into a tall guy carrying an armful of folders. In a moment all of his papers are spilled across the ground.
“Oh shit, sorry!” I exclaim, bending to help him gather his things.
The page that I pick up first is so odd that I stop, trying to make sense of it. It’s a black and white print-out of what appears to be people with large toucan-like beaks reclining in a field before a mountain range.
The man I knocked over snatches it from my hand before I can look any further.
“Don’t worry about it,” he blusters.
He doesn’t sound angry, more worried, and his urgency gives me pause. I look at him harder.
“Wait, you’re Clark,” I say. “Paul Morgan’s assistant.”
