Page 92 of Keep

“You look like a man who wandered into the wrong hearing room.”

He turned. Frannie was standing behind him, drink in hand, looking entirely too pleased with herself. She wore a dark green blazer over black—her off-duty uniform, which meant she’d come straight from somewhere more important and wanted him to know it.

“I’m fine,” Hank said. “I’m appreciating the art.”

“You’ve been staring at that red square for four minutes. I timed it.”

“It’s a compression study.”

“It’s a red square, Henry.”

“I was giving it the benefit of the doubt.”

Frannie took a sip of her wine, surveying the room with the same expression she wore during Judiciary Committee hearings—alert, amused, cataloging. “Where’s the boyfriend?”

“He’s not my—” Hank stopped. Reconsidered. “He’s over there. Talking to someone about... texture. Possibly pigment. I lost the thread around minute two.”

“And you didn’t follow him because⁠—”

“Because I’d contribute nothing to that conversation, and I know it.” Hank ate the goat cheese thing. It was excellent. He still didn’t know what to do with the toothpick. “This is his night. I’m trying not to make it about me.”

Frannie’s eyebrow rose a fraction. The fraction that meant she was filing something away. “Well. Introduce me before I form an opinion based solely on what I can observe from here.”

“What can you observe from here?”

“That he’s younger than I expected, better-looking than you described, and that he just redirected that woman’s attention away from you and back to the painting behind them without her noticing.” Frannie paused. “That last part was interesting.”

Hank looked. Chad had indeed shifted the conversation—the silver-haired woman was now studying the piece on the wall behind them, gesturing at something specific while Chad nodded. Hank hadn’t even seen it happen.

“He does that,” Hank said. “Reads rooms. Steers them.”

“I know the type.” Frannie’s mouth twitched. “I employ the type. Come on. I didn’t put on heels and drive here to stare at you staring at a square.”

They crossed the gallery. Chad saw them approaching, and his posture straightened—his hands going still. He smiled, but Hank caught the flicker underneath. Nerves.

“Chad, this is Senator Frances Holloway. Frannie, this is Chad Ellsworth.”

“The famous Frannie.” Chad extended his hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“And I about you. Relentlessly.” Frannie shook his hand, holding it a beat longer than strictly necessary—long enough to take a reading. “You have good hands. Artist’s hands. My husband Charles paints, though calling what he does painting is generous. More like organized suffering.”

“That’s not entirely inaccurate as a description of the process.”

“He says the same thing.” Frannie released his hand, turned to the painting behind them—one of the faculty pieces, bold color work that Hank couldn’t have named the style of with a gun to his head. “Walk me through this. I know what I like, but I’ve never understood why I like it.”

It was a test. Hank knew Frannie’s tests—had been on the receiving end of them for six years. She wasn’t asking about art. She was watching how Chad answered. Whether he condescended. Whether he showed off. Whether he could translate what he knew into language that others understood.

Chad considered the painting for a moment. “See how the red at the top pushes forward? And the blue underneath pulls back? Your eye doesn’t know where to rest. That tension is the whole point—you’re not supposed to settle. You’re supposed to feel a little off-balance.”

Frannie studied the canvas. “Hm. That’s either profound or the most convincing nonsense I’ve ever heard.”

“Could be both.”

“Could be.” Frannie turned back to Hank. Said nothing. Sipped her wine.

That was the approval. Hank had sat through enough committee votes to recognize a yes that didn’t announce itself. The absence of further questions. The half-smile she was hiding behind her glass.

“I like your friends,” Frannie said to Chad. “The loud one over there in the fabulous jacket just offered to make me something called a Hemingway Daiquiri. At an art show. I’m considering accepting.”