Page 58 of Over Her Dead Body

The room exhales without admitting it had been holding anything.

Genevieve pats Philip’s sleeve, then follows the man in the black jacket toward the hall. Philip goes with them. Not quickly. Nothing in this house happens quickly unless someone wants the help to look untrained.

Music continues from somewhere hidden.

A waiter appears with a fresh tray of champagne.

For a few minutes, that is all that happens.

Which is how I know something has.

People do not stop talking. They adjust.

The girl in silver is no longer standing beside the windows.

She is the one who asked me about the servers. The one I gave my champagne to.

I noticed her after that because she looked like she was trying very hard not to look nervous. She spent most of the next few minutes near the windows, one hand worrying the side of her dress, laughing beside a man old enough to have a favorite divorce attorney.

Twenty-something, poured into silver the color of a knife. A companion, if the room wanted manners. An escort, if it wanted accuracy.

Rooms like this rarely want accuracy.

Accuracy creates responsibility.

So the room chooses other words.

Guest. Companion. Tired. Overheated. Unfortunate.

A man by the bar asks for sparkling water, then changes his mind and asks for Scotch. Celeste leans toward Reid and says something I cannot hear. Reid listens with the pleasant attention of a man who has never had to ask to be included.

Todd shifts closer, his smile smaller than it was before.

“Everything okay?” he asks.

“No idea.”

“That feels honest.”

“It’s my gift.”

Across the room, Margot detaches from her husband with the precision of a woman who has waited long enough.

I consider pretending not to see her.

She points at me.

So that is over.

“There you are,” she says when she reaches me.

“Here I am.”

“Terrific. Walk with me.”

It is not a request.

Todd, sweet doomed Todd, looks between us. “Should I⁠—”