"It looks like a hearse for a giant," Jax mutters, drinking his fourth espresso of the morning. He is vibrating. Whether it is the caffeine or the impending doom, I cannot be sure.
"It’s a Rolls-Royce Phantom Extended Wheelbase," Preston corrects him, adjusting his silk scarf. "Mother likely had it armour-plated. She treats wedding planning like a motorcade through a hostile nation. Which, given who she invited, is accurate."
The rear door opens. A driver in a cap steps out.
"Dr. York," the driver nods to me. "Mr. and Mrs. York are waiting."
We climb in. The interior is cooled to a precise sixty-eight degrees. Mother is sitting on the back bench, looking like the CEO of winter, while Father sits beside her looking uncharacteristically tired and jet lagged. She is wearing a white pantsuit and oversized sunglasses, despite the fact that the windows are tinted to ninety percent opacity.
Opposite them, looking entirely unimpressed, is Rosa Ortiz.
Rosa is not wearing scrubs. She is wearing her "Sunday Church" outfit: a floral dress with a structured blazer that commands respect, sensible heels that could double as weapons, and a handbag that I know contains peppermint candies, a rosary, and possibly a shiv.
The air inside the car is so thick with tension it could be cut with a scalpel.
"Good morning," I say, sliding onto the bench next to Jax. Preston takes the jump seat, crossing his legs with practiced elegance.
"You’re late," Mother says without looking at her watch. "We are three minutes behind schedule. The traffic on the FDR is suboptimal."
"We were waiting for the elevator," Jax says.
"Buy a faster building," Mother replies smoothly. She turns her sunglasses toward Rosa. "Ms. Ortiz. I understand you are joining us as a... consultant."
"I’m here as the Chief of Staff," Rosa corrects her, her voice flat. She pats her handbag. "And to ensure my boys don't starve. I heard rumors about your catering, Catherine. 'Foam' is not a food group. If I see a foam, I am calling the health department."
Mother lowers her sunglasses an inch. Her eyes narrow. "It is molecular gastronomy, Rosa. It is art."
"It’s gas," Rosa counters. "And it causes bloating. If you serve gas at a wedding, you are asking for a melody you do not want to hear during the vows."
Preston snorts, quickly covering it with a cough. "I believe what Ms. Ortiz means is that we prefer solid matter, Mother. Legally, it has to be chewable to count as dinner."
Mother looks horrified. "Driver," she snaps. "Drive. Before I lose my appetite."
Venue 1: The Aerie
Location: Hudson Yards, 100th Floor.
The elevator ride takes forty-five seconds and makes my ears pop twice. When the doors open, we are not in a room. We are in a cloud.
"Behold," Mother says, stepping out onto the floor. "The Aerie."
It is a glass box suspended one hundred stories above Manhattan. The walls are glass. The ceiling is glass. Theflooris glass. It offers a 360-degree view of the city, the river, and the terrified pedestrians a thousand feet below.
Jax takes one step out of the elevator, looks down between his feet at a yellow taxi the size of an ant, and immediately emits a high-pitched sound only audible to dogs. He flattens himself against the central support column, hugging the concrete like a koala.
"Nope," Jax wheezes, his eyes squeezed shut. "Absolutely not. I am a ground-dwelling mammal. This is a bird feeder. Why is the floor transparent? Who hates a solidly visibly opaque surface this much?"
"It is breathtaking," Mother declares, walking to the edge and looking down as if she owns gravity. "We will have the ceremony on the cantilevered deck. The guests will feel as if they are floating."
"They will feel nausea," I correct her, my own stomach doing a slow roll as I calculate the shear stress on the glass panels. "Vestibular disruption is a known side effect of visual-proprioceptive mismatch. You will have four hundred people vomiting on a transparent floor. The visual impact from the street level will be... unfortunate."
"And the acoustics are a nightmare," Preston adds, clapping his hands. The sound ricochets sharply around the hard surfaces. "It sounds like the inside of a blender. If anyone laughs, it’ll sound like a manic episode. If a baby cries, we’ll all need hearing aids."
Rosa Ortiz marches to the centre of the glass floor. She stomps her heel.Thud.
"Where is the kitchen?" Rosa asks the venue manager, a terrified man named Stefan who is wearing a turtleneck.
"We have a prep kitchen in the basement," Stefan squeaks.
