“It's Thursday,“ Alexandra said.
“I know.“
Alexandra stopped walking. “Ask them to wait,“ she said. “The project is still going forward. By the time anyone talks to the press, I want to give them a resolution.“ She looked at Diane. “The renovation will proceed. I'll make sure of that today.“
Diane held her gaze for a moment then nodded, her shoulders lowering a fraction. “Thank you.“
Alexandra drove to the city manager's office, the windshield wipers losing their ground on the steeper stretches. She hadforty minutes before her meeting with Shannon Everton started, and she spent most of that time thinking about what she had seen at the school and how she had let this project exist only on paper for twenty-two months.
Shannon Everton received her at one o'clock and offered her a mug of coffee. Alexandra settled in at the conference desk, her notebook ready. Ruth joined by phone for twenty minutes of the meeting, and by two-thirty, they had a contingency funding plan. It would require the school board to sign off on it and a council vote on an expedited timeline, but it worked.
“I'll need to talk to the school board chair by the end of the day,“ Shannon said.
“You'll have her.“
Ruth drafted the amended bond structure by three. Meg called Patricia Osei—the school board chair who had four children in the district, a background in municipal finance, and had been livid since Tuesday—and by four-fifteen Patricia had agreed to call an emergency session at the district office. Ruth drove over to present the bond structure in person. The proposal passed at five-fifty with only one abstention.
Alexandra walked out of the building with Meg and Ruth at her heels.
“Thank you.“ Alexandra turned and looked at them. “Both of you.“
Meg was already on her phone, walking toward her car. She raised a hand without turning around, and Ruth smiled and nodded once.
Alexandra sat in her car for a moment before starting it.
The project would continue. She had made sure of that. The thought came without the satisfaction it should have carried, and she let it sit there without trying to inflate it into something it wasn't or analyze it too deeply.
She watched the rain move in diagonal sheets across her windshield for a moment, then started the car and pulled out of the lot.
She knew she had done good work and had been right to come today. But she also understood, in the specific quiet of having nowhere to be until tomorrow, that she would drive home alone and that there was no one waiting for her, no one who would ask how it went. What used to be a deliberate life decision now just felt heavy and hollow, and she was so tired.
The estate was dark when she pulled up in the long driveway, and Alexandra moved through the house without turning on anything else. She changed out of her work clothes into comfortable loungewear, and she walked to her liquor cabinet and poured herself a single malt whiskey. She carried it to the living room.
The room, like the rest of the house, was all her mother’s design. It had high ceilings, two long sofas facing each across a low coffee table, a room built for evenings with people in it. Alexandra used it for that purpose approximately never. She stood at the window with her glass and looked out at the city below, the lights blurred and softening by the rain. Her mind was numbed from the day, and she thought about nothing in particular, which was its own type of exhaustion.
She heard the car before she saw the headlights approaching her house. She knew the sound of that engine by now, knew it the same way she knew the creak in the upstairs hallway and the howl of wind off the headland before a storm.
Simone knocked rather than rang the bell. Alexandra set her glass on the windowsill and went to the door, steeling herself with a breath before she opened it. Simone stood on the step in her coat, raindrops streaked on her shoulders and a folder tucked under her arm. Alexandra said nothing and stepped back to let her in.
She took Simone’s coat and hung it in the entry. Simone looked around the sitting room with that same unhurried attention she observed everything.
“Whiskey?“ Alexandra offered. “Or there’s wine.“
Alexandra watched as Simone’s eyes flitted to her glass before she said, “Whiskey.“
She walked over to the liquor cabinet, opening it and grabbing another glass slowly to give her time to recenter. She poured the amber liquid and handed it across to Simone. They settled on opposite ends of one of the sofas.
Simone held her glass, and something in her stillness was cautious. Alexandra looked up at her face for a moment and understood: Simone knew about the school, and more than that, it was no longer leverage.
“The proxy timeline,” Simone said, breaking their silence. “Where does Ruth think it lands?”
“Before the fifteenth, if your counsel files on time, which means the vote will be by March.” Alexandra swirled her whiskey once. “Assuming your institutional holders stay committed.”
“They will.”
“NorthPoint might surprise you.”
Simone looked at her over the rim of her glass. “You’ve been talking to NorthPoint?”
