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“Champagne, please.”
He hands me a tall flute and takes one for himself. Flutes. Not coupes. My mother-in-law would have commented on that. She had gifted Percy and me a set of twenty-five Cristal Champagne coupes for our wedding and insisted I never use flutes.
The hag.
“Sophia?” he asks.
“Yes? Sorry.”
“Are you all right?”
“Yes,” I say and force a smile. “You know, it surprised me when I first came to New York how important events like these are for one’s job.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. I’d thought, naively perhaps, that business was done during office hours. A handshake in a conference room, a phone call or an email sent. But it’s not.”
“No,” Isaac says, “not always.”
“It’s a shame it’s tacky to bring business cards to benefits,” I say, looking out over the crowd. “It would make remembering people’s names the next day a hell of a lot easier.”
Isaac breaks out into surprised laughter, the arm beneath mine trembling with it. And when he speaks, his voice is warm. “It’s a wonder how alike we think sometimes.”
I feel warm. “You know, great minds often do.”
“I can’t tell you,” he says, “how often I’ve struggled to remember the name of someone on Monday morning after a weekend of these things.”
“Might be a bit awkward when you verbally agreed to build a hotel together with someone you can’t call?”
He nods. “Exactly,” he says, “although I save things that big for when I have lawyers present.”
I look around the room at the gentlemen in tuxes and women in floor-length gowns. Isaac and I blend in perfectly. “I think there are a fair amount of lawyers present,” I say.
“Probably, but I bet there’s not a single practicing one.”
“You don’t think at least one of the couples invited their divorce lawyer along?”
“I don’t know,” he says, and looks down at me. “Did you?”
I take a sip of champagne. It feels bubbly on my tongue, adding to the symphony inside of me. “No. She was excellent, expensive as hell, and I never want to see her again.”
“I think that’s the mark of a job well done for a lawyer.”
“Yes. Quite the opposite of you, the emperor of hospitality.”
He chuckles. “Yes. If my customers never returned, I’d have a serious problem.”
Isaac’s eyes are light on mine, lighter than I’ve seen them before. There’s gold mingled with the dark brown, flecks of them forming a ring around his pupils.
He smiles. “Although, you— ah. We have incoming.”
My stomach tightens. “Who is it?”
“The vultures are circling,” he says, but his tone is amused. “My aunt and uncle.”
“Oh.”Showtime.I smile, at the ready, and realize that we never decided how long we’ve been dating for or how we met.
But they don’t ask, even if they’re curious. It’s there in their eyes, flicking between Isaac and me. And they’re not alone.
