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The choreography continues as dinner guests immediately scramble to return their forks to their correct position on the table. The spectacle is almost enough to make me smile, but then my grandmother’s cold gaze pins me and I recenter my attention down onto my plate.
Everyone begins eating, and there’s a hush in the air until Emmett speaks up.
“As you must realize, hors d'oeuvres is French,” he tells my grandmother, though the whole table is listening in. “It translates literally to ‘outside the work’ or ‘outside of the masterpiece’.”
“That’s lovely,” a woman near him says.
I hadn’t noticed her until that moment, and I have to lean forward to get a better look at her. She’s a vivacious brunette with cropped hair and a wide, red-lipped smile. Her eyes are set flirtatiously on Emmett as he continues, “I’ve heard the practice originated in Russia, where small snacks of fish, caviar, and meats were common on long travels.”
Everyone at the table finds this interesting except for my grandmother, who seems insistent on holding on to her tight-lipped expression.
The conversation slowly grows, voices filtering in and out. I’m wholly apart from it all. A waiter comes around to fill our wine glasses, and I greedily accept, wishing it were possible to ask for the entire bottle. While the waiter pours, I let my gaze slip to Emmett. I’m not the only one paying attention to him. He draws us all in, eclipsing even the most illustrious guests. Crown prince who?
Though it’s a break from proper etiquette, I thank the waiter for the wine just as our second course is brought out, a classic French mushroom soup plated beautifully.
Down the way, across the table, Royce talks to the man at his side. He hasn’t looked up at me once.
It’s interesting to pick apart the seating arrangement. Victor’s done nothing by accident. He’s placed himself at the helm, acting as our dinner party’s fearless leader, and made sure to keep the most important guests close at hand. My grandmother and Emmett are at his side, and beside Emmett is the crown prince of Malaysia. He’s a diminutive man closer to my grandmother’s age than to mine.
I carefully tip my spoon away from me as I ladle small bites of soup and continue my assessment. My seat in the middle of the table seems slightly out of order. I’m truly no one, but my grandmother’s presence looms like an umbrella over me, and I suppose that’s why I’m deemed more worthy than I am.
“Did you enjoy your walk through the gardens, Elaine?”
Victor’s pointed question stretches across the room, and my spoon freezes in my soup.
I’m aware of everyone’s curious stares, the redness creeping up my neck.
“Yes. Thank you.”
My voice is so faint I’d be surprised if anyone heard it.
“You gave us all a real scare.”
The soft clinking of silverware against china is the only sound in the entire dining room.
The moment takes me back to my time at St. John’s, when I was all too often the butt of some joke or game, and rather than stand up for myself and deliver a stinging remark, I’d shy away from confrontation.
“She was—” Emmett begins, attempting to come to my aid.
“Victor, the soup is delicious,” my grandmother says, cutting him off and drawing the attention away from me. “Where was your chef able to source the mushrooms this time of year?”
Later that night, after the longest dinner of my life, I hold my breath as I follow my grandmother into our shared bedroom. I’ve worried about this moment all evening, the first chance for her to speak with me in private about all the ways in which I’ve disappointed her. I wring my hands as I watch her walk toward her closet. Usually, at home, Margaret would help her undress after a formal event, but I go to her now, helping her unzip her dress and hang it back up. She’s silent as she gets into her nightgown, and then I do the same. My stomach is in knots. Most of my food went untouched at dinner, and I know I’ll be starving in the morning.
I put on my pajamas and go into the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face. My grandmother does as well, at the sink alongside mine, and when she’s done, she walks over, kisses my hair, and tells me good night.
Chapter Sixteen
Emmett
I wake in the morning well before the sun has risen over Lake Como. Jet lag should work against me, but I travel so often my body has learned to trudge through. Victor has given me a room on the third floor of the villa overlooking the lake and mountains. I sit at a desk in front of the picture window for two hours, chipping away at emails, correspondence, and a to-do list best tackled in the peace and quiet of the early hours, before the rest of the houseguests wake up.
