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As the applause subsided, I tried to free myself from the CEO’s hold. Clearly he’d forgotten I was here, and I had never intended this donation to be about me.
“Now,” the CEO continued, “I’d like to introduce this very special surprise donor-slash-guest.”
Really, I was supposed to be off the stage by now. Why was the CEO still death-gripping my elbow?
The stage lights shifted to the far side of the stage, where a redhead stood, but my eyes had to adjust to the change, so I couldn’t make out her face. The CEO said the name, but the audience’s scream swallowed his words.
The woman crossed the stage, holding out her hands to the CEO—and me? I’d nearly accepted—no need to be rude, even if putting someone in this position is super uncool—when finally I saw who she was.
Harper Tyne.
She shook my offered hand, then used it to pull me in.
And kissed me on the mouth.
I joined the crowd’s gasp as Harper Tyne kissed Davis. My stomach plummeted like the drop on that awful elevator by ID.
I might have thought the reaction was jealousy, but everything about this felt wrong. The event photographers, already clustered near the stage and snapping away at Harper’s entrance, went into overdrive. Davis finally stepped back from her. I wasn’t close enough to make out his expression, but his body language was stiff.
His brother had dated Harper—had just been seen with her again—and now Everett was seen out with Jessica Stryker.
“Does Davis know Harper Tyne?” Dr. Donaldson murmured.
“No.”I have never even met her, he’d told me, more than a little mad I’d alluded to her song.
“Then—why?”
I was asking the same question, but from Dr. Donaldson, it sounded like he wanted to study this curious human behavior rather than help where needed.
Maybe Davis didn’t need help. He didn’t jerk away from Harper, though he did make a hasty retreat from the stage. As soon as Davis was out of the stage lights, it was as though he disappeared to the rest of the audience, standing and cheering, all attention turned on Harper and the opening notes of “Just Waiting”—the same song I’d quoted. Which, looking back on the lyrics, was probably about Everett.
Ouch.
Davis’s path striding back to his table brought him within twenty feet of our seats. I could hardly make him out amid the crowd until I stood too. His expression was stony as he pulled out a handkerchief and wiped his mouth.
Whatever he was feeling, he could use some support—but I wasn’t the person to give it to him. He reached his table, all still seated, and his date, whose gold sequins still glittered dully in the low light of the banquet room. Surely he’d take his seat and she’d comfort him. And I’d stop watching and wishing someone would.
They conferred for a moment, but Davis scarcely paused at his chair. He gave her a placating gesture, perhaps assuring her he was fine, and continued right out of the ballroom, snagging a champagne flute from a waiter on the way out.
I was halfway to the doors when it occurred to me that I probably should have made up an excuse for Dr. Donaldson. Instead, I made a beeline for the same waiter and tray of champagne flutes that Davis had taken one from.
The lobby outside the ballroom was empty, but glass doors showed Davis silhouetted against the city lights, leaning his elbows on the balcony railing. His slumped posture made it appear he wasn’t just by himself—he wasalone.
I tentatively opened the doors to join him on the balcony. He turned to look and did a double take when he saw me. He turned back to the fading sunset. “No,” he said, “I’m not going to get you her autograph.”
“I had to ask, didn’t I?”
He raised his champagne glass to me.
I ventured over to the balcony railing. The rush from the river of traffic a few floors below us felt like gentle white noise, buffering us from the commotion we’d just left. If we looked out over the city, its two-hundred-year-old brick buildings juxtaposed against sleek glass skyscrapers, we could pretend that hadn’t happened.
But I hadn’t come out here to act as though he hadn’t just been assaulted. “I’m going to hazard a guess,” I said gently, still staring out over the city lights. “But it looked like that wasn’t planned.”
“Yeah, no.” He sipped his champagne, eyed the glass and frowned at it. “The speech was all right, wasn’t it?”
I’d imagined him looking in my direction when he’d talked about making a difference around the world with our research. Maybe. Possibly. “Better than all right, especially if you didn’t have any notice. I’d hate to be put on the spot like that.”
“Then make sure you never make a generous donation.”
