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And I feel…happy.
Chapter Eleven
Henry
She’s late for the board meeting. Almost ten minutes late. I’m surprised. I keep watching the elevators across the vast empty space that, since this is Manhattan, costs more per square foot than a Bentley.
Brett rocks back in his chair and says, “Somebody didn’t read the bylaws as well as she should’ve.”
The bylaws stipulate that if you’re fifteen minutes late without alerting anyone, the board votes your percentage. It’s a rule that was originally created so meetings wouldn’t get held up if our grandfather decided to grab a dozen glazed bear claws from Jolly’s on the way in from Long Island.
“Let’s do this.” I pull up the motion to strip her of her votes and enter it into the agenda with a sense of disappointment.
I was looking forward to today. Perverse, I know. But I’m curious to see what’s next in the pretty little scammer’s playbook. Does she cram on the bylaws? Bide her time until she attains expertise in all things Locke, and then go in for the kill?
Or does she play bull in the china shop, making us suffer and squirm until we make her a better offer?
Does she cut in a lawyer? Somebody to read everything that comes up for vote? I definitely wouldn’t blame her if she did that, considering what we pulled in that last meeting.
Mandy seconds the additional agenda item and moves that we consider it first.
Kaleb seconds the emotion.
At thirteen after, right as we’re about to vote her off the island, the elevator doors open.
I sit up, heart pounding. Saved by the bell, I think, folding my hands in front of me, ready to give her the amused smile that seems to annoy the stuffing out of her. Ready for another one of her prim-but-strangely-hot librarian outfits.
But it’s not her.
It’s a pair of mimes, and they’re carrying something large between them—a piece of wooden furniture with shiny detailing, like some kind of fancy high chair. They start across the floor with the thing hoisted between them.
Vicky steps out of the elevator after them with Smuckers on a leash.
Her hair is tauntingly confined in that polished ponytail. Her simple brown dress has a slim, shiny belt that matches the dark brown of her glasses. But it’s not her outfit that gets me—it’s her bright gaze, her flushed cheeks, just the energy of her.
It charges the air around her. It sends shivers across my skin.
I have the feeling that medieval warriors must’ve had, seeing the enemy pour over the hill, flags flying, armor glinting.
I go to my feet.
“What the hell?” Brett mutters. We’re all standing now.
The mimes proceed toward us with whatever it is they carry, followed by Vicky and April. Smuckers trots along on the end of a leash. Wearing a blue bow tie.
A Locke-blue bow tie.
My pulse races.
Vicky cuts ahead of the mimes and opens the door for them. They’re your classic mimes’ mimes: white painted faces, striped socks, berets, black suspenders, the whole dorky deal. They enter bearing the strange piece of furniture, acting surprised and delighted to discover us.
What. The. Hell.
I watch in shock as they set the thing—some sort of a cross between a high chair and a throne—down at the end of the table. They make a huge production out of shifting chairs around to make room. They measure the space with an invisible measuring tape, gesturing dramatically to each other.
They’re not really very good mimes; this adds to the insult of it.
Vicky seems engrossed with the operation. Smuckers pants excitedly in her arms.
