Page 47 of His Wall

I had been watching the door since it opened. I knew it. Anyone who had been in the room for more than three minutes knew it. The bartender knew it.

I had not heard from the unknown number in seven days.

I had spent four of those days having my security guy run the burner. He had come back with what I had known he would come back with, which was nothing. The number had been live for the four minutes it had taken to send the text and had been dark since. The man had not contacted me again. He had not needed to. The not-contacting was its own kind of contact.

I lifted the glass. Drank. Set it back at my hip.

I had decided, in the elevator on the way up tonight, that I was going to put it down for the duration of the gala. Conrad — if it was Conrad, and I knew it was Conrad — could wait until Monday. Tonight I had asked Claire to come with me, and she had said yes. Tonight was going to be the night I let it be the thing it was.

I scanned the door again.

"She's not here yet."

Declan was at my left elbow with a champagne flute in his hand. He had on a tux that fit him too well, and his dark hair was carefully arranged in the way that meant Thea had run her hand through it on the way out the door. He did not bother to fix it. His wedding band caught the chandelier light when he raised the glass.

"Who?"

He looked at me.

It was the look he had been giving me since we were twenty-four years old.

"Don't insult me, Jules."

"I'm just looking at the door."

"You've been looking at the door for fifteen minutes."

Nolan came up behind us. Soleil was on his arm in cream and gold, dark curls down her back, a pair of long gold drop earrings catching the light when she turned her head. Nolan was in his tux with the same charcoal mood he wore in meetings, his hand at the small of Soleil's back.

"He's been watching the door for fifteen minutes," Nolan said.

"I think it's sweet," Soleil said.

"I think it's a liability," Nolan said.

"You're both wrong," I said. "I'm watching the door because I am responsible for greeting late arrivals. I am the official greeter. Declan put me here."

"I did not put you there," Declan said.

"He put me here."

"I did not put him there."

"He has been the official greeter for the entire two minutes he has been at this gala," Nolan said.

Soleil patted my arm. "Sweet."

She tugged Nolan toward the bar. He let himself be tugged. Declan stayed.

"I offered to pick her up," I said. The words came out before I had decided to let them.

"And?"

"She said no."

"Twice?"

"Twice."