Chapter 2 - The Mask Slips
James returned to Table Four like a victorious general returning from a bloodless conquest.
He slid into his seat beside Hannah, letting out a heavy, satisfied breath. The crystal award made a sharp *thunk* as he planted it directly in the center of the table, crowding Hannah’s bread plate and forcing her to pull her elbows inward.
“God, that went well,” James muttered, wiping his forehead with a monogrammed handkerchief. “Did you see Vance? He was red in the face. Absolutely ate it up.”
Hannah did not look up from her plate. The sea bass had gone cold twenty minutes ago, congealing in a pale pool of tarragon butter.
“You’re welcome, by the way,” James added, leaning closer to her. He reached for his wine glass, taking a long sip of the cabernet he had demanded the server bring specially from the reserve list.
Hannah turned her head slowly. Her face was pale, her dark eyes clear and glassy, like winter ice over a pond.
“Welcome for what, James?”
James frowned, the warmth instantly evaporating from his expression. The boyish, charismatic grin vanished, replaced by the tight, pinched displeasure that Hannah knew far better than anyone in the Drake ballroom.
“For giving you a personality tonight,” he whispered harshly, leaning in so the associates at Table Twelve wouldn't hear. “Look at yourself, Hannah. You’ve sat here like a stone for three hours. You didn't smile at Vance’s wife. You barely nodded when Hale walked past. I had to humanize you.”
“You humanized me by telling six hundred people I was an embarrassment?”
“I made a self-deprecating joke!” James snapped, his fingers tightening around the stem of his glass. “It’s called rhetoric. It makes people relate to us. It softens the room. Do you have any idea how hard it is to make senior partner at thirty-six? You think they want a robot with an anti-social wife? They want a guy with a real life. A domestic life. A guy who can laugh at the messiness of it all.”
“I am not your messiness,” Hannah said. Her voice didn't rise. It possessed a low, steady cadence that should have warned him.
James scoffed, shaking his head. He looked away, waving to a junior associate two tables over who gave him a thumbs-up.
“Don’t start this,” James said through clenched teeth, keeping his fake smile plastered on his face for the room. “Not tonight. Don't be hysterical. It’s the hormones talking, I know that. But just... sit up straight, drink your sparkling water, and look proud of your husband for once in your life. Can you manage that for forty-five minutes?”
Hannah looked at him. Really looked at him.
She saw the tiny specks of dandruff on his silk lapel. She saw the faint yellowing around his collar where his foundation makeup had rubbed off—he had started wearing tinted moisturizer three months ago to hide the dark circles from late nights he claimed were spent at the office. She saw the sharp, brittle vanity of a man who had never in his life built anything from raw wood, who had only ever polished things other men had carved.
She thought of the tiny apartment in Lincoln Park where they had spent their first year. She thought of how she had cooked him stews in a cracked Dutch oven while he studied for the bar. She thought of how she had walked four miles in the snow to save eighty dollars on groceries so he could buy the leather briefcase he swore he needed to look professional.
*“You’re a librarian,”* he had told her when they married. *“You’re so pure, Hannah. You don’t care about all this garbage.”*
He hadn't loved her purity.
He had loved that she demanded nothing.
He had loved that she had no expectations he couldn't step over.
Across the room, the microphone near the lectern let out a sharp, piercing whine of feedback.
James flinched, turning toward the stage. “What is the sound crew doing? Amateurs. When I’m managing partner, we’re switching this gala to the Peninsula.”
Arthur Vance was already standing near the podium, adjusting his reading glasses to read the closing remarks. But before Vance could reach the microphone, a stagehand in black jeans whispered something in his ear.
Vance frowned, looked down at a sheet of paper handed to him, and then froze.
His head snapped toward the side curtain. Then, slowly, with an expression that looked remarkably like a man watching an artillery shell drop through his living room ceiling, Vance stepped away from the podium.
“What is he doing?” James murmured, leaning forward. “He’s supposed to introduce Hale now.”
The house lights in the ballroom did not dim. Instead, the amber wash faded, replaced by stark, clean white illumination from the overhead architectural spots.
A man walked out from the shadow of the velvet drape.
He didn't hurry. He walked with the relaxed, heavy stride of an owner walking through his private stables. He wore no name badge. He carried no notes.
Hannah’s heart gave a sudden, painful lurch against her ribs.
Her breath caught in her throat.
“Damian,” she whispered.
James turned to her, his brow furrowed in annoyance. “What?”
“Damian,” she repeated, her voice barely louder than a breeze through dry leaves.
James looked at the stage, squinting. “Who is that guy? Some tech consultant from the AV team? Why is he touching the podium?”
The man reached the microphone. He adjusted the stand upward by four inches with one casual hand.
May you like
Then he looked directly at Table Four.
***
