Chapter 13: Hands Behind My Back

I texted Maxine back from the train.

"Put me where the photographer can see my hands. All day."

"Why your hands?"

"I'll explain at noon. Wear something you don't mind getting wet."

"I'm a pastry chef. Everything I own has been wet."

The tasting was in the Palm Room, off the lobby, the second room in the hotel with its plastic off.

Twelve round tables. White cloths. Food writers with notebooks and TV people with ring lights.

Maxine's six plates went down the long table on silver stands.

Edmund worked the room in a cream suit, shaking hands with both of his.

"Hen!" he said, loud enough for the TV people. "Our star! Come stand with Maxine. The cameras want you two together."

"I bet they do."

The freelancer was a skinny man in a black vest, two cameras on straps.

He wasn't shooting the plates.

He was shooting the space between Maxine and me, and he hadn't lowered his lens once.

[ok here we go]

[the slap. chapter 13. the cover image]

[I know it's coming and I STILL don't want it to happen]

I stood beside Maxine at the head of the table.

I put both hands behind my back and held my own wrists.

"Why are you standing like a butler?" Maxine whispered.

"Watch the server with the red tray."

She looked.

He was young, in a Northcott vest, carrying a tray of glasses of something dark red. Beet and cherry shrub, the menu said.

He wasn't serving anybody.

He'd been circling our end of the room for six minutes. I'd counted.

Edmund caught his eye across the room and touched his own pocket square.

The server started toward us.

I took one step forward, into the open space in front of the table.

And I used the detective's voice.

"Ladies and gentlemen, before we taste, a little preview of the show."

Keep reading free with an account. Start After I Learned I Was Going to Be His Ex-Wife from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.