Chapter 4: Golden Hour

I read the email four times.

"She is resting."

Jody had never rested in her life. She chewed gum in her sleep.

I fed the cats.

I called her phone and heard it ring in her bedroom, under the pillow, where she always lost it.

Then I called Danny.

"Where are you?" he said. "Your bed's made. Your bed is never made."

"Jody's. Long night."

"The wedding thing?"

"The wedding thing."

"Was it good?"

I looked at the sun hat on the hook.

"Somebody got carried off," I said. "Eat breakfast. Real food. Not cereal from the box."

"Cereal is real food."

I hung up before my voice did something stupid.

Then I put on Jody's leather jacket over the gray sweater a god had given me, and took the train into Manhattan.

Golden Hour took up the whole fortieth floor.

White carpet. White orchids. Glass walls with the whole of Fifth Avenue under them.

The Saturday meeting, before the weekend's weddings, was in the big glass room in the middle.

That way the matchmakers could watch the cupids, and the cupids could watch the matchmakers.

Thirty people sat around the white table with oat lattes.

Aphrodite sat at the head in a white silk suit, legs crossed, gold sandal swinging.

She saw me through the glass and smiled.

"Clary, darling," she said, when I opened the door. "We were just talking about you."

Every head turned.

I could see their hearts. Most were small and nervous, tucked down tight.

Two cupids at the end of the table, a man and a woman I'd trained, looked at my sweater and then at the floor.

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