Chapter 5: Tea With Lionel

I closed the door and leaned my back against it until I heard the man's shoes go down the stairs.

Nate came out of the closet with a winter coat sleeve stuck to his hair.

"Don't go," he said.

"He invited me."

"That isn't an invitation."

"I know what it is."

"Then don't go."

"If I don't go, he sends the man back, and next time it won't be a nice envelope."

I opened it.

The card inside said only, Four o'clock. The Faculty Club. Please come alone. L. Hargrove.

"I'm coming with you," Nate said.

"No."

"Roxy."

"You have been hiding me for three years," I said. "I'm not going to hide behind you for one cup of tea."

He opened his mouth and closed it again.

At the door he turned, with the lint still in his hair, and looked at me.

"He'll offer you money," he said.

"Good. I have a diner shift on Saturday."

That time neither of us smiled.

The Faculty Club was a stone house at the top of the quad, with tall windows and a carpet that swallowed my sneakers.

I had put on my only blazer, the one I'd bought for my scholarship interview.

A waiter took me through a dining room with white tablecloths and low talk.

Two professors in tweed looked up from a table by the fire, and one of them whispered something to the other.

Lionel Hargrove sat at the window table with his hands folded.

He didn't stand up.

He was a slim man with silver hair and a face that had been handsome so long it had gone soft and gentle, like a coin worn smooth.

"Roxana," he said. "How good of you to come. Sit."

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