Chapter 11: The Engagement Party

I put the phone in his hand at dawn and said, "Rescind it."

Joaquin sat up in the pool house bed with the sheet at his waist.

He read the attorney's draft once, then called a number and put the phone on speaker.

"Withdraw the Heyward offer," he said. "All of it. Tonight."

A sleepy voice protested in a London accent.

"Now," Joaquin said, and hung up.

He looked at me.

"I won't buy it," he said. "That doesn't mean I forgive your uncle."

"I don't want you to forgive him." I pulled my knees up. "I want you to do it my way."

"What's your way?"

"In front of people. With me next to you."

He smiled slowly, and it went all through me.

"Sunday," he said. "Grayson's engagement party. They invited us. I think Noelle sent the card herself."

The Chastain estate sat on a bend of Buffalo Bayou behind iron gates, and the lawn was strung with lanterns.

A string quartet played under a white tent.

Two hundred guests had been told to come and admire a young couple, and half of them had read the Saturday paper.

MERIDIAN CHAIRMAN IN HOUSTON, said the headline, with a photograph of Joaquin leaving the gala.

I wore red.

Joaquin wore his old canvas jacket over a plain black shirt, and he had put the cheap steel watch back on.

"You're doing it on purpose," I murmured.

"Everyone's looking at my wrist," Joaquin said. "Nobody's looking at my hands."

We walked in, and the music faltered.

Heads turned in a wave.

A tall silver-haired man at the center of the lawn was talking to a banker with his drink in his fist.

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