Chapter 22: Play It

The ballroom doors were tall and gilded, and two ushers pulled them open for us at the exact moment the applause ended.

Three hundred people sat at round tables under a chandelier.

Everett stood on a low stage at the far end, holding a glass.

I walked in with my hand on Jonah's arm.

The nearest table saw me first.

A woman put her fork down, and the man beside her turned, and the quiet spread across the room one table at a time.

Everett was still smiling when he saw me.

Then the smile stayed where it was while his face changed around it.

"Nell," he said into the microphone, and the speakers carried his voice over everyone. "You came. Please, everyone, give her space. She isn't well."

"I'm very well," I said.

I did not raise my voice.

The room was so quiet it reached the stage anyway.

I walked down the long center aisle between the tables, and Jonah walked beside me, one step off my shoulder, and said nothing.

Heads turned as we passed.

I saw faces I knew from the ninth floor, and the intern who had filmed the all-hands, and the HR manager with her fork.

At the head table, Walter stood up.

He leaned on his cane, and for once he used it.

"Sit down, Everett," he said.

"Dad, this is a family matter."

"It stopped being a family matter when you put it on the company website." Walter nodded to the stage. "Miss Garrity, would you come up?"

At the foot of the steps Lacey stood waiting with a folder against her chest.

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