Chapter 13: The Agent

The agent's name was on the sheet in his own handwriting.

I folded the page once and put it inside my jacket.

"Where is he?" I asked.

Penelope had already pulled up the agency's calendar on her phone.

"Quarterly client lunch," she said. "Noon, forty-first floor. Forty clients and the press."

"Good."

"Wesley." She held my sleeve. "Do you want me to come?"

"Yes."

"Then I'm coming."

We rode up in silence.

The elevator opened on white marble, a string quartet and a long table of actors holding champagne.

The agent stood at the head of it with a glass in his hand.

I had met him at nineteen, in a dorm room, when he was the only one who shared his noodles.

I had been the best man at his wedding.

He saw me and his smile stayed on a second too long.

"Wes," he said, loudly. "Everyone, this is my oldest friend."

The room turned.

Half of them knew my face from the news, and the quartet stopped playing.

"I came to give you something," I said.

I took the sign-in sheet out of my jacket and held it up.

"What is that?" he asked.

"A visitor log from my father's ICU. The night before the fans came."

He did not move.

"Sonia signed it at nine. You signed it at ten."

"I visited your dad," he said. "I was worried about him."

"You told me to take the money and disappear. You told me to stay away from the Ambroses. You never said you had been in his room."

"I forgot."

"For two weeks?"

A young actor near the table set his glass down.

The agent laughed, a thin laugh.

"Wes, you're exhausted. Everyone can see it. Let's talk in my office."

"No."

I walked the length of the table and put the sheet down in front of him.

"Read me the third line," I said.

"I won't."

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