Chapter Thirty-Four
About Eight Hours Earlier
Merritt stared at the building, feeling like a slightly lost ingenue at the beginning of a Golden Age movie musical. Willa
had assured her that this was the right place. She had also mandated that Merritt not mention her name at any point during
this reckless mission, but Merritt tried not to think about that now.
When she had arrived in New York the previous evening, she’d gone to pull out her phone, only to realize that she’d left it
in the seat pocket on the airplane. She felt a brief moment of panic, but then remembered her mother’s insistence when she
dropped Merritt off in the departures lane that she tell her Evie and édouard’s address, just in case. After visiting the
customer service desk to file a claim for her phone, she used the landline to call her mother, who told her the address and
as much as said, without saying it, Aren’t you glad you have a mother who takes such prudent precautions?
Two weeks ago, she had planned to tell Ian Hoult some of the truth and to jump-start her own writing career in the process,
but this second step was a spur-of-the-moment move. When the pieces clicked into place in her mind, she had called Willa and
Evie in quick succession. Both had expressed skepticism about her plan but had nonetheless agreed to maintain silence on the
matter should they speak to Whit within the next forty-eight hours.
This morning, following a cozy dinner with Evie and édouard and a night of restless sleep, Merritt joined her hosts for breakfast. Evie took one look at Merritt’s proposed outfit of black jeans and black sweater and gasped.
“No,” she had said. “I’m sorry, but no.” After a protracted argument over coffee and yogurt, Merritt had been talked into
borrowing a pair of high-waisted trousers paired with a silky green tie-neck blouse, as well as Evie’s fawn-colored tweed
trench coat.
Now, standing on the city street with this intimidating building before her, she wished she hadn’t also let Evie bully her
into trading her public radio tote for a big designer bag. She would have liked to use the old thing as a security blanket.
“Just walk in confidently,” Willa had said the day before. “Wear your sunglasses—”
“I don’t wear sunglasses. I wear regular glasses.”
“Act like you’re wearing sunglasses, and then ask to speak to Shreya. Tell her you’re with legal.”
When édouard heard about this plan over dinner, he had simply said, “Non.”
“What?”
“Non, it will not do. You need a real lawyer.”
“I don’t have a real lawyer.”
“Merritt,” Evie said. She set down her red wine. “édouard is a real lawyer. Whit’s lawyer.”
“And I would be honored to assist you.”
Merritt fought a blush, though she refused to interrogate whether the source was her forgetfulness or the full force of édouard’s
gaze.
“How?”
“I will go with you to this place and get you in.”
“I don’t know, I don’t want to get you in some sort of trouble,” Merritt lied. Inwardly she was thrilled by the prospect of
not doing this part alone.
“Non,” édouard said again. “Nonsense.”
Then he held his hand out and spoke in a voice of mock ceremony: “Merritt Pryor, would you do me the honor of being my client?”
She suppressed a giggle and shook his smooth, strong hand for the second time.
Now she stood on the sidewalk, waiting for him. From everything Whit had told her, publishing people did not seem like the
type to get to the office early, and so édouard had headed into work first for meetings. But now he was approaching her, in
his Stoffa raglan coat, Loewe suit, and shining oxfords. The wind tossed his coat and hair with cinematic chicness.
“Thank you again for doing this,” Merritt said.
“Of course. Now listen.”
He set his briefcase down against his leg, straightened his clothes, and took both of Merritt’s hands in his. A luxury watch
glimmered in the midmorning light.
“You must be confident and at ease, and per’aps a little bit rude until we get past the front desk. This I do all the time.”
Merritt sighed, her breath appearing in a puff that fogged her glasses. She straightened her spine as they approached the
rotating door and were met by a warm blanket of air that fogged her glasses yet again. She had worried that they might have
to charm a security guard, but before them was a wide stone-tiled lobby lined with well-lit bookshelves. At the far end of
the room was a reception desk, where two people in white shirts and black doorman-like jackets sat.
édouard led the way. Merritt pictured her favorite TV lawyers—Christine Baranksi, Viola Davis—and channeled that energy as
they approached the desk.
“We’re here to see Shreya Ramanathan,” édouard said in a tone at once forceful and bored, so unlike his normal speaking voice.
“Okay,” the woman said hesitantly. “Is she expecting you?”
“She should be,” édouard said, as if offended by the question. “I’m with Mulryan, Martineau, and Poore. I called ahead.”
This was a lie, but édouard had warned her of the trick in advance. It gave the appearance of certainty and set the other
party scrambling, afraid that something had fallen through the cracks on their end.
“I represent Whit Longacre and his late wife, Helen Albright Longacre,” édouard went on, sliding a business card across the
table. “The author of those,” he continued, pointing at the Greenwood Castle books displayed in the bookshelves across the room.
The woman’s eyes widened, but she turned to Merritt. “And you are?”
“Merritt Pryor,” she said with a smoothness she was proud of. “An associate of Mr. Longacre’s.”
“Fine,” the woman said, as if growing bored. She cradled a black phone against her ear and called an extension. As they listened
to her repeat édouard’s words to the faceless person on the other end of the line, Merritt tried to look serious and fully
at ease but also a little impatient.
“He said they’re with . . .” The woman put her hand to the receiver. “Sorry, what was the firm?”
édouard shot Merritt a performative can-you-believe-this look.
“Mulryan, Martineau, and Poore.”
“Mulryan, Martineau, and Poore. They represent Helen Albright Longacre and—”
“Her husband.”
“Her husband.”
Merritt nodded approvingly.
“Mm-hmm,” said the woman. “Yes, I think so . . . No . . . No . . . All right, thank you.”
She hung up the phone.
“If I could just see your IDs, please, we’ll get you upstairs.”
As the woman fiddled with their cards, édouard shot Merritt a conspiratorial wink, which she would have returned had she not been close to fainting from relief.
In her daydreams, and occasionally her real dreams, Merritt had pictured herself being escorted into the offices of an imprint
at one of the country’s most prestigious publishing houses. It had looked about like this. There were books and bookish people
everywhere, as well as trinkets and statuettes from canonical and not-so-canonical texts. But it had not felt like this. In
her dreams, she was an author going to meet her editor or on her way to approve potential book covers or meet audiobook performers.
Instead, she was now on a covert mission. As merely Whit’s associate, for all anyone knew, she sat in a glass-walled conference
room, waiting, occasionally catching people in the open offices beyond looking her way with curiosity. What did they think
of her? What had they heard?
“Look more confident,” édouard admonished, and Merritt sat up straighter, earning a nod of approval. She tried not to appear
like she was doing mindfulness exercises, which were in fact what she had turned to for support. Deep breathing, feeling the
ground holding her feet, sending a kind wish to the Shreya woman—humiliating stuff, and none of it working. Her heart beat
like a bouncy ball in a contained space. Her upper lip was sweaty and the small of her back, too, and she kept crossing and
uncrossing her legs. Not very Christine Baranski–like behavior.
When the door opened, she was surprised to see two people: a forty-something South Asian woman in a black dress and red spherical
earrings and a dowdy, square-shaped white man with patches of curly gray hair on the sides of his head and glasses that could
have been borrowed from a trunk labeled “Senior Citizen Props.”
“Mr. Marchand? Ms. Pryor?” the woman said, extending her hand. “I’m Shreya Ramanathan.”
Merritt stood to shake the editor’s hand, ignoring how intimidatingly perfect her silky chin-length hair was and how Merritt’s
own had more of a panicked-and-also-it’s-wintertime vibe.
“And this is Alan Binford. He’s a member of our legal team.”
Alan, who was wiping his glasses with a microfiber cloth, held out his hand and missed the mark so spectacularly that édouard
had to take a large step to his left to shake it.
Merritt yearned to say, “Nice to meet you,” but she followed édouard’s serious, disinterested lead and sat silently opposite
them at the table.
“I apologize for being caught a bit off guard,” Shreya said, through a polite smile, “but I don’t think I knew you were coming
in today.”
Merritt sighed. She had talked with édouard and Evie the night before about what they would do if they made it this far. édouard
had given her oodles of examples of the language he could use to make his case and threaten this woman into capitulation.
But now that she was here, Merritt realized that getting in was the complicated part. Now it was best to go down the path
of least resistance.
She placed a hand on édouard’s forearm to stop him from speaking first.
“Please don’t apologize,” she said. “I appreciate you meeting with us.”
Alan had pulled a notepad from an old leather briefcase and had not looked up since, but Shreya was staring, her expression
unreadable.
“And may I ask why you wanted to meet me?”
“Well, I’m not just an associate of Whit’s. I’m his coauthor.”