Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Warner
Beau Monde
I’ve got a great poker face.
Not everyone does. Or at least that’s what I tell myself when I’m protecting my cards—in boardrooms, choosing new investments, launching new structural surveying apps, and, more and more these days, when I’m forced to publicly face “polite society: the ones supposedly committed to elevating Black excellence in this thriving metropolis of Ellswood.
Yeah, okay.
Judgment fills their eyes now as they hunt for even the faintest tear in the fabric of my carefully constructed armor as if they need to see, with their own eyes, that I’m grieving the “right” way. Broken enough, but not so much it makes them uncomfortable.
“That’s right. Keep staring…” I say under my breath.
On principle, I keep my head high as I scrape my fork across my plate, gathering the last bite of custardy cream and truffle bits, leaving nothing behind.
As I swallow, though, frustration still tightens viselike around my chest. Every table in the country club is littered with glitterati who’ve come out in droves today for the spectacle.
If they don’t like that I’m here again, that’s a them problem.
I take a long drink from my glass, letting the water cool me from the inside out, then sit up straighter, smoothing my expression against the glares. But I’m determined to see this brunch through.
Not for them, for me.
For what might’ve been fourteen years of marriage.
For my sanity.
For my goddamn right to sit here and eat golden-yellow scrambled eggs flecked with truffle shavings, crisp chives, and crème fraiche. Eggs I’ve denied myself for over a year.
That’s why, dammit.
“Is everything to your liking, Mr. Easton?” asks one of the servers, a tall and sheepish-looking guy with thin, rectangular glasses and a part that’s doing its best to bisect his egg-shaped head.
I catch the somber lilt to his tone as he refills my water, and I meet his teary-eyed stare.
He, along with half the staff, have been over to my table, kindly, quietly—as I asked—giving their sympathies and condolences.
But this guy, who still hasn’t even told me his name, his poker face is nonexistent.
With that quivering bottom lip and shaky hand?
The way his brows are gathered together?
He might not make it through the shift without a good cry.
I give it fifteen minutes, tops. The dam breaks.
“Yes, thank you,” I say, clearing my throat to mask my laugh. “Everything is delicious. Please send my compliments to Chef Hibbert.”
Dutifully, he nods.
But then his attention flits to Sherry’s untouched plate again, and he sniffles.
Lord help him.
“Would you care to take this home with you? Maybe a late-evening snack?” he probes, voice shaky as all get-out, already reaching, anticipating my needs. “And you’re sure I can’t offer you another beverage? Water, espresso… I’ve got a lovely assortment of teas, champagne, whatever you—”
“Thanks, just the to-go container, please,” I say, partly for his sake, sparing him the waterworks in his place of business.
I’m tempted to slide him my tele-therapist’s phone number and tell him how my sessions are clearly doing wonders for me.
Can’t he see how cathartic it is, sitting here, utterly uncomfortable with phones aimed at me, gossip circulating, all in the name of creating healing “rituals of remembrance,” an idea Dr. Bellamy swears by?
He sniffles again.
Really, I’m tickled at the comedy of it all.
There’s no manual to teach people how to handle a person dealing with grief.
Obviously, they mean well. But they either treat you like you’re contagious or fragile, like my employees and my family.
Or like it’s just a hump, a minor pit stop on life’s journey to brave my way through, like Dad and my buddy Cord.
In most cases, though, I don’t know what it is, but they want to overfeed you, like Mom.
They keep offering me random banana-nut loaves and casseroles.
Just endless, hardy, carb-heavy stuff. Like weighing down my gut will somehow make me smile and consequently make them feel better that they’ve made me happy.
“You know what, I’ll bring a few teas over for you,” the server says, putting himself firmly in the third category.
I guess now I’m adding “lovely” teas to the list of overabundant offerings.
I avert my gaze, shifting my focus toward the bar, unable to look at him directly without laughing.
“Just the one to-go container,” I repeat, nearly choking on my laugh because other than sparing this poor man, I’m distracted.
It’s a little hard to hold on to my train of thought when there’s a beautiful woman at the bar, and…
Why am I staring at her?
“Of course…” The server trails off, surprising me when a smile breaks over his splotchy face as he follows my line of vision.
It’s almost like he too noticed me noticing her when I’ve got no business noticing any woman.
Especially not with legs like that when I’m here in remembrance of the vows I exchanged with my late wife.
Shit.
“Please, let me know”—his lips twitch—“if there’s anything else I can get for you.”
Now he’s laughing at me?
His suddenly vibrant gaze flits from the woman to me, before he practically skips away.
Except he doesn’t fall back in line with the rest of the pristinely dressed waitstaff.
No, he cheerfully veers off toward the back of the house, ducking into the kitchen, knowing good and well he’s about to throw dirt on my name.
Wow.
“Uh, glad I could help?” I murmur, amazed and exhausted at the quick turn of events.
I can already see the headlines:
HEARTLESS LUXE HUSBAND AND RECLUSIVE TECH CEO SPENDS WEDDING ANNIVERSARY OGLING ENCHANTING WOMAN AT ELLSWOOD COUNTRY CLUB.
DETAILS TO FOLLOW.
Jesus.
The wildest part is, I hardly noticed her earlier.
She was sitting with some clown in acid-washed denim overalls and a blue beret who looked like he was confused between Paris, France and Paris, Texas.
I laughed, thinking about what must’ve gone through that man’s head to pair those two closet staples together and walk out feeling on top of the world.
Then she abruptly stood. Her back was to me, so I couldn’t see her face.
But there was something about the way she moved with a sense of purpose.
It caught me off guard.
I was more than intrigued.
In Ellswood. In this country club, specifically.
People don’t move with urgency. Everything’s about leisure and liaising.
Luxuriating over a four-hour lunch conversation about the next gala and cotillion, like this environment alone isn’t the most stale, predictable setting in the city.
Same impeccable but—mostly—uninspired menu.
Same “high society,” high-tea, holier-than-thou folks.
I don’t know this woman from Eve, and suddenly, I’m that guy who’s captivated by a woman’s walk?
But there she was, moving against the current.
Tall, warm brown skin, long, textured, dark curls falling down her slender back as she took long, purposeful strides toward the exit. No stopping to hobnob. No performative smiles or polished laughter. Not even a second glance at any of the guestlist crowd.
That alone surprised me.
And I’m rarely surprised by anything or anyone.
It felt noteworthy somehow.
I really haven’t thought about women lately. How could I jump back into the dating trenches when I was still shedding labels, defining who I am without Sherry, what life’s supposed to look like without her? I’ve been working on me, healing. Even if it is through tele-therapy.
So, even though every inch of me tensed at how wrong it felt noticing another woman’s smooth, toned legs, or how the late-afternoon light glinted off her full red pout, I was paying attention. As she weaved through the tables. As she’d barely left one man before another called her by name.
Whitney Anika Graves.
“Mr. Easton, it’s so good to see you.”
I tear my gaze away, still searching the corners of my mind to place her name as I spot Chef Hibbert’s burly frame bounding toward my table, arms open wide.
“There he is.” That hardy laugh of his jostles into the air as he all but lifts me out of my chair, squeezing me so tight that I feel the emotion leaking out of me.
“It’s, uh”—I swallow hard around the lump forming in my throat—“good to see you too, Chef.”
When he finally lets me go, he slaps his large palm over his heart and sighs. His entire body deflates at the sight of the two place settings and softly flickering votives.
“I’m so sorry, son.” His thick eyebrows, a little more salt than pepper, braid together with that familiar somber expression. Lips pressed into a shaky line. Hurt glistening in his stare.
“Thanks, I’m getting by,” I say, fanning my hand to him and the team he stationed to keep me unbothered, to the table they reserved, to the meal Sherry and I last ordered together that Chef Hibbert refuses to charge me for. “Thank you. For all of this. It really means a lot.”
Every part of me hates that my grief is the reason his warm features contort with pity.
He nods, like there’s more he wants to say but can’t find the words.
But then a slow smile blooms on his face just as the “lovely assortment of teas” server appears behind him wearing a shit-eating grin.
“So, I hear you might need an introduction…” All thirty-two of Chef’s teeth are on full display as he tips his head toward the bar. “Miss Graves?”
Miss, not Ms. or Mrs.
Still, not a blip.
God, the way my fingers itch for my phone, desperate to start Googling. The name doesn’t even sound familiar. Although instinctively I’m certain I’d know if our paths have ever crossed.
Even this short distance from her is disarming.
Curve-hugging black dress, leopard heels, fire-red lips.
Midafternoon, just beaming and bright-eyed in a private conversation like Ellswood’s country club isn’t the city’s biggest stage.
Meanwhile, she’s tracking every man’s whereabouts, smiling, wielding her charm like she’s leaving with something. Rather, someone.