The Fisher deal celebration was held in a glass-walled hall that looked over the river, the city's lights spread like spilled coins. Emma wasn't invited. She was there anyway, at Ethan's insistence, wearing a dress that Sophie had called "dangerously reasonable"—soft, black, fiercely modest in the front and an act of subtle defiance in the back.
"You don't have to prove anything to anyone," Sophie had said as she zipped it. "But if you want to prove that you're art and not acquisition? This will help."
Ethan found Emma just as she was convincing herself to turn around and leave. He paused a meter away, as if there were rules about proximity he'd written and still honored.
"You came," he said.
"You asked," she answered.
They moved through the room with the practiced grace of people pretending they knew how the dance went. Charles Blackwell gave Emma a look that suggested she was a statistic he didn't have a column for.
A string quartet threaded the evening. Ethan danced with a board member's wife with perfect manners. Emma drank water and tried not to watch his hands.
Sienna materialized with a glittering laugh. "You again," she said to Emma. "I'll give you this—you're persistent."
"I'm here for the study of landscapes," Emma said, deadpan. "This one interests me. So many reflective surfaces."
Sienna's smile sharpened. "Careful not to mistake your reflection for your place."
"Careful not to mistake your place for permanence," Emma returned, surprising both of them.
Sienna's eyes cooled. "Oh, darling," she crooned. "You think he's a storm that didn't pick you? He's the sea. He drowns without trying."
She glided away. Emma exhaled. Ethan was at her shoulder like a shadow that had learned how to be warm.
"You didn't need to defend yourself," he said.
"I didn't," she said. "I attacked."
"You did," he allowed, and for once the smile reached his eyes.
They stepped outside to a balcony of cold and reflection. The city wore its night face. Emma's breath fogged in front of her. Ethan shrugged out of his jacket and draped it over her shoulders without asking. It smelled like cedar and rain. It felt like being claimed and she didn't know whether to smother under it or never give it back.
"Thank you," she said, small.
"Don't thank me for basic decency," he said. "I'm trying to make it a habit."
She faced him. "What are we doing, Ethan?"
His eyes flicked down to her mouth and back up. "Lying badly," he said. "To ourselves."
"Then let's be honest."
"I want—" His voice broke on the simplest verb. "You."
The word fell between them like a match in dry grass. She felt herself lean, as if someone had pulled a string attached to the center of her body. He reached, hand rising to her jaw, and—
"Ethan."
Charles's voice, from the doorway. Ethan's hand fell. The air rearranged itself into something brittle.
"There are investors who require your presence," Charles said, eyes narrowing at the sight of his jacket on Emma.
"I'm occupied," Ethan said.
"You'll learn to be unoccupied when it matters," Charles said. "Now."
Ethan's cheek flexed. He looked at Emma in a way that said I am sorry and I am not done and I have not yet learned how to choose you out loud.
He went inside. Emma stayed with the jacket and the city and the taste of almost on her tongue. When she finally followed, she took the long way. Which is how she overheard Charles, phone to ear, voice low and bored.
"Yes. He's dabbling with some girl. No, not a problem. A scholarship, likely. People like that are currency. You spend them to learn the value of restraint."
Emma stood very still, a hand on the wall like the building might fall if she didn't hold it up. She didn't cry. She didn't run. She turned and walked toward the lifts like a person who'd learned how to walk through fire quietly.
Behind her, Sienna watched, her face unreadable for once.