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me and extends his hand to Holt. “Caleb Frank. I went to college with this comedy team.”
    Duck and I, on cue, look at each other drolly, eyes innocently wide, and Holt chuckles. “I’m married to this one.” He points to Duck. “Nice to meet you.”
    “So, what are you all up to?”
    “Oh, just trying to keep up in the big city—,” I say at the same time Duck says, “Molly’s a super hotshot lawyer at Bacon Payne.”
    He smiles and nods slowly. “Nice,” he says as I am struck by how boring that sounds.
    “Yeah. How about you?” I decide to play dumb and pretend I don’t know about his founding of a joystick company, Da Styck, Inc., with a business school buddy; the sale of that company for an eight-figure price tag; his subsequent purchase of three homes (Manhattan, Sun Valley and the Hamptons); his amateur triathlon competitions (a phase that seemed to have petered out two years ago after a mediocre finish in the South Maui race); and, of course, his on-again, off-again relationship with Anastasia Peppercorn, party girl and heir to the Peppercorn Vodka fortune.
    What’s funny is that when we ended things back in college, I nursed my wounds telling myself that I, obedient overachiever, was on the way up, while he, who could rarely roll out of bed in time for class, was headed nowhere, even if he didn’t realize ityet. The fact that he has turned into a master of the universe disrupts my adopted narrative more than a little.
    He smiles at me. “You know, just trying to keep up in the big city.” I smile back, despite myself.
    He looks over at his table. Although I see three hipster grunge guys and two willowy blondes in all black, Anastasia, with her trademark shock of pink hair, is not among them. “Well, I best get back to my table, but it was great to see you guys.” He’s looking right at me as he says it.
    I smile and nod, pressing my suddenly sweaty palms against my legs to dry them.
    “Hopefully we’ll see each other around soon.” He squeezes my shoulder, gives a little wink, and then he’s gone, swaggering back to the hipster/model table.
    And just like that, I feel a jolt of adrenaline. I’m sure it’s relief. I saw him. I finally saw him, and my dignity is intact. I didn’t start sobbing, jump into his surprised arms or pelt him with dumplings. Maybe this is the closure I needed.
    “So, what were we talking about? Aspen?” I direct my question to Holt because I can tell even without looking at her that Duck now wears the anxious expression of the hiker who spotted the bear.
    Holt launches into a long description of the Aspen house and I pretend to pay attention, but out of the corner of my eye, I’m watching Caleb.

4
    ____
all is right with the world
    I t is a little before nine o’clock in the morning, and I am reading my e-mail at my desk, even though I just checked my BlackBerry fewer than five minutes ago in the elevator on the way up to thirty-seven. Frantic e-mail checking is the tic of every Bacon Payne lawyer.
    Kim buzzes me on the intercom. “LucyFowleronWades.” I press hold and rummage around on my desk until I find the Wades file. Last week, Lillian had told me to read up on the case—an instruction that I knew meant she was passing the baton of responsibility to me. “Yes,” she had added when I read the name on the folder and looked up, my mouth agape. “Wades as in that Wades.”
    I skim quickly. Our client is Kira, thirty-eight, married to Jonathan, thirty-nine. Neither Jonathan nor Kira work, aside from parenting their twins along with three full-time nannies. They live off Jonathan’s substantial trust fund and Kira’s considerable inheritance; his great-great-great-grandfather Clarkson Wades made a fortune in banking, and her mother was an oil heiress turned fashion designer.
    Lucy launches right into it. “Listen, we have some real problems about Thanksgiving. I’m following up on my letter. Jonathan needs some time with the twins. His parents do a