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sense served him well in all his endeavors. He’d had a hand in dozens of businesses by the time he met Olivia Asher in 1964. She was a brilliant coed withplans to become a lawyer. He saw her for the first time walking down Fifth Avenue in New York. She had long, raven hair that shone in the midday sun, and she walked with an air of confidence about her. Their two-year courtship was a struggle because she believed marrying him would mean giving up her own dreams. He finally convinced her they could dream together and they married in 1966. He was forty-seven. She was twenty-four.
    Before long, it became apparent to both Robert and Olivia that she had a head for business and instead of practicing law she eventually became his most trusted executive. She bought new businesses and grew them all over the world. They bought the house in Georgetown in 1970 and kept Robert’s Park Avenue apartment where she still lived. For thirty-two years they were happy, even though they had no children, a disappointment to both of them. Their fairy tale came to an end when Robert died suddenly in 1998. Olivia had been a youthful woman of fifty-six when she became a widow, but the idea of marrying again was a nonstarter. Within a year she had turned the day-to-day operation of their global business over to a trusted CEO and opened the Robert L. Fordham Institute, which was devoted to charitable causes around the world. The institute had become her passion and while she had gentlemen callers, as she referred to them, she took her role as Mrs. Robert Fordham very seriously and let nothing interfere with the work they both held dear. Robert had always talked of spending his last years giving away a great deal of the money he had made. Olivia was committed to seeing that happen.
    The staff was handling her luggage as they always did as she and Chase proceeded to her accommodations. Olivia was a frequent and very high-profile guest of the hotel and her billing was always handled between her assistant and the front desk. Only a few steps from the elevator, Chase stopped with her outside the double doors to her usual suite.
    “It’s so wonderful to have you back with us, Olivia. Please do call upon me if there is anything at all that I can do for you,” he said as he opened the door and held it for her to walk through.
    “It’s so good to be back, Edward. It feels like home,” Olivia said as she took the key from him. There was no exchange of tip at that point. Olivia was extremely generous with all the staff who served her at the hotel and she quietly arranged for their gratuity when she checked out each time. It was a pet peeve of hers to see people in service treated like servants and she felt that passing a few dollars from hand to hand was demeaning. Her way was better, she was sure of it. And the staff seemed to love it. They were all happy to see her in the hotel.
    Edward let himself out of the grand suite and walked to the elevator. Without a doubt he was always glad to see Mrs. Fordham, but he couldn’t shake the guilty feeling in the pit of his stomach. He knew something she didn’t, that this trip would be different than the others. But it had to be her. He had wrestled with the decision and determined it simply had to be her. She could do the job. And she, maybe more than anyone, would appreciate the opportunity, once it was all over of course. Sometimes he really disliked his job. Edward stepped into the elevator still telling himself she would appreciate the opportunity.
    It wasn’t home but it had really grown on her over the past few years. Olivia always stayed in the Jefferson Suite when she was at the Willard. It was easy to forget one was in a hotel in this suite. It was really more like an apartment and much bigger than many New York apartments she had seen. From the double door entrance she stepped across the black and white checked marble floor of the sunlight-flooded foyer to the hall table where she laid her purse and