About Last Night

“But I don’t get it— The catalog is supposed to make a profit, right? Or at least break even.”

“In the long run, yes. But in the short run, it’s either kill the catalog or kill the exhibit. There isn’t enough money to go around.”

Trying to ignore the roiling combination of disappointment, panic, and fury that was making it difficult to breathe, she asked the question she least wanted answered. “Am I going to get fired?”

Judith looked down at her hands. “I hope not. I fought for you. But the exhibit’s on a shoestring, and without the catalog you’ve become a luxury. We’ll see.”

Shit. Shit shit shit.

“How much do they need?”

“Fifty thousand pounds to get the job done right.”

Fifty thousand pounds. Eighty thousand dollars, give or take. Too much money to sniff at. Cath must have winced, because Judith said, “Don’t look so devastated. We’ll try to find some more sponsors to pick up the slack. We have too much invested to drop it now. And anyway, this is the way the museum business goes. The funding is always a scramble.”

Buck up, she told herself. It’s not a life-and-death situation. It’s only a stupid exhibit catalog.

Besides, Judith was right. They might be able to find some new sponsors to back the exhibit. But that would take time, and the catalog was supposed to go to the copy editor next week. Day in and day out, she’d been fussing with sidebars and scrambling to get photo permissions lined up while her whole project was about to get the ax. The knowledge diminished her. She was a gnat on the wall of history, totally insignificant. Possibly about to get squished.

“Thanks for telling me. I’ll just—” She’d been about to say she’d get back to the sidebars, but there would no longer be a need for sidebars. There would no longer be a need for her. “I’ll get back to work, I guess.”

As she stood and turned to leave, Nev came through the open doorway of the office, so polished and bankerish in a three-piece navy pin-striped suit that all he needed was a gold watch chain hanging from his pocket to complete the picture. So gorgeous and familiar, a

ll she wanted to do was step into his arms and cry.

“You found me.”

He smiled the special greeting smile he seemed to reserve just for her and said, “It wasn’t so difficult now that you’ve told me where to look.” Glancing behind him at the door, he added, “Though there are a lot of bloody corridors to choose from. I think I might’ve tunneled beneath the Thames at one point.”

Cath gave him a weak smile, stepping back so he and Judith had a view of each other. Might as well get this over with.

“Judith, this is Nev Chamberlain. Nev, my boss, Judith Rhodes.”

Judith had been scanning Nev with the calm insolence of a sated bird of prey, but her eyes brightened when she heard his name. “Nev Chamberlain, like the prime minister?”

“Exactly like.”

“Not the most illustrious namesake, is he?”

Nev gave Judith his best dimpled smile. “He’s Cath’s favorite prime minister.”

Judith glowered at him, and the combination of her expression and the situation time-warped Cath back to adolescence: she was a teenager again, standing by and watching her father interview her date. She hoped Nev could hold his own. Judith made a scary dad.

“Only Cath would have a soft spot for the man who rolled over for Hitler,” Judith said. “She’s such a sap. Though maybe you hadn’t worked that out yet.”

Nev leaned against the doorjamb, hands in his pockets. He didn’t look intimidated. If anything, he looked amused. “No, I had.”

She was not a sap. And she didn’t appreciate being spoken about in the third person when she was in the room. She would have said so, but Judith spoke first.

“So are you also aware she’s very bright and quite talented?” Judith pointed her finger at Nev. “She’s been invaluable to me.”

It was more praise from Judith than she’d had in seven months, delivered as some sort of indefinable threat to her lover. The strangest compliment she’d ever received.

“I have no doubt of that,” Nev replied, unflappable.

“Does it threaten you? Most men can’t handle smart, strong women.”

“I find it very attractive.”