The conference room at Sterling and Associates smelled like old money. Mahogany, lemon polish, leather that had been curing since before I was born. I sat on one side of the massive oak table with my hands folded in my lap, studying the grain of the wood.
I was wearing a suit I had bought off the rack three years earlier for a friend’s wedding. It was a little tight in the shoulders and the fabric had started to shine at the elbows, but it was black and it was respectful, which was all I cared about. Across from me, it looked like a runway show for the morally bankrupt.
My stepmother Elena was holding court at forty-five degrees to the table, angled so that even seated she appeared to be presenting herself to an audience. She was fifty-five but had spent considerable money to look thirty, the result of a plastic surgeon who was probably on speed dial. The dress she wore was black, but not mourning black.
It was cocktail black, the kind you wore to a gala where you expected to be the center of attention. Next to her was Brad, her son, twenty-five years old and slouching in his chair, sunglasses still on indoors, tapping furiously at his phone. And then Tiffany, twenty-two, flipping through a travel brochure for the Maldives with the focused interest of someone who had somewhere more interesting to be.
“The red one,” Brad said, his voice cutting through the silence of the room. “The dealership in Beverly Hills said they’d hold it until Friday, but we need to move funds today. The black interior is nice but the red pops.”
“We’ll handle it, sweetheart,” Elena said, patting his hand.
Her nails were long, manicured into sharp points, painted a blood red that matched her lipstick. “Let’s just get the formalities out of the way. Mr.
Harrison is always so slow with these things.”
“I’m thinking a penthouse in Tribeca,” Tiffany said without looking up. “Or maybe Soho. I need space for a studio and a view.
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