Page 2 of The Dating Contract

He shook his head. “I don’t,” he’d said.

“But he—” the woman pointed at Aaron, who was smiling and already talking to someone else “—said you did something for her?”

That was when Samuel nodded, and the information clicked in his head. Whether it was a deliberate misunderstanding or that of a general kind, the problem was obvious. “My lettering did feature on some of these—” he pointed to the poster display behind him “—for the Goldstone saga series, which was based on Melanie Gould’s books. And some of my work was even in the show, but I’ve never met her.”

“See,” another woman said, brown eyes filled with the look that came with an explanation made and ignored multiple times. “He doesn’t know her. Like I told you.”

“But I want to make the poster my ketubah theme,” the first person said, clearly the bride. “I want my first child to be named Moshe after the first hero in the series and…”

“Tell her it’s a horrible idea to live your marriage like it’s one of your favorite books.”

This line of conversation wasn’t new, but he’d been dealing with it more and more recently. Whether it was thehot soferthing or the push for the LivePix series, it didn’t matter.

But he wasn’t good at the delicate maneuvering a situation like this needed; his brother, glib and socially gifted, was the front man. And unfortunately, Aaron was doing his networking and negotiations and holding court in his usual spot.

Which meant defusing the tension, in a way that wouldn’t end up with him fighting copyright infringement, was up to him.

Task clear, Samuel pulled himself together and smiled. “Listen,” he said, searching for the right words, “I can absolutely create a ketubah based on a combination of your and your future spouse’s interests, something to build a future on. I can even sign a poster for you.”

“Wait,” the first woman said. “You can sign a poster for me?”

He nodded, glad he’d managed to find something that would calm the situation. “I can absolutely sign a poster for you.”

“Good.” And then a grin from the bride, a sigh from what looked like her long-suffering companion. “Sign a poster and I’ll get a ketubah and a mezuzah.”

And as he signed the poster, watching the women head over toward his brother, there was a strange feeling developing in what felt like his stomach.

It wasn’t breakfast or lack thereof, and it wasn’t nerves.

So what was it? What was going on? He definitely needed to find out.

*

“What’s your firststop?” Leah asked as they made their way inside, past security checks and the ticket checks. This was Judith’s show, and as she reminded herself, Leah was just along for the ride.

“Ketubahs,” Judith replied.

Fair enough.

Ketubahs were the one thing required for a Jewish wedding after all. And they were art—calligraphy, paintings—which meant work went into finding the right artist. And so Leah put on her maid of honor hat and followed her sister up the escalator.

“This way,” Judith said.

After a while of perusing the booths, she heard her sister’s question. “Anything?”

If Leah was going to be honest, there wasn’t anything. But this wasn’t Leah’s show. It was Judith’s. Which meant she had to make it clear where she stood while interpreting the situation. “No. But more importantly, do you see anything? This is for you.”

But Judith didn’t have a poker face, and Leah didn’t have to read her sister’s mind to know that she’d only asked the question to confirm she’d seen nothing that belonged on the wall of whatever residence she’d share with Asher. “No.”

So they continued to walk through, when all of a sudden, Judith stopped. Leah watched as her sister extended her arm and then her index finger toward one of the booths. “What the hell is this?”

Leah followed the direction her sister was pointing in, only to see a line.

A never-ending line of people.

She was used to seeing lines outside, and in very few booths on the main floor, like the cake-tasting areas, or some of the shoe or jewelry designers.

But here? Where the ketubah section was? “What the hell is right!”

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