Page 72 of The Photograph

“So, what do you do, Des?”

“I’m a project manager at a software security company.”

Alex snorts at my side, and I turn toward him with raised eyebrows.

He leans forward. God, he smells delicious.

“He’s the second in command, Nana, and the company’s growing fast.”

His grandma waves her hand. “Oh, I don’t understand all this newfangled computer stuff. But my online bridge is awfully clever. The internet is an amazing thing.” A smile curves across her lips. “By the way,” she adds, patting my arm. “Please call me Ruth.”

“And you’re an absolute babe, am I right?” I say, grinning.

She laughs and pats my hand as Alex groans. “Oh, Alex,” she says. “I like this one. Reminds me of my Nate.”

A few bad jokes and she’s a pussy cat. Alex squints at me, a slight smile twisting his lips. “That’s my grandpa,” he says. “He died six years ago.”

“May his memory be a blessing,” Ruth says, eyes looking suspiciously more watery than they did a couple of seconds earlier.

Anna appears with a tray in the doorway and places it on the gold-and-glass coffee table in front of us. She starts pouring tea from a teapot into delicate china cups with roses all over them. Tiny cakes sit on a rotary cake stack, alongside small white triangular crustless sandwiches.

I sweep my hand over it. “Mrs. S, this is old school.”

Alex gapes at me.Maybe I’m being a bit out there.

“We like to do things properly on the Upper East Side,” she says.

“I can see that.”

And it’s a joy to experience this. Everything is perfect: beautiful petits fours and sandwiches perfectly aligned and artfully arranged. The gorgeous art and furniture here … It’s notmodern, but the care and craftsmanship in the whole place takes my breath away.

“These cakes look so good.” I pick up a small scone bursting with jam and cream, and pop it in my mouth, and the cream and jam ooze out onto my tastebuds in a burst of sweetness and crumbly scone. “Oh wow!” I lean back as my eyes roll into the back of my head. When I sit forward again, Alex is frowning at me.

“Des, we can’t just help ourselves! We’re supposed to …”

Laughing, his grandma leans around Alex to pat my knee. “What a sweetheart you are. No one’s ever been so enthusiastic about my cakes.”

I grin at her. “This is heaven on a plate.”

She chuckles. “So, you’ve got an important role in this company you work for?”

I blow out a long breath. “We won a big security contract from Samsung and I’m managing it. They’re one of the biggest phone manufacturers in the world. It’s driving me a little crazy, to be honest.”

I’ve switched into oversharing mode. Too early in this conversation, I’ve decided that Alex’s grandma is a sweetheart who will forgive me anything, even my worst secrets, and that’s a very dangerous thing to think, especially when I’m pretending to be straight and, looking around Mrs. Sach’s apartment, probably Republican.

Actually, complaining about my work is also dangerous. I wave my hand. “Tell me all about Nate.” Glancing across the living room, a hundred pictures are sitting on top of a grand piano in the corner.

“Oh my God!” In a heartbeat, I’m on my feet and over the room. “Look at this!”

A silver-framed picture of a very attractive man in uniform is sitting front and center. “Is this Nate?” I say, picking it up.

His grandma struggles up. Alex stands to help her, but she just waves him away as she shuffles over to me.

“It is.”

“So handsome!”Thisis where Alex gets it from. The words are almost out of my mouth before I stop them, and a hot sweat breaks out on my neck.

“He was! Oh, he definitely was. When he came over to ask me to dance that first time …” She presses her hand to her chest. “I thought he was coming to talk to the girl beside me, I never thought he’d pick me. I was shocked.”

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