Page 21 of So This Is Christmas

Ah. Now Matteo understood. Well, he understood the invocation of the late queen mother. Hedidn’tunderstand the comparison itself. The queen mother had been a lifelong Eldovian patriot. She’d been a patron of the arts and the founder of the now-famous and much beloved Witten Cocoa Fest.

Had the queen mother a motto, it would never have beenChange, or die.

Cara checked in with Tonya when she got back to her room at the palace that afternoon. She’d promised the CZT partner a report at the end of day one.

Cara:Hi. First day wrapped. It went fine, I think. Definitely two or three tricky people I have my eye on. But the king seems very on board, which is the important part.

Her phone rang. Tonya had a tendency, when she wasn’t immediately busy, to reply to a text with a call. It was probably the generational difference between them, but Cara liked it. Even though she’d risen steadily through the ranks at CZT over the years, some part of her still felt like the college intern, starstruck by the founding partner who had taken an interest in her. Back then, Tonya had been the only female partner. It had been hugely flattering to have such a mentor. It still was.

“Hi,” Cara said.

“Hi, yourself. I’m eating lunch. Thought I’d call.”

Cara could picture it, Tonya with her salad at her desk. Sometimes Tonya invited Cara to join her for lunch when both women were in town at the same time. “How’s Brad?” she asked, because that was what decent people did—they asked after injured colleagues. Fucking Brad.

“He’s having a second surgery next week, then he’s supposed to move to a rehab hospital. He’s agitating to skip that step.”

“Can he even walk?”

“He cannot. Not even with crutches. But he says he’s young and will bounce back. Anyway, tell me about these tricky people.”

“Well, there’s a union steward, but he’s surprisingly okay. Or at least, he’s straightforward. He’s kind of declared war on me, but he’sdeclaredit, you know? He seems smart, like he gets the big picture even if he’s not happy about it. He actually gave me a logistical tip that’s really going to help.”

“Respect organized labor.”

Tonya always said that. One of the reasons they clicked professionally, Cara thought, was that they both came from union families. “And then, perhaps more surprisingly, I’m getting the sense that the CEO might be a problem.”

“Noar Graf?”

“Yes.”

“Hmm. He was noticeably quiet during the virtual meetings.”

“Yes. Here, not so much. He wanted to wait for Brad, which is fine.” She chuckled. “He reminded me a bit of Brad, actually.” Brad was good at his job when he chose to be. He had some specialized skills, and he spoke a couple foreign languages, which was super handy in their field. But he was also one of those guys who’d never had to work for anything in his life, but acted like he was god’s gift to the consulting world—and he bristled at having to work under Cara, even though she was older and more experienced. She never complained about him, though, to Tonya or anyone else. He was her cross to bear, and she strived to be as professional as possible at all times. “Noar’s allowed to be upset that he got me instead, but—”

“He’sluckyhe got you instead.”

Aww. There went Cara’s inner teenager again, flushing at praise from her mentor. “Well, my point is, I can deal with that. And maybe that’s all it is, but I’m getting a sense that there might be more there. It’s hard to put a finger on.”

“Trust your instincts, or at least don’t ignore them.”

“Hopefully I’m being paranoid, but I’ll keep an eye on him.” Having the CEO of the company working against her would be a giant pain in the ass. “We have a one-on-one the day after tomorrow. It was supposed to be today, but he canceled it.” Which wasalso suspicious. One would think a meeting with the consultant tasked with ruling on his company’s future would be a priority. In his shoes, she would want to get in early and help shape the narrative.

“And number three?”

“Number three?”

“You said there were two or three people who are potential roadblocks.”

Right. “I guess I meant two.” Which was a lie. For some reason she couldn’t articulate, she didn’t feel like getting into roadblock number three, which was, of course, Mr. Benz.

There was a rap on the door. “Hang on a sec. There’s someone at my door.” She heaved herself off the bed where she’d sprawled out, exhausted, after she got back to her room. “It’s probably a footman. How wild is this: They have people here whose literal job title isfootman. And there’s a housekeeper who keeps sending these footmen to check on me. There’s some serious fairy-tale-grade stuff going down here.”

“Well. You know what I think of that.”

It was funny, having grown from being Tonya’s protégé into... well, not a peer exactly. But the gulf between them didn’t seem as wide as it once had. Years ago, Tonya had given Cara all kinds of unsolicited advice. Unsolicited hadn’t meant unwanted, though. Cara had appreciated the hell out of it. She was super close with her parents, but neither of them were going to be able to tell her where to buy business suits and how to make sure men didn’t take credit for her ideas in meetings. But somehow, without Cara even noticing, that kind of stuff had faded out of her interactions with Tonya. Cara still felt like the mentee, but Tonya no longertreated her that way, even though she was still technically her boss. In fact, these days,Tonyaasked forCara’sadvice on projects and staffing. And these days, when Tonya would normally have opined on a topic, instead she merely said some variation onYou know what I think about that.

And Cara did. “Well, first you probably think they should be called footpeople, and I couldn’t agree more, and then you’d say, ‘Fairy-tale endings are for cartoon women.’” That had been one of Tonya’s adages from the early days.

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