Behind them came the chairman of the board of the company that signed his paychecks, carrying a leather folder against his chest like it was something holy. Pruitt heard a small sound come out of his own throat. Ethan Whitmore was still talking. He hadn't seen the elevator yet.
He was still in the world he'd been living in 10 seconds ago, the world where he was the most important man in the courtyard and the dirty old biker was a joke he was telling to impress his friends. "And another thing," Ethan was saying, "if you really own this place, which you obviously don't, you—" Vanessa grabbed his arm. "Ethan."
"You'd have the decency to at least dress like—" "Ethan." Her voice had gone strange, high and tight. She wasn't filming anymore. The phone hung forgotten in her hand.
She was staring past her husband at the four men in suits walking across the courtyard, and her face had gone the color of the champagne in her glass. Ethan finally turned around. He watched the lead attorney, a silver-haired man with the bearing of someone who had never once in his life been told to use the service entrance, walk straight toward them. Toward him, Ethan thought for one last beautiful second.
Surely toward him. The attorney walked right past Ethan Whitmore like he was a coat rack. He walked right past Vanessa. He walked past the manager, past the friends, past 60 staring guests, and he stopped in front of the dirty old biker leaning against the battered Harley.
He did something that made the entire courtyard understand all at once, in a single terrible instant, exactly how wrong they had been. He bowed his head just slightly, the way you do for a man you respect more than anyone you've ever met. "Mr. Reed," the attorney said, and his voice carried clear across the silent courtyard, "I apologize for the delay. We came as fast as we could."
He opened the leather folder and held it out. "The acquisition paperwork is ready for your signature, sir. Everything's in order. We just need you to sign." Travis Reed didn't take it right away.
He looked at Ethan Whitmore, the open mouth, the drained face, the eyes that had finally, far too late, begun to understand. He looked at Vanessa, who had stopped breathing. He looked at Gerald Pruitt, who was already calculating exactly how much of his life had just come apart and finding the number too large to hold. Then Travis Reed reached out and took the folder.
"Thank you, Daniel," he said to the attorney. "Sorry to drag you down here on a Saturday." He glanced at the cover of the documents, and that ghost of a smile came back just for a moment. "Turns out it couldn't have happened at a better time."
He looked up, found Ethan's eyes across the silent courtyard, and held them. "You said I was too poor to be here," Travis said. Ethan's mouth moved. Nothing came out.
"Say it again," Travis said quietly. "Go ahead. Everybody's listening now." Ethan Whitmore could not say it again. The words that had felt so good in his mouth 10 minutes ago, "You're too poor to be here," had turned to ash.
He stood frozen in the middle of the courtyard, 60 pairs of eyes on him, and for the first time in his adult life, he could not find a single thing to say. His brain, which had always been so quick with an insult or a boast, had simply stopped working. "Cat got your tongue?" Travis asked. There was no cruelty in it.
That was almost the worst part. He said it the way a man talks to a kid who'd been caught lying, disappointed, a little tired, not even angry. "A minute ago, you had plenty to say. You said I never built anything."