More Than Words(49)

“Of course.” He tightened the scarf around his neck before heading to the door.

After she saw him out, Nina went back to the balance sheets. She wondered if her dad had chosen the firm because they’d named themselves after “Jabberwocky.”

Whether or not running the Gregory Corporation was something she wanted to do, it was something she was going to do, and at least for now, that was enough.





48



Three weeks had passed since her father had died and even though on one hand it had felt like no time, on the other hand it was getting harder for Nina to remember the exact timbre of his voice and the specific feel of his hands on hers. Her emotions weren’t quite as raw, quite as ready to erupt at the strangest moments. And her brain was starting to function again at its usual speed. She felt like she could reenter the world.

Nina picked up the newspaper from her breakfast table. There was an article on Rafael. He was planning to march in the Village Halloween parade at the end of the month, about a week before Election Day. She wondered how everyone at the campaign was doing. Whether she should stop by and say hello. To Jane, who’d been texting every few days to see how Nina was. To Jorge, who maybe would do his touchdown dance if she asked. To Rafael, who had texted her a few more times, offering to talk, to meet up. She had responded enough to be polite but still hadn’t made any concrete plans. Instead she ran along the Hudson River, with breaks to admire the bravery of the people taking trapeze lessons on Pier 40. She spent hours wondering what the hell her father was thinking when he cheated on her mother, spent a few more debating with Tim as to whether or not they should ask his parents what they knew about the affair. And now Tim was asking her when she thought it might be the right time to tell everyone else about their engagement.

“The old Nina would be so excited,” he’d said the other night. That was how he started a lot of comments now. “The old Nina wouldn’t have put pimentos in this sandwich.” “The old Nina wouldn’t have gone and gotten her ear cartilage pierced in the middle of the day.” Which Nina had done. Two days after she’d spoken with TJ and realized that her dad was definitely not the star businessman she’d always assumed he was. The day she’d put off her meeting with the board.

It turned out TJ had been making most of the decisions, doing his best to keep the business in the black while her father networked and hobnobbed and was the figurehead of the corporation. He was the publicity driver, but TJ had done the real work. And he’d done it in a way that Nina didn’t always agree with.

She’d felt like she was living in a house of mirrors, where up was down and left was right. Then, for some reason, she remembered back to when she was sixteen and wanted to get the cartilage at the top of her ear pierced, and her father had told her no. That it looked low-class. She didn’t agree. She’d made a list of girls at school who’d gotten their cartilage pierced. But he’d still said no. So now, seventeen years later, she’d done it herself. And her fiancé hated it just as much as her father would have.

As Nina took a bite of her English muffin, she wondered if maybe she could volunteer at the campaign. Just a few hours a week to help out. It might make her life feel more grounded, less like she’d walked into a movie about herself, where the best friend became the fiancé and the main character was left rudderless, floating in a sea of half-truths and outright lies.

Then her phone rang—it was campaign headquarters.

“Hello?” Nina said, wondering who she’d find on the other end.

“Nina? It’s Christian.” Other than coming to her with a few introduction requests, Nina and Christian hadn’t had a ton to do with each other while she was working for Rafael.

“Is everything okay?” she asked.

Christian made a noncommittal sound on the other end of the phone. “Well,” he said, “we were hoping that Marc Johnson’s donors would come on board after the primary, but they haven’t. At least, not in the way we’d hoped.”

“Oh,” Nina said, “I’m sorry to hear that,” while her brain spun, wondering who had donated and who hadn’t, whether her calls might make any difference. “Do you want me to try to convince some people?”

Christian cleared his throat. “Your father used to host fund-raisers at The Gregory Hotel,” he said. “A thousand dollars or more a head.”

Nina was nodding. “Right,” she said. “He would raise a few hundred thousand dollars for the candidate.”

Christian cleared his throat again. And Nina realized: “You want to ask me if we can do that for Rafael?”

“Perhaps next week?” Christian answered. “I wouldn’t ask except . . .”

“Except you need it. Rafael needs it. I understand. Let me make some phone calls. I’ll see what I can pull together.” She wondered if Rafael had authorized this ask. He must have. Maybe that was why he’d been wanting to meet her for coffee.

There was a sigh on the other end of the phone. “Thank you,” Christian said. “So much.”

Nina said good-bye and then called Caro. After explaining what they wanted, Nina said, “What do you think, Aunt Caro? Is this possible?”

Nina heard Caro’s mouse clicking. “The ballroom at the Park is free Tuesday night. I know it’s not a lot of time, but . . .”