Sierra shoved her bag—containing her clothes from her day of class/costuming/Black Box rehearsal/gala prep—under the table, smoothed her black beaded cocktail dress (chosen by Ethan) and shook her hair free from its ponytail. Ethan, in his new black suit, glanced over from the glass display case, straightening the signed scripts for the silent auction then locking the case again.
“You clean up nice, Mrs. Summit.”
“Really? I feel like we would hyphenate—Suarez-Summit? Summit-Suarez?” she said, taking her place beside him at the auction table.
“We’ll figure it out in marriage counseling.” He smiled.
The lobby of the Hathaway House Museum had been transformed for the gala. Doors set to open in minutes, tuxedo-clad servers hoisted trays of canapés, finished assembling champagne flutes into neat little rows and checked that bottle labels faced outward at all the bars. Nicholas Blunt—looking dashing, actually, like he had at the Oscars those years ago—crossed from the auditorium to the exhibition room for the thousandth time in the past half hour, this time carrying a stack of programs.
“What’s Blunt so nervous about, anyway?” Ethan whispered, watching.
Sierra wished she didn’t know, but it wasn’t her secret to tell, so she deflected. “Who knows, but I’m sure Harlow is on it.” She gestured to the lounge off the lobby, where their peers now gathered on the sleek-lined, modern couches and angular chairs, waiting to assume their roles as ushers and waitstaff and ticket takers. Harlow (poured into a vintage bandage dress) and Alex held court. Both had scored the plum assignments: Alex would be at the front of the auditorium guiding the most illustrious guests to their seats. Harlow would tend to the A-list donors in the VIP room, which housed the university’s most treasured Shakespearean artifacts. By contrast, Sierra and Ethan had spent all day unloading boxes of donated costumes, props, autographed posters, photos and scripts for the silent auction, less glamorous than she had hoped. But still far better than Tripp’s garbage duty.
“Is it just me, or do they have more free time than we do?” Ethan asked.
Nicholas appeared at the front of the lobby and clapped his hands. “Curtain up,” he announced simply.
At once, the apprentices scattered to their places, string music piped in through the speakers, the glass doors opened, and the well-dressed, deep-pocketed guests flowed inside. Choreographed to arrive just five minutes later were the beautiful, talented creatures—the artists themselves—tasked with enticing the potential donors to part with their cash. Danica swanned in first, a lavender Cinderella. Then came Matteo, distinguished in his dark gray suit and splashy watercolor tie, followed by Chase in a cobalt tuxedo, the gauze on his cheek somehow adding to his allure, giving his perfect features rugged charm.
“That works on him, you’re lucky,” Sierra said, paying no attention to the people scribbling bids for the auction.
Ethan followed her line of vision. “The two stitches?” He laughed.
They had manned the table a solid hour—Sierra’s feet aching in the strappy black sandals borrowed from Harlow, a half size too small—overseeing a steady stream of silent bidders, when Charlie finally wandered in through those glass doors.
She wore a cerise leopard-print satin tuxedo and stilettos, pausing just a moment to take in the scene and let the scene take her in. Then she made eye contact with Sierra, her arms out to her sides, as if to say, Not bad, right?, and disappeared down a corridor.
“Um, did Charlie Savoy just send you some kind of telepathic message?” Ethan whispered, adjusting his tie.
“Could be,” Sierra said, proud. It was her greatest accomplishment in the apprenticeship thus far.
The lights dimmed, and a clinking of silver on crystal rang from the museum’s second floor, which overlooked the lobby. Ethan stopped talking to a potential bidder midsentence. Everyone around them froze, their collective gaze lassoed by a figure leaning against the waist-high railing, champagne flute raised in the air.
There stood Charlie, commanding all those eyes.