less his uniform: a crop-jacketed suit, polka dot tie, and brogue shoes worn without socks. His prematurely gray hair was spiked up in front, also a signature for him. They hugged warmly.
“Don’t you wonder?” he asked, after they’d entered Gagosian, “why the people at the front desk in galleries always act as if you’re tearing them away from their jobs when you ask a question. It’s like you’ve interrupted them as they’re about to negotiate the sale of a de Kooning or a Rothko. I thought it was their freaking job to be there for the people walking in the door.”
Kit laughed. “Oh, good, I thought it was just me that generated that kind of please-don’t-annoy-me response from them.”
“Shall we just browse now and catch up over dinner?”
“That sounds like a plan,” Kit said. They’d been friends for six years and though Chuck had told her he could simultaneously gab and engage in almost any other function at the same time, even a tooth extraction, he knew Kit preferred quiet when she looked at art. She liked to fully absorb what she was seeing.
They spent a half hour at Gagosian and then decided to head to two more galleries before dinner. At the third they separated for a bit so Chuck could check out woodprints she had little interest in.
She positioned herself in one of the rooms, where each wall was dominated by a huge canvas by the same artist. She tried to do what an artist friend had once suggested: examine each corner and let it tell you something about the middle.
As she studied the most dramatic piece, she sensed someone come up alongside of her, just a few feet away. For a moment she thought it was Chuck, back from the woodprints and eager for food and booze, but out of the corner of her eye, she could tell that the person’s hair was long and black. She glanced over.
It was someone she knew, she realized, though for a moment she struggled to place her out of context. And then, with a start, her mind caught up.
She was staring at the woman from the hedge fund, the one who’d come into the ladies’ room. She couldn’t escape from those people, Kit thought in frustration, no matter how hard she tried.
The woman turned, too. Kit noticed her gray eyes flicker with recognition.
“Hello,” the woman said, slowly drawing out the last syllable, as if deliberating the reason for Kit’s presence. She was wearing a perforated black suede anorak over another pair of sleek black pants. An expensive fragrance wafted off her, a floral scent with a hint of something resinous, like amber.
“Sasha Glen, from Ithaka,” the woman added. Kit realized she’d been staring blankly at her, and the woman had assumed she hadn’t placed her yet.
“Right. Hello.”
“By the way, I’m sorry about the other day,” Sasha said. “I had you totally confused with someone else.”
“Not a problem.” She wanted to move away, to not be talking to this woman anymore, but there was no point in being rude. She glanced toward the door to the rear gallery space, wondering where Chuck was.
“Mitch told me you’re a decorator.”
“Mitch?” Who was that and why was he telling this woman anything about her?
“Mitch Wainwright. The man who runs Ithaka. I saw you talking to him last week and he said you might be redecorating some of the space.”
Kit tried to keep her face neutral as her mind raced. Wainwright had obviously lied to Sasha Glen about why she’d been in the building. But it made sense that he’d want to be discreet about the real reason for her appointment.
“That’s kind of up in the air,” Kit said, covering for him.
“It’d be a plum assignment,” Sasha said, kind of girlfriend-to-girlfriend–like now. “Do you do residential jobs as well as commercial ones?”
“Mostly just residential.” She glanced over the woman’s shoulder, wishing that Chuck would materialize.
“You must have heard the terrible news, of course. About Matt Healy’s death.”
“Um, yes,” Kit said, trying not to sound flustered. “I saw it in the newspaper. How tragic.”
“We were in separate areas, but it’s still a shock. How well did you know him?”
She’d already told Sasha in the ladies’ room that she barely knew him. Was this some knd of test?
“Not very well at all.” She needed to extricate herself from the conversation as quickly as possible.
“But he was the one who introduced you to Mitch, right?”
“Yes—sort of. If you’ll excuse me now, I need to catch up with a