“Well, we do want to insure them, don’t we?”

“It all goes under my family’s umbrella policy. I just add it to a list that Miss Seong keeps at the family office.”

“I didn’t know about this. Can my vintage sports cars get on the policy too?”

“I don’t think so. It’s just for Leongs,” Astrid blurted out, before regretting her choice of words.

Michael didn’t seem to notice and continued chattering away. “You’re really getting all of your Ah Ma’s biggest jewels, aren’t you? Your cousins must be envious as hell.”

“Oh, there’s plenty to go around. Fiona got the Grand Duchess Olga sapphires, and my cousin Cecilia got some superb imperial jade. My grandmother is very discerning—she gives the right pieces to whomever she knows will appreciate them the most.”

“Do you think she feels she’s going to conk off soon?”

“What a thing to say!” Astrid exclaimed, giving Michael a look of horror.

“Come on, lah, it must be going through her mind, which is why she’s begun divesting all her stuff. Old people can sense when they are going to die, you know.”

“Michael, my grandmother has been around all my life, and I can’t even begin to imagine the day when she won’t be here.”

“Sorry—I was just making conversation.”

They lapsed into silence again, Michael focusing on the client dinner and Astrid contemplating their disagreeable conversation. Michael had always shied away from anything to do with money when they first got married, especially if it involved her family, and went to great pains to show that he had absolutely no interest in her financial affairs. Indeed, their marriage had been rocked to its core by his insecurities over her fortune and his ill-conceived attempt to set her free, but thankfully that awful period was well behind them.

But ever since his business had exploded into a huge success, he had become the proverbial mouse that roared. It dawned on Astrid that at family gatherings these days, her husband always seemed to be at the center of the financial debates with the men. Michael relished being the go-to guy for advice about the tech industry and the newfound respect he was forging with her father and brothers, who had for years treated him with barely veiled condescension. He had also discovered his acquisitive side, and Astrid had watched in wide-eyed wonder as his tastes had upgraded faster than you could say “Do you take Amex?”

She glanced over at him now, cutting such a dashing figure in his dark gray Cesare Attolini suit and his perfectly knotted Borrelli tie, the face of his Patek Philippe Nautilus Chronograph glinting under the flash of streetlamps as he shifted gears forcefully on his iconic automobile, the one that every hot-blooded male from James Dean to Ferris Bueller had coveted. She was proud of all he had achieved, but part of her missed the old Michael, the man who was happiest lounging at home in his soccer kit enjoying his plate of tau you bahk^*4 with white rice and his Tiger beer.