“That I’m a jealous, vengeful hag who refuses to move on with my life. That I’m the one holding things up. Which I guess is technically true, but only because of Max Minimus.”

“But isn’t Vince on sabbatical? How are you supposed to be seen being civil and friendly to him if he’s in Spain?” Vince and Berkeley were still doing Picasso cosplay and Instagram influencing in Barcelona. And yes, Max had stalked Berkeley’s Instagram. Her most recent post had been of her lower body poolside, her hand balancing a glass of wine on her taut, tanned belly, captioned “Syrah with my Sweetie” and followed by literally twenty-seven—he’d counted—hashtags. It made him irate.

“He’ll be back next week. We have our start-of-year departmental party in a couple weeks, so off I go to be fake friendly.” She made a strangled noise.

“Do you have to be fake friendly at the party? Can you just stop by his office and have a quick, civil chat?”

“The lawyer says that unless it’s going to cause me undue stress, I should go. She says it’s the perfect venue to show myself as a nonthreatening, reasonable person—in case it does go to trial and colleagues have to testify.” She was sounding uncharacteristically timid.

“Is that all that’s bothering you?” he asked gently. Normally, Dani would be the kind of person who would embrace this sort of assignment as a necessary evil. She’d be brusquely efficient in carrying out her duties.

She sighed. “The truth is, I’m scared.”

She did that sometimes. Came out with a truth deep into a conversation. It was as if she had to back herself into admitting something she didn’t think accorded with the image she should be projecting. He was stupidly pleased to be the recipient of such truths.

“I’m not scared of Vince,” she added in a rush. “He’s not going to hurt me or anything. I’m afraid of . . . getting into it with him. It’s hard to explain, but he’s such a good talker. I mean, why was I in mediation for so long? Because he has this way of making you believe what he says. He has this way of making it seem like he’s listening to you, when he’s not actually paying any attention to you at all.” She had said that before, that Vince didn’t listen to her. What a monumental ass. “You didn’t see it at the Christmas party because of our perfectly timed exit, but Vince has this way of talking you into a corner.”

“Nobody puts Dani in a corner.”

There was a long pause. Then, Dani’s voice, laden with amusement and incredulity: “Did you just quote Dirty Dancing?”

“Did you just recognize a quote from Dirty Dancing?” he countered.

“I love that movie!”

“You do?”

“I do. But I am not an Eldovian baron.”