Once I get to Pierrepont Place I can see the blue of the East River ahead. With the sun shining, the water is a brighter shade than I’ve seen in months and months, and the breeze across my face is enough to cool me down, but not enough to make me worried about getting hair stuck in my lip gloss, which, as everyone knows, is the ideal type of breeze. There’s a woman hanging around the bike racks, juggling four balls of yarn and singing a song about cat astronauts (Keep NYC Weird, obviously), and while I’d normally think of this as an ideal opportunity to avert my eyes and pretend there’s something interesting on my phone, this stretch of people-watching I’ve been indulging in means I’m somehow charmed and not vaguely on alert for one of those yarn balls to hit me in the head. For a few seconds I feel a bit like chocolate milkshake guy or club sandwich man, remembering for the first time since the swoosh why I’d thought this was a good idea. Even if Reid says no, getting out here, around all these people, will be good for me.

I just need to get through this one meeting, which I am, again, six minutes early for, an absolute advantage since I can set myself—

Except of course! He’s already here.

He’s twenty or so yards down the Promenade, his forearms resting along the railing, hands clasped in front of him as he looks across the river toward the city. He’s definitely not doing business casual, wearing instead something similar to what I saw him in a week ago—sneakers, jeans, jacket. Maybe this is his Sunday outfit. It’s probably labeled that way in his extremely anal-retentive closet. His profile, even at a distance, is ridiculously handsome.

I subtract a few letters from that word that’s been haunting me. His face looks like the word swoon.

He straightens as I draw closer to him, as though he’s sensed me coming, and when he turns toward me there’s an awkward few steps where there’s nothing happening except him standing there waiting for me. I feel as if I’m walking the plank toward those blue eyes, flat and fixed on me. I wonder if he’ll say, “Good afternoon.”

“Hey,” he says instead. I try not to let my eyebrows raise in surprise.