“Okay, everyone!” Someone with a very cheerful voice and perfectly straight hair stood by the door. “The community members are mostly here; we’ll just wait a few more minutes for stragglers and then get going.”

Max’s staff always seemed deeply competent. Olivia liked that so much.

“This’ll be fun,” Olivia said to Max as they walked down the hall toward the auditorium. “I haven’t really seen you do your thing since that first luncheon—Fourth of July was all softballs. I’m sure I’ll have some notes for you.”

He looked at her sideways, and she giggled. The doors to the auditorium swung open, and Olivia started to step to the side so she could drop behind Max and out of the spotlight. But before she could do so, he took her hand.

The hundreds of people inside scrambled to their feet, flashbulbs went off, and Max and Olivia walked inside, hand in hand. Knowing Max, he hadn’t planned for this in advance, he’d just grabbed her hand at the last second. She tried not to let her irritation show on her face. Instead, she forced a smile as Max gave high fives to the people in the crowd closest to him.

As soon as they were toward the front of the room, Olivia let go of Max’s hand and looked around for somewhere to go. Jamila gestured to her from her seat at the side of the stage, where she sat with some of the staff from the center. Olivia made a beeline for her and then tried her best to fade into the background. But she knew that no matter how much she tried to disappear, it was impossible; everyone in this room knew who she was, and many of them were probably taking pictures of her right now. She had to look alert and interested and friendly and intelligent, and she had to keep a smile on her face the whole time. She felt the tension settle into her shoulders as she tried to do all of that. Shit, her shoulders—she had to think about her posture, too, didn’t she?

The executive director of the center made a too-long speech that tested Olivia’s ability to keep that damn smile on her face. At one point she made eye contact with Max, who of course had a perpetually interested, intelligent smile on his face—how the hell did he do this? He had to deal with this every day, all day, didn’t he? He winked at her, almost imperceptibly, and she winked back.