Vivian inhaled audibly through her nose.

“Although you’re both younger than my parents!” Jules added instantly. “I wasn’t implying—um, ha-ha.”

Helga Schumann pursed her lips, then opened her mouth to reply.

“You aren’t completely wrong, Julia,” Vivian said mildly.

Jules actually grabbed the arm of her chair to make sure she wasn’t about to fall out of it.

“The amount of time your age group spends on social media is both a blessing and a curse,” Vivian continued. “It’s made you socially aware and tragically misinformed.”

“Social media!” said Mrs. Schumann. “Do not get me started!”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Helga,” Vivian said.

Jules tried to shrink down into her seat as the two women stared at each other, Mrs. Schumann trying to decide if she’d been insulted, Vivian cool as a cucumber.

Thankfully, at that moment, Georg Schumann said something to the man on his right, and Mrs. Schumann turned from Jules to participate in the conversation.

Jules gave Vivian an apologetic look. Vivian returned a look that seemed sort of…amused. Which had to be impossible.

Suddenly, Jules desperately wanted to know how she was—if she was less fatigued, if she was eating enough, sleeping well. But of course she couldn’t ask any of that here, so she just said, “Have you heard from Simon since you arrived?”

There. Conversation that wasn’t small talk. Vivian had limited tolerance for small talk.

Vivian sniffed. “The LA pictures didn’t come out as well as either of us had hoped. But they could be worse, I suppose. We’ll make do.”

We’ll make do? That one sentence told Jules volumes about how Vivian felt. She never “made do.” Was she tired, or was she bending to Mark Tavio’s pressure to keep costs down? Or both?

She wondered yet again what Mr. Tavio would say when he learned that Vivian was pregnant and the circumstances surrounding it. Robert dumping her, an extremely acrimonious divorce, Vivian being a single mom… It’d be all over the papers, on the lips of all of New York society. Of course, it would reflect on Du Jour, on Koening, whether that was fair or not.

Jules had heard that any publicity was good publicity. She just hoped Mr. Tavio felt the same way. Vivian had threatened legal action if he didn’t, if she faced any discrimination related to her pregnancy, but she was fighting so many battles right now—would she have energy for one more?

“What?” Vivian’s eyes narrowed, and Jules realized she’d been staring with what was probably a blank, stupid-looking expression.

“Oh!” she said. “Sorry. I was just, um…”

Vivian tilted her head away as if already bored by whatever excuse Jules was about to offer and turned to speak to the man on her left again.