The Alcott Museum had been transformed.
Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked black Atlantic water.
Orchestral music drifted through the hall.
Waiters moved between tables carrying champagne.
A hundred white orchids surrounded the stage.
Grant sat at Table One.
Not twelve.
Not nine.
Table One.
Across from him sat a banking chairman.
To his right, a hospital-system CEO.
Two seats away, Senator Malcolm Price discussed housing policy with a billionaire hotel owner.
Grant could barely contain himself.
Delaney sat beside him.
Mavis and Brielle had been placed at Table Four.
Even better.
They could see him clearly.
Grant leaned toward Delaney.
“When Bellamy announces the Harbor funding tonight, everything changes.”
Delaney smiled.
“The press already has the projections.”
“You sent them?”
“Not everything.”
“Good.”
Grant squeezed her knee beneath the table.
“You’re incredible.”
She whispered, “Tell your wife that.”
Grant laughed.
Across the room, Julian Reese heard him.
Julian stood near the stage in a black dinner jacket, speaking with two Bellamy executives.
