You know the crazy thing about being crazy? People never seem to believe you when you're being absolutely honest.
Nathan Beaumont had been telling the truth for the past twenty minutes that he had not spent the previous night with Amanda Chers in her bed (he had), that he was not going to buy another building just because it had a good view of the city (he was), and not a single person believed him. Not his mother, who had looked at him with the pinched expression of a woman who had heard this particular song before. Not his cousin Cecilia, who had laughed and patted his arm and said, "Oh, Nathan," as though his entire existence was a joke she had heard a hundred times and still found mildly amusing.
And not the glass of champagne in his hand, which he was holding but not drinking, because he had discovered that people took him more seriously when he was sober. Not that it helped.
The polo match had finished an hour ago. The field stretched out in a long green sweep of manicured grass, still holding the grooves of hooves and the occasional divot that groundskeepers were already moving to repair. The sun had dipped low enough to paint the sky in shades of peach and gold, and the event had shifted from the aggressive cheer of the match itself to the softer, more dangerous hum of the post-game reception. The wealthy did not leave early. Leaving early was for people who had somewhere better to be, and no one at this event could imagine such a place.
Nathan had been to a hundred of these. Charity galas, polo matches, regattas, charity auctions, charity dinners, charity breakfasts; his mother's calendar was a monument to the belief that spending money in public was the same thing as doing good. He had perfected the art of standing at the edge of a conversation, looking interested enough to be polite and detached enough to be left alone.
"Don't even think about going to that club of yours tonight. Are you looking to get killed?" His cousin Cecilia had materialized at his elbow, her blonde hair pinned back in curls. She was holding a glass of white wine and eyeing him the way one might eye a stain on a good rug.
"I'm not," Nathan protested. "I promised to stay for the entirety of this farce."
"You're supposed to be mingling."
"I'm mingling. This is mingling. I'm mingling so hard right now."
"You're brooding in the corner."
"Eugh" He took a sip of his champagne, then remembered he wasn't drinking it, and lowered the glass. "What do you want, Cecilia?"
"Your mother wants to know if you've spoken to the Fairbanks girl."
"Which one? There are like eight of them."
"There are four, Nathan. The eldest is Margaret. She's perfectly lovely and she's been standing by the dessert table for twenty minutes waiting for you to come over."
"Then she's standing by the dessert table for twenty minutes too long." Nathan glanced over. There was, in fact, a woman by the dessert table. She was tall and elegant and looked like she had been carved from good breeding and better money. She was also, from this distance, politely smiling at something a man next to her had said. The man was in his fifties and had a moustache that suggested he had never once been told he was not funny.
"See?" Nathan said. "She's fine. She's found a moustache. She doesn't need me."
"Nathan."
"Cece."
"You could at least try. Just a conversation."
"I have conversations." Nathan adjusted the cuff of his shirt which was somehow, always rumpled by the end of the evening. "I'm a fantastic conversationalist. I'm conversing with you right now. Look at us. We're conversing."
Cecilia's mouth tightened. "You know, one day you're going to run out of jokes and there won't be anyone left to hear them."
"God, I hope so."
She stared at him for a moment longer, then shook her head and walked away. The crowd swallowed her. Nathan watched her go and felt the familiar flicker of guilt that he immediately buried under a fresh wave of irritation. She meant well. They all meant well. That was the problem. Everyone meant well, and everyone had a plan for him, and no one ever asked if he wanted to be part of it.
He turned his glass in his hand. The bubbles rose in thin, lazy spirals.
I could leave, he thought. No one would notice. Or someone would notice, but no one would care. Cece would tell my mother I left early, and my mother would sigh at the next family dinner, and the whole thing would blow over by Sunday.
He had done it before. He was very good at leaving.
But he was still here. Standing by the railing that overlooked the field, watching the light fade and the crowd flutter like colorful insects. The last of the horses had been led away, and the groundskeepers were working the far end of the field. Someone had set up a live band near the main tent and the first notes of a jazz standard drifted over the grass. It was, in a way, a perfect evening. The kind of evening that looked better from a distance than it felt up close.
Nathan had just decided he would give it ten more minutes, enough time to finish his un-drunk champagne and make a polite excuse when he noticed odd movement in the grounds.
He couldn't see much at first, and the tent blocked his view of the eastern edge of the field. A child burst through the crowd.
He was small, maybe four or five years old, dressed in a dark jacket and shorts that looked like a miniature version of what the men at the event were wearing. His hair was dark and his face was pale, and he was running with the kind of desperate, uncoordinated speed that could only belong to someone who was terrified. He dodged around a woman in a blue dress, nearly collided with a server carrying a tray of champagne flutes, and kept running.
Behind him, a man in a white staff shirt was pushing through the crowd. He was smiling, which was the first thing that struck Nathan as wrong. The man was smiling, and his smile was too wide, and his eyes were fixed on the child with an intensity that made his skin crawl.
"Grab him," the man called. "Someone grab that boy. He's—"
Later, he would try to convince himself he had thought about it, that he had weighed his options and made a rational decision. But the truth was that his body moved before his brain caught up. He set his glass down on the railing, later he would not remember doing this, and he stepped forward into the path of the running child.
The boy slammed into him. Nathan caught him by the shoulders, more by instinct than by skill, and the child immediately twisted, trying to break free.
"Hey," Nathan said. "Hey. Whoa. Slow down."
The child looked up. His eyes were dark and wide, and they locked onto Nathan's face with the kind of intensity that made the whole crowd fade into background noise. He was breathing hard. His small hands grabbed at Nathan's jacket, fisting the fabric.
"Are you okay?" Nathan asked.
The child didn't answer. His grip tightened.
The man in the staff shirt reached them. He was breathing hard too, and the smile was still there, but it was different now, brittle and stretched. He reached for the boy's arm.
"There you are," the man said. "You scared everyone. Come on, we'll—"
"No."
Nathan heard the word before he realized he had said it. His hand was on the child's shoulder. The man in the staff shirt looked at him, and the smile flickered.
"Excuse me?"
"I said no." Nathan's voice was calm. "You're not taking him. Not until I know who you are and why you're chasing this child."
The man's smile dropped. He straightened. He was about the same height as Nathan but broader.
"He's my—" the man started.
"Stranger danger." The child's voice was small and muffled against Nathan's jacket.
Nathan blinked. The man in the staff shirt stiffened. Behind him, someone in the crowd had noticed. Then someone else, gradually pulling all attention to them.
Nathan kept his eyes on the man. "You will leave now."
The man took a step forward. Nathan didn't move.
There was a moment, a single, breath-held moment, when Nathan was certain the man was going to force him. He had no plan for that. He was not a fighter. He had never thrown a punch in his life. But the child was holding onto him like he was the last solid thing in a worldand Nathan had discovered, with a kind of distant surprise, that he was not going to let go first.
Then two men in actual security uniforms arrived, radios crackling, and the man in the staff shirt stepped back. His smile was gone entirely now. He said something, Nathan didn't catch the words, and then he was being led away through the crowd, and the crowd was closing behind him.
Nathan exhaled.
The child had not let go.
He was still holding onto Nathan's jacket, his small face pressed against the fabric, and Nathan could feel the shudder running through him. The crowd was watching. Someone was asking if he was all right. Someone else was asking who the child was. Nathan ignored them all.
He crouched down, bringing himself to the child's eye level. The boy lifted his head. His face was tear-streaked and his nose was running, and he looked at Nathan with an expression that Nathan would remember for a very long time afterward.
"You're okay," Nathan said. "You're safe. The bad guy's gone."
The child didn't say anything.
"What's your name?"
The child's lips parted. Then closed. He looked around, at the crowd, at the tent, at the field and the fading sky. He looked like a boy who had been dropped into a world he didn't recognize and was trying to figure out which way was up. His grip on Nathan's jacket tightened.
And then he looked back at Nathan, and his brow furrowed in a way that seemed far too serious for a face that small, and he said:
"Daddy?"
Nathan's mind went blank. He blinked. He opened his mouth. Then closed it.
What the fuck, he thought.
The child was still looking at him. Waiting. His small hands had not let go of Nathan's jacket.
What the fuck, he thought again, with feeling.