like climbing roses. But lots of people want formal rose gardens.”
“Status symbol?”
“I suppose. Or just lack of imagination.” She takes a sip of tea. “Did you know there’s a rose called Richard M. Nixon?”
“With the M?”
“Yes.”
“That’s actually revolting.”
He reaches behind his chair and brings out a bunch of spectacular, full-blown peonies, a wet paper towel wrapped around their stems.
“I don’t know if they’ll last long enough for you to get them home.”
“They’re far more beautiful than roses.”
A young man— Waiter? Bellboy? Concierge-in-training?—materializes with a vase half full of water. He places it on the side table and departs.
“Did you arrange that?” she asks Micajah.
“They’re good here. They think of everything.”
“You did.” He escapes the accusation rather than denying it, by picking up his dice cup and raising it toward her as if he’s making a toast.
“Shall we play?”
“Sure.” She picks up her own cup. He tips one die into his palm and rolls the other. A six. She does the same. A six also. She feels a twinge of embarrassment, as if she’s done it intentionally to flirt with him.
“Game on,” he says, turning the doubling cube to two.
The game comes back to her. She finds herself able to move her pieces without counting, to know instinctively when to risk getting hit and when to close ranks and protect. It’s a relief not to have to talk. She lets the rhythm of the game take her, the ebb and flow of the energy across the board, his hand reaching toward her when he moves his pieces and withdrawing as he collects his dice, her hand reaching toward him when it’s her turn. She finds herself staring at his long fingers as they slide the marble discs into place.
“Double you.”
He pushes the cube toward her. She looks into his eyes, green flecked with gold. She does not need to look at the board to know that she will say yes. After all, there’s nothing at stake.
She takes the cube with her left hand, and notices the glint of her wedding ring.
They play for nearly two hours. The board belongs to the hotel, he tells her; it’s why he invited her here. She asks about his band, and he tells her that their name is Blisskrieg, though they may change it to Metropolis because the label thinks Blisskrieg looks weird in print. They’ve been together for nine years, he says. It’s been a long road to what’s shaping up to be their overnight success. She’s pleased she can see, even in this softly lit room, the beginnings of lines around his eyes.
“What instrument do you play?” she asks.
“Lots of them. Fiddle mostly, and cello. Whatever gives the track an edge. Accordion sometimes. I just started learning theremin.”
“What’s a theremin? I’ve never heard of it.”
“A man named Léon Theremin invented it. It sounds like a zombie opera singer and it looks like something out of Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory. You play it without touching it. It picks up the electrical energy from your hands.”
“So it’s like you’re playing the air?”
“Exactly!” He’s excited that she’s understood so quickly. She is too.
“I’d love to see that,” she says.
“I’ll show you,” he says. “Next time.”
So there will be a next time. It’s agreed.
She wins an eight-point game and he gives her a high-five. It feels like a stopping place. By tacit agreement, they don’t reset the pieces. He checks the time on his phone.
“Teatime’s over,” he says. “It’s cocktail hour.”
“I should be getting home,” she says. Though Larry is not due back from his business trip until tomorrow, and the cat can look after itself.
“Just one?”
He stands, and holds out his hand to her.
“Not here?”
“Kind of,” he says. “And kind of not.”
Again, that feeling of the horse under her—not bucking, but picking up speed. Yes, she should be going home, back to the safety of her home and the sanctity of her marriage vows. But there are reins this time; she can control it.
“All right,” she says. “One.”
He grabs a backpack from the floor and, after checking that nobody is watching, leads her to an unobtrusive door for staff only, ushering her through into a tiny space with another door blocking the way. He digs in a pocket, fishes out an ID card on a lanyard, and slides it through the reader.
“You work here?” Eve asks, happy that this extravagant venue now makes some kind of sense.
“Art deliveries,” he explains in a low voice, almost a whisper. “People actually live here. The kind of people who don’t want visitors to come inside their apartment, and don’t want to go outside. Too famous. Too wanted, in every sense of the word. They buy art, of course. Very expensive, large art, which somebody has to deliver. Which would be me.”
“So we’re sneaking in?”
Eve is the kind of person whose heart races when she sees a cop car, even if she isn’t speeding.
“Does it bother you?”
The thought of getting caught does, but she left caution behind when she left her house hours ago, and adrenaline is fueling her now. She feels like a kid sneaking into her parents’ bedroom when they’re out for the evening. She will discover something forbidden. She will learn secrets.
Micajah conducts her quickly through the service passageways to an elevator, and presses the button for the highest floor. Once the doors close, he speaks in a normal voice. “This”— he gestures with the ID card, —“is because I got a temp pass one time. Complicated installation piece, lots of in and out. The night shift was on duty when I left and they forgot to ask for it back. So later, I took it to this guy I know.”
“What kind of guy?”
“The kind of guy who can turn a day card into an all-access platinum wonderpass.” He grins at her. “The advantages of the frontier lifestyle. Brooklyn. Not the fancy part.”
When they emerge, he leads her down a scruffy corridor to a door marked Fire Exit. He pushes a horizontal bar to open it. Concrete stairs lead up to another door at the top.
“Close your eyes.”
Eve hears the click of the bar being pressed, and the squeak of hinges. She feels a faint breeze on her face. Micajah takes her hand lightly.
“Watch the step.”
Eve feels with her foot: it’s just a high lintel. She steps across it.
“Keep them closed, okay?”
“Okay.”
Micajah lets go of her hand. Behind her the door creaks closed. She hears the long rasp of a zipper, things being pulled from the backpack.
“You can open them now.”
They are on a wide expanse of roof, punctuated by little towers that enclose the various vents and chimneys of the building. The rooftop itself is paved with terracotta tiles. It’s the tallest building in the vicinity; all around them, the sky is a haze of pink.