things,” she assured him. A date with this man might be a diversion. Her romantic past was … undistinguished. Perhaps that was the word for it. Forgettable teenage gropings in high school had given way to slightly more sophisticated dating in college—frat parties and raves. And then there was Greg. They’d married before they even knew who they were. It was like grafting together two incompatible trees—tolerable at first but eventually the differences could not be ignored. Had she loved him? Everyone loved Greg. He was the adorable, charming, indulged youngest of the four Bellamy siblings. How could anyone not love him? This sense that she should love him had sustained the marriage over sixteen years, long enough for her to be absolutely certain the love was gone. Afterward she had walked around shell-shocked for several months.
Only last fall had she dared to stick her toe into the dating pool. The first time a man had asked her out, she had regarded him as if he’d spoken in a dead language. Go out? On a date? What a novel idea.
Thus began the dating phase, which was infinitely preferable to the postdivorce shell-shocked phase. Her first prospect was a diplomatic protection agent who was more interested in showing off his 007 trappings—an alert device hidden in his lapel, a cigarette pack that could dispense cyanide gas—than in discovering who Sophie actually was. Despite her disenchantment, she’d tried to move seamlessly into the sleeping-around phase during which a newly divorced woman indulged her every fantasy. Women who slept around always seemed as though they were having such fun. Yet Sophie found it disappointing and stressful and quickly retreated to the benign safety of casual dating. She told herself she would stay open to the possibility that one day one of the attachés or diplomats or Georgian nationals she was dating would unexpectedly inflame her passions. So far, it hadn’t happened.
She regarded Brooks and wondered if he might be the one to make her drop her natural reserve. To make her remember what it felt like to be held in someone’s arms. Not tonight, she thought.
“You’ll have to excuse me,” she said, and headed for the dais.
She looked around for a place to set down her champagne flute, and approached a passing waiter. He didn’t seem to see her.
“Pardon,” she said.
The man jumped, and a glass fell from his tray, shattering on the marble floor. In the immediate area, people fell silent and turned to stare. At the periphery of the room, the security agents tensed, prepared to take action.
“I’m sorry,” Sophie murmured. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“It’s nothing, madame,” he murmured, his accent very thick. She was about to ask him where he was from when she caught the look in his eyes. It was a glittering, burning fury all out of proportion with a broken glass.
Sophie lifted her eyebrows, wordlessly conveying a warning, the way she might to a key witness. He moved slightly, and the light fell on his face, illuminating ebony skin highlighted by twin rows of shiny scars, a pattern of ritual scarring that looked vaguely familiar to her. He was Umojan, she surmised. Employing him was a nice touch by the caterer, and it explained his inexperience.
The waiter started to move away.
“Pardon me,” Sophie said to him.
He turned back, seeming more agitated than ever.
You’re a waiter, she thought, get over yourself. She held out the champagne glass. “Can you please take this? They’re about to begin.”
He all but snatched it from her and stalked away. Touchy fellow, she thought. We just liberated your country. You ought to be happier about that. She dismissed the incident from her mind. Focus, Sophie, she told herself. You’re about to meet a queen.
Four
The group on the raised dais at the end of the ballroom consisted of three of the justices from the International Criminal Court, another from the Court of Justice, a liaison from the United Nations and the queen of the Netherlands herself, whose bloodlines went back through seventeen generations of Dutch royalty. Sophie joined the rest of the prosecution team on a lower tier, where the event producer’s assistant had instructed them to wait. This group included Sophie’s best friend and colleague, Tariq Abdul-Hakeem. Like her, he was an assistant deputy to the ICC and they’d worked together on the case. She’d known Tariq from their intern days in London, years ago, and he was one of her favorite people in the world. He was also one of the most attractive, with the kind of looks found in high-fashion spreads—creamy skin and intense eyes, and features that appeared to have been shaped by an idealistic sculptor. He was a gifted linguist and had the most delicious English accent. While working together, they’d become more than colleagues. He was one of the few people in the world she’d opened up to, telling him about the situation with Greg and her children.
“Are you all right, Petal?” Tariq whispered to her.
“Of course, I’m all right. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Quite possibly, you’re somewhat bouleversée by the fact that your ex-husband is getting married today.”
She waved her hand in a dismissive gesture, even though she knew Tariq would not be fooled. “So he’s getting married. We knew it was coming. He’s a guy. It’s what they do. They remarry.” She gave a small, soft laugh. “Somebody’s got to finish raising them.” Despite her sarcasm, she remembered Max’s text message with a twinge, along with the perennial unanswerable question—was this career worth the price she’d paid?
“Such a generous opinion of the male sex,” Tariq said. “After tonight’s ceremony, I’m taking you out and getting you so drunk you’ll forget your own name.”
“Sounds delightful.”
“Isn’t that what you Yanks do, go out and get—what’s the term?—shitfaced?”
She sniffed. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. You don’t even drink.”
“But I buy drinks. I’ll take you to Club Sillies after this.”
Sophie knew she would go, and she’d be the envy of every woman there, at the hottest nightclub in The Hague, a place frequented by the European elite. Tariq never failed to turn heads; he was elegant, with a subtle layer of sadness in his regard. The sadness was real, but few people knew the reason for it. Oxford-educated, one of the top jurists in the free world, he dedicated his every waking moment to the law. Yet as a gay man, and a Saudi, he struggled every day; in his native country, same-sex relations carried a penalty of death.
“Anyway,” she said, “thank you for the offer. I really should get home afterward. I have work—”
“Yes, Allah forbid that you should have anything resembling a life.”
“I have a life.”
“You have work—at court, and at the office, and in the field—and then you have sleep. Oh, yes. You also have that entirely dreadful sport you do.”
“It’s not dreadful. Distance swimming is good for me.” She was always in training for some kind of extreme race or another. She never placed first. Ever. But she always finished. Every time.
For Tariq, whose only athletic activity was a dash for the elevator, her sport seemed madly dangerous.
“Paddling about in a wet suit in freezing waters is mad. You need to have some fun, Petal. You need a life beyond work. And don’t think I don’t know why you refuse to unbend a little. Because if you were actually to have fun and enjoy something, that would interfere with your penance.”
“You don’t know the first thing about doing penance.”
“Guilt is not the exclusive domain of Christians,” he pointed out. “You feel guilty about your kids, so you refuse to allow yourself to enjoy anything.