She assumed.
That was the plan anyway, and she’d come too far not to stick to the plan.
* * *
As much as he didn’t want to, Matteo decided at the last minute to go to the airport himself. He could have sent a car. There was no reason he personally had to make the trek to Zurich, much less physically go inside and hold up a sign that said “Ms. Cara Delaney” in order to welcome the woman who would be his undoing. He did it anyway.
Matteo would freely admit that he was the sort of person for whom duty mattered. Well, perhaps that wasn’t entirely fair. That made him sound like a protocol droid. It was more that tradition mattered.
So when the king charged you with personally making sure that the hotshot American management consultant was welcomed properly, when he asked you to be her interpreter and tour guide, you went to the airport yourself. Once you started deciding how, or god forbid, whether, to do certain parts of your job, you might as well give up and throw open the doors to the forces of chaos.
Speaking of the forces of chaos, a woman burst into his field of vision, suddenly there when she had not been before. He had been keeping a close eye on the doors that disgorged passengers from the customs hall—he’d thought. But there she was.
She was wearing a black pantsuit and the highest heels he had ever seen on a woman in Eldovia in the winter. She approached at an impressive speed, given those shoes, pulling a small rolling suitcase behind her. The staccato clacking of her heels joined the steady buzzing sound made by the bag’s wheels to create an ominous, crescendoing symphony. Her dark, almost black hair was pulled into a severe chignon and, along with the black suit, provided a stark contrast to her skin, which was almost as pale as the snow falling outside. Her eyes were a deep, dark blue, like the sky over the mountains after a storm. She looked like an angel.
He huffed a self-disgusted exhalation. Honestly. He needed to take the hyperbole down a notch or several. Cara Delaney was not bringing good tidings of great joy. If she was an angel, she wasn’t a good one. He arranged his mouth into the shape of a smile but took care that his eyes did not convey any warmth. “Ms. Delaney?”
“Yes.” She stuck out her hand in that aggressive way Americans had. Her nails were varnished in a red so dark it was almost black. “A pleasure to meet you,” she said in a tone that suggested there was in fact nothing whatsoever pleasurable about making his acquaintance as she attempted to break his fingers.
“Likewise,” he murmured, squeezing her hand as hard as she was squeezing his. It was ridiculous, these displays of dominance, when everyone, except perhaps American management consultants, knew that when it came to getting what you wanted, soft power was a great deal more effective than brute force. Bone-crushing handshakes and shoes that should be subject to EU weapons regulations were not only empty signifiers, they suggested an underlying lack of confidence that could be exploited.
He made a mental note.
“I know you’d been working closely with Bradley Wiener to prepare for his arrival,” she said. “I hope getting me instead isn’t too much of a disappointment.”
He was supposed to rush to assure her that she could never be a disappointment. Instead, he kept his face expressionless. “I do hope Mr. Wiener’s health is improving?” To think of all the effort Matteo had invested—speaking of soft power—in . . . well, frankly, in manipulating the Wiener gentleman.
It wasn’t that he thought he could have any real impact on the economic policy of Eldovia. At least not given that the king had made up his mind about the job Ms. Delaney was here to do. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t play a role in shaping how that job was done. In minimizing the chaos and injury she was surely here to visit upon them.
He’d done so much work already on this front with Mr. Wiener, worked to convey the rich culture that was Eldovia, to explain the importance of tradition and continuity. And now he had . . . her. He would have to start all over, just as he was headed into his busiest time of year, too.
Well, there was nothing for it. The only way out was through, onward and upward, etcetera, etcetera.
Ms. Delaney did not address Matteo’s inquiry about her colleague’s health. “I can assure you that Brad has oriented me to the file.”
The file. As if an entire nation, its well-being and prosperity, could be reduced to something so pedestrian as a file. But he needed to remember that in her mind, it could. It already had been.
“I didn’t realize you would be meeting me,” she said.
He did not know if she was remarking on the fact that he hadn’t merely sent a driver—as he should have—or if she was complaining that the king himself was not on hand to roll out the red carpet. “I am equerry to His Majesty, King Emil. Are you familiar with the role?” He asked because many people weren’t. Americans often thought he was a butler. Not that there was anything wrong with being a butler. It was an honorable way to make a living performing an important service.
“Yes. I’ve seen The Crown.”
God preserve him. His impassive façade almost slipped.
“As far as I can tell,” she went on, “being an equerry is like being an executive assistant. Everyone thinks you’re a secretary, but really, you make the entire ship go.”
“The ship? I beg your pardon?”
“It’s a Star Trek metaphor. The captain can talk a good talk, but the person who actually makes the ship go is the engineer. If he—or she, but let’s face it; on TV it’s usually a he—doesn’t want the ship to go, it’s is not going, no matter what the captain says.”
Hmm. What a curious, and unexpected, analogy.
“But choose your metaphor,” she went on. “The wind beneath your boss’s wings. The man behind the throne.” She cracked a smile, which she held for a beat, clearly trying not to laugh. She lost the battle and let loose a low, throaty, delighted chuckle that seemed at odds with her corporate-goth persona. “Which I guess is not a metaphor in this case, because you literally are that.”
“Well, not literally.”
“What?”
“I don’t literally stand behind the throne.” There wasn’t even a literal throne, at least not in the way she imagined.
She rolled her eyes ever so slightly, which surprised him. He would have expected “Don’t roll one’s eyes at the client” to be a first principle.
Of course, he wasn’t the client. He was the concierge. He tried not to bristle overtly.
“Are you aware,” she said, “that the dictionary recently revised the definition of ‘literally’ to include ‘in effect,’ or ‘virtually’?”
“I am, but that doesn’t mean I approve. A word cannot also mean the opposite of itself simply because enough people agree.” He was aware that he shouldn’t be speaking to her like this. King Emil hadn’t charged him with being a concierge in quite those words, but that’s what his request had amounted to. And concierges didn’t get high in the instep with their guests.
She stared at him for a beat too long before saying, “I see how this is going to be.”
“Do you?” He was still doing it. He couldn’t seem to stop.
“I do.” She was getting impertinent, too.