I started to say something to the driver, knock on the glass between us and point, but then the strange runner vanished and the house came into view.
It was even more impressive in person than it looked in the photographs and videos I’d seen. It lolled among the trees like a gigantic animal at rest, the upper-floor windows bright with the last of the sun while lights glowed warmly from the lower rooms. The drive curved around before the double-door entrance, and we pulled to a stop there. The taciturn driver opened my door, took my bag and set it down at the top of the steps leading to the doors, then returned to the limo and drove off.
I heard music coming from somewhere nearby—live, jazzy—and smelled food cooking. I was just climbing the steps to ring when the door opened. Madelyn Wilmont smiled down at me.
I wasn’t prepared for how stunning she was in person. She looked far younger than forty, with the sort of perfect casual elegance that only wealth can provide. She extended a welcoming hand to me, and I took it, surprised at its heat. “Hello, Sara, it’s so lovely to meet you. I’m Madelyn.”
A few of the reviewers of The Rich Are Different had praised its “sharp-tongued voice,” while others had decried it as “needlessly verbose.” Neither quality surfaced now; when faced with Madelyn Wilmont’s effortless poise, I felt like a single leaf of wilted spinach, small and inadequate. I just grasped her hand and smiled.
She turned to indicate the entrance. “We’ve got a room ready for you—I thought you might like to relax a bit before joining the party. It doesn’t really start for another hour, anyway.”
I started to reach for my bag, but Madelyn flicked a slender wrist. “Oh, no, dear—I’ll have that brought up to you. The stairs to the second floor are quite a climb, even without a heavy bag.” She turned and strode into the house. I forgot about my bag, following.
I tried not to stop and gape at the things we passed—delicate vases and furnishings that were probably invaluable, shelves of leather-bound books behind glass doors—but it was the art that staggered me. It ran the gamut from modern to Pre-Raphaelite. I found myself literally frozen before one large canvas in the style of Italian late Baroque. It was a landscape—classical ruins atop a hillside beneath a gloomy sky—but it was the figures in the image that caught my attention. At first glance they’d merely looked like dancers, or revelers, but upon closer inspection they were revealed as not entirely human—a leering face was topped by subtle horns, a bent torso perched atop shaggy goat legs. It was haunting, something out of a dream.
“Ah, I see you’ve found our Magnasco.”
I saw Madelyn watching me, and I realized I’d been unaware I’d even stopped. “I’m sorry, who is it?”
“Alessandro Magnasco. He’s one of our favorites.”
Something about the way she said “our”—some implication of possession, perhaps—raised a few more unspoken questions. I forced myself to turn away from the painting, smiling. “I’m not familiar with Magnasco. This is fascinating, though.”
“Not many people know him.”
I looked at the painting again, my attention drawn to a figure loping across a clearing before a collection of cracked and tilted columns. Something about the figure… saturnine, long arms swinging, legs bent the wrong way—
“Shall we…?”
I jerked around, on the verge of a question, but broke off as Madelyn continued on up the stairs. We’d just reached the second-floor landing when a voice from below called up, “So, that’s Lennox’s package?”
A man stood at the bottom of the staircase, looking up at us; he was middle-aged, balding, dressed in polo shirt and khakis, holding a drink in one hand. He swirled the contents of the glass, the ice inside tinkling.
Madelyn stopped, turning slowly, her gaze icy. “Alan, meet Sara Peck. Sara, this is my husband, Alan.”
He saluted with the drink. I was just opening my mouth to greet him when he blurted out, “We’d introduce you to our charming so-called son, Grant, but the little freak’s out running loose somewhere—”
Madelyn cut him off, firmly but not loudly, a technique she’d probably honed from frequent use. “Alan! I’m sure there must still be a few bottles of gin out back that you haven’t drunk up yet.”
Alan smirked, started to amble off. “Of course. Good luck, Miss Peck. Oh, and by the way, dearest—this is vodka.”
He vanished through a doorway, and Madelyn’s shoulders sagged. “My apologies for that, Sara. My husband… well, he’s developed an unfortunate tendency to overmedicate…”
“No apologies necessary, Madelyn. I understand.” Which wasn’t entirely true—I didn’t understand how a father could call his son a “little freak” and make the crack about “running loose somewhere.”
Madelyn led me to a bedroom on the second floor that was roughly twice the size of my first apartment. “I thought you might enjoy the Gold Room,” she said, with just a slight twist of sarcasm.
The room was furnished in tasteful gold and white, and I didn’t have to ask if the finishes were real. I stepped to the spacious windows and looked out onto the rear of the Wilmont estate. Just below, dance floors had been set up around an Olympic-size pool; a band played in one corner, people milled, chefs cooked at stations tucked in among marble statues and trimmed hedges. “Thank you, I’m sure I will.” I turned to face her and saw that she waited in the doorway, apparently expecting my question. “I have to confess, though, that I’m not quite sure why I’m here.”
She smiled, laughed slightly, then said, “You’re Lennox’s birthday surprise. He’s been a fan ever since he read your book, and he’s been dying to meet you.”
“Oh.” A flutter circled my stomach. I was a “birthday surprise”? Was I expected, perhaps, to change into a bikini and pop out of a giant cake?
Madelyn must have seen something in my expression, because her own smile faded. “Sara, my brother and I are very close. And I’m sure you’ll find him quite charming.” She backed away, reaching for the door. “I’ll have your bag brought right up. I’m really so happy to have you here.”
She stepped out, closing the door behind her.
As I used the bathroom (a little in awe of the real gold fixtures), my anxiety ramped up. What was expected of me? Why did the bit about Madelyn and her brother being “very close” sound like a jealous wife’s warning? What if I didn’t fit the picture Lennox had of the author of The Rich Are Different?
As I stepped out of the bathroom, I was heading for my purse to get a Xanax when a knock came at my door. I steeled myself, expecting the limo driver, and pulled the door open.
Lennox Wilmont stood there, my bag grasped in one hand. When he saw me, his handsome face was split by a grin that made him look younger. “Oh my God, you really are Sara Peck!” He dropped the bag and stepped toward me, and for a second I expected him to fling his arms around me… but then he grasped one of my hands instead, the picture of youthful enthusiasm. “When Madelyn told me you were the guest in the Gold Room, I didn’t believe it. I am such a fan!”