She kissed his cheek.
Then looked at Maggie.
For one fleeting instant, Maggie felt foolishly out of place.
Of course he had a woman like this in his life.
Men like Nicholas Sterling did not wander around New York unattached, waiting to meet struggling architectural designers with broken zippers.
They dated women who wore diamonds without appearing aware of their weight.
Nicholas introduced them.
“Maggie Bennett, Isabelle Laurent.”
Isabelle smiled warmly.
“How lovely to meet you.”
Maggie shook her hand.
“Likewise.”
“Are you involved with the foundation?”
“I'm working on a restoration proposal.”
“The Starlight?”
“Yes.”
Isabelle's expression brightened.
“Oh, wonderful. My mother used to take me there when I was little.”
Maggie relaxed slightly.
“Then you know how beautiful it is.”
“I do.”
Isabelle looked at Nicholas.
“You should listen to her.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“I've been doing little else all evening.”
Isabelle laughed.
Then a waiter approached with another tray of champagne, and Nicholas was summoned toward the podium.
He glanced back at Maggie.
“Don't disappear.”
She looked at him.
“Is that an order?”
“No.”
He smiled.
“A request.”
Then he walked away.
Maggie watched him go.
Isabelle followed her gaze.
“Be careful,” the blond woman said lightly.
Maggie turned.
“Sorry?”
“Nick has a habit of becoming terribly interested in things he believes are impossible.”
Maggie frowned.
“Like old theaters?”
Isabelle smiled.
“Sometimes.”
Then she moved toward the podium.
Maggie stood alone for several seconds.
For reasons she could not explain, the champagne suddenly tasted different.
Nicholas Sterling had spent most of his adult life attempting not to become his father.
This was complicated by the fact that his father had built an empire.
Walter Sterling was sixty-eight, brilliant, ruthless, and widely admired by people who had never been required to work for him.
He began with a small construction company in Brooklyn after the war and transformed it into one of the largest privately held real estate firms in the city.
He believed in discipline, ambition, and the fundamental principle that sentiment was an expensive distraction.
Nicholas had inherited his father's dark hair, his height, and a stubbornness neither man was willing to acknowledge.
But he had inherited his mother's temperament.
Helen Sterling had been a pianist before her marriage.
She loved old buildings, late-night jazz, terrible detective novels, and New York in the rain.
When Nicholas was a child, she took him to the theater on Saturday afternoons.
She told him that a city was not simply a place where people made money.
It was a place where they made memories.
He had never forgotten that.
His mother died when he was twenty-one.
Afterward, Nicholas went to work for his father.
It was easier than remaining in the apartment where every room reminded him of her.
He studied business, learned to negotiate contracts, and developed a reputation for being calm under pressure.
By thirty-five, he had become president of Sterling Properties.
He was very good at his work.
That was the problem.
He had become so good at managing numbers that he sometimes forgot what they represented.
The Starlight acquisition had initially seemed straightforward.
The property was deteriorating.
Its mortgage was in default.
The existing operator could not afford the necessary repairs.
Sterling Properties had acquired the controlling interest through a distressed sale.