“That's too bad. That he's in Chicago, I mean. How's everything else?” He perched on the arm of a chair, and was almost the same height as Faith as she stood and they talked.

“Okay, I guess. It's weird having both of the girls gone. I don't know what to do with myself. I keep saying I'll go to work, but I don't have any marketable skills. I was thinking of going back to law school, but Alex thinks I'm nuts. He says I'm too old to go back to school, or pass the bar.”

“At your age? Lots of people do. Why wouldn't you?”

“He says by the time I pass the bar, no one will hire me anyway.” Just hearing her say it annoyed Brad. He had never liked Alex anyway.

“That's nonsense. You'd make a great lawyer, Fred. I think you should.” She smiled in answer, and didn't try to explain to him how impossible it would be to convince Alex of that. He was a stubborn man.

“Alex thinks I should just stay home and relax, take bridge lessons, or something like that.” It sounded deadly to her, and Brad agreed. As he looked at her, he was remembering her long blond hair when she was a kid, and wished he could pull the pins out of her bun, for old times' sake. He had always loved her hair.

“You'd be bored to death. I think school is definitely the right idea. You ought to look into it.” It was exactly what Jack would have said, and it sparked her enthusiasm again, as a fresh group of people walked in, and she went to greet them. She recognized several faces, and thanked them for coming, and a little while later, she came back to Brad.

“So what's Pam doing these days? Are you working together at all anymore?” They were both attorneys, and had met at law school, although Pam had been a year ahead of him. Jack had gone to their wedding and been best man, but Faith had only met her once. Pam had seemed hard and more than a little daunting to her, but smart certainly. Brad had definitely met his match in Pam.

“Hell, no,” Brad grinned. “She's still working in her father's firm. He keeps threatening to retire, but he's seventy-nine and hasn't yet, so I don't know if he ever will. She's a litigator and she thinks I'm insane for what I do.”

“Why?” What he did had sounded both interesting and noble to Faith. According to what he'd said the last time they met, he was defending a wide assortment of kids accused of some fairly major crimes.

“No money, for one thing. Most of the time I'm court appointed, the rest of the time I don't get paid, or not enough, according to her. I work days, nights, and weekends. She thinks I gave up a cushy job in her father's firm to hang around in county jail with a bunch of kids who are allegedly unsalvageable. The nice thing is that some of them actually do turn their lives around, if they get a break. It's interesting work. And it works better for me. You can come and clerk for me one summer if you go to law school,” he teased. “You'd have to work for free of course, or you could pay me, that would work.” They both laughed as they wandered to the buffet, and Allison introduced them to a couple Faith had never met. The crowd had begun to thin by midafternoon, but Allison thought they should stay till five out of courtesy, in case others arrived late. It gave Faith a chance to spend more time catching up with Brad.

“So what else, Fred?” Brad teased as they sat down again, after eating egg salad sandwiches with watercress, some strawberries, and petits fours. “Any misdemeanors? Felonies? Parking violations? Affairs? You can confess to me, I'm bound by confidentiality,” he said, and she laughed. He realized as he sat with her, how much he had missed seeing her in the last several years. It was so easy to drift apart with distance and time and busy lives, his at least. And yet the moment they were together, it was as though nothing had changed. And if anything, Jack's absence brought them closer together and provided a tighter bond. “So, what's the deal?” he pressed.

“No deal,” she said, crossing her legs, as they faced each other. He was still an incredibly handsome man, she realized, as she looked at him. All the girls had always been crazy about him, although it was always Jack who had gotten the best girls. He had had irresistible charm, and in some ways, Brad was shy. Faith had always loved that about him. “You'll be very disappointed. No misdemeanors or felonies. I lead a pretty boring life. That's why I want to go back to school. I've been out of a job since Zoe left for Brown. Alex is busy all the time. Ellie's gone too. That's about it. I do some charity work from time to time, organizing fundraisers. I can do that in my sleep.”

“What about affairs, Fred? You've been married for a hell of a long time. Don't tell me you've behaved all this time!” He'd done the same thing to her when they were kids. He'd always wormed all her secrets out of her, with his big brotherly way, and then teased her about them afterward. But this time she truly had nothing to tell.

“I told you. I lead a very boring life. And no, I've never had an affair. I don't think I'd have the guts, too complicated, besides, I've never seen anyone I want. I've just kept busy with the girls. It sounds embarrassingly dull, doesn't it?” She laughed and he grinned, his green eyes locked on her.

“You must still be madly in love with Alex then,” he said, and she looked away thoughtfully and then back at him. It was odd, all the same intimacy was still there between them, even after all these years. She trusted him, who he was now, and all he'd ever been to her. And he was standing in for Jack in a way. In some ways, at certain times, she had been even closer to Brad than to her brother. She and Brad were very similar. Jack had always been more outgoing than either of them, and more outrageous at times. She and Brad had always had a lot in common. And she had told him things in the past that she hadn't even told Jack.

“No,” she said honestly, “I'm not in love with him. Not ‘madly,’ as you put it. I love him, he's a good person, a good father, a good man. We're good friends. Actually, I'm not sure what we are anymore. I think his work is his first love, and he doesn't need anyone close to him, he never has. We live in the same house, share children, go out together to business dinners, and see friends occasionally. Most of the time, we go about our own lives. We don't have much to say to each other anymore.” He realized then that that was the sadness he had seen in her eyes.

“That sounds lonely, Fred,” he said quietly, although his own life was no better than hers. He and Pam had scarcely been more than acquaintances for years. Things hadn't been going well between them when he went out on his own professionally, and she had yet to forgive him for leaving her father's firm. She viewed it as an abandonment, and a betrayal of sorts. She had taken it personally, and couldn't see that what he was doing was better for him. It was diametrically opposed to everything she wanted and believed, for either of them. Making money, lots of it, was far more important to her.

“It is lonely sometimes.” She didn't want to tell him it was lonely all the time. It didn't seem fair to Alex to say that, and it sounded pitiful to admit that to Brad. “He's a very solitary person, and we have different needs. I love people, being with the kids, I used to love seeing friends, going to movies, hanging out together on weekends. We kind of lost all that. Alex can't see the point in doing anything unless it's related to his work.” Even his golf games were with clients, or people he wanted to get to know, and do business with eventually.

“God,” Brad said, running a hand through his hair and sitting back in his chair, with an agitated look. He hated to think of her living that way. She deserved so much more, which was what Jack had always said, and Brad agreed. “He sounds like Pam. All she cares about is how much money we make. And frankly,” he smiled at Faith sheepishly, “Scarlett, I don't give a damn. I mean sure, I wouldn't want to see us starving to death. But that's not going to happen. She makes a fortune at her father's firm, she has some very, very major clients. And he's going to leave the whole shebang to her when he retires, or dies, whichever comes first. We have more than enough put away. We have a great house. Terrific kids. What the hell more could we want? How much more do we need to make? The beauty of it is that I can afford to do what I want, I don't have to gouge clients, or do boring tax work for them. I love what I do, that means a lot to me. I think Pam is embarrassed by it, because I'm not making the kind of money she thinks I should. And in the end, who gives a damn except Uncle Sam on April fifteenth? We've got more than enough to leave the kids, and we live very comfortably. I figured it was time for me to give back. Someone should.”

“It makes sense to me,” Faith said thoughtfully. It sounded like he'd made the right decision, for himself at least. But it also sounded as though it had created a big rift between them.

“For Pam, it's all about status and prestige, who you know, what other people think, what clubs you belong to, what parties you get invited to. I don't know, maybe I am getting old, or weird, but I'd rather sit in a jail cell talking to some kid than go to a boring black-tie dinner and sit next to some old bag who doesn't work and doesn't have a goddamn thing to say.” He looked heated as he talked about it, and Faith smiled at him.

“I think that's me you're talking about. I think that's the best argument I've heard for going back to school.”

“Maybe it is,” he said honestly. “I don't know. I just knew I had to do something better with my life than estate planning, or listening to people whine about their taxes, and try to help them preserve their fortunes for their kids, who need to get out and make a living anyway, and probably never will. I think I might have killed someone if I'd stayed.” He had hated the years he'd worked at her father's firm and longed to get out.