Rian shook her head and laughed a little. I’m not the one who should try to stay cool and collected here.

“So let’s continue with your story. Can’t help but be curious about what you’d said.”

Rian motioned with her hands in a circular motion as if to indicate: “go on; tell me what’s on your mind.”

“You mentioned public school, going to college, grad school, etc., on scholarship. I would have sworn, just looking at you, so polished, poised, radiating confidence, remaining unfazed by what I’d just said about meeting these people, etc., … and my gosh, just beautiful, by the way .. that you’d …”

“Gone to private school the whole way? Ivy league and the whole bit?”

Harley gave her a half-smile and shrugged.

Rian looked out the window, rubbed her fingertips absentmindedly over her brows, and thought about her upbringing, and about her mom and dad.

“I owe everything to my parents, actually. My mom did have the sort of background you mentioned, and she is straight-up beautiful, elegant, too. I’m just glad I inherited some of that. She comes from what they called a “Philadelphia mainline family.” And then, when she was eighteen, she met a tall, handsome cadet visiting Philadelphia from West Point. She said her parents tried hard to redirect her affections to guys headed for Wall Street but from the moment they’d met, my mom only had eyes for dad. They married a year after she graduated, and after he’d returned from a European assignment. They moved to a base in North Carolina, raised me, and made sure my childhood was eventful. They still live in a modest home in Charlotte. When my grandparents died, the inheritance they’d left me was funneled into a trust fund my parents had set up. My parents didn’t touch it.”

“My dad worked hard but he never made a lot of money; he provided for us with the salary the service paid him, and my mom didn’t work, so we never had much. But whatever we had at home was stylish, courtesy of my mom. She knew how to save so that we could get a few choice pieces for the house. We ate well, and broadly, because mom always made a special effort to introduce new food and drink to our family table. And even if my clothes were never designer-type, but they were always pressed, neat, and clean. My growing up years, in the family life mom and dad created, was rich in the more important things, and filled with love … and beauty. I never felt deprived or anything, even if I had friends who liked to wear the latest cool stuff. Maybe that stuff had never been important to me…”