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“How long?”

“Twenty minutes.”

His mouth shifts. “Is that an actual estimate?”

“Probably not.”

“I thought so.”

I save the document before looking up at him.

“I assumed you’d already gone home.”

“I was finishing something with my father.”

“And now?”

Ross looks toward the windows again.

“Now I’m reconsidering the wisdom of walking outside in that.”

“Your driver might object too.”

“He’d survive.” Ross drapes his jacket over the back of a nearby chair.

“My flat isn’t far from here anyway. I’m in Chelsea.”

I lean back slightly.

“Yet you’re choosing to wait out the rain in a house with approximately forty rooms.”

“It has certain advantages.”

“Such as?”

“Better whisky.”

I laugh.

Ross glances toward the far end of the library, where a paneled cabinet and small bar sit beneath the gallery level. “You want one?”

“I’m still working.”

“You’ve been working since this morning.”

“That hasn’t stopped you before.”

“No, but I’m not asking you to negotiate an acquisition after it.”

I glance at the report, then at the storm outside. The rain is coming down even harder now, and a flash of lightning briefly throws the gardens into sharp relief.

“One,” I say.

Ross nods. “One.”

He crosses to the bar while I finish the sentence on my screen. I hear glass against wood, followed by the quiet opening of a cabinet, and when he returns he sets a heavy crystal tumbler beside my laptop.

The whisky is deep amber, and one look at the label in his hand tells me it isn’t something anyone buys casually.