I grabbed my jacket from the back of the chair and turned to face the room.
"Something came up. I'm heading out. Enjoy the rest of your evening."
I paused at the door, glancing back at Brett. "Oh, and class rep? Don't bother inviting me to these little gatherings anymore."
I couldn't stomach another second of this.
Alberta's insufferable posturing made my skin crawl. But I wasn't about to waste my breath calling her out. This dinner—the social niceties, the face I'd saved for her—consider it my parting gift.
But as I passed her, she grabbed my arm.
"Mike." Her voice was saccharine. "Forgetting something?"
"What?"
"Your bill."
I stuck a finger in my ear, certain I'd misheard. "Alberta, did you hit your head on the way here?"
"They just said the whole tab is comped. What exactly am I paying for?"
She let out a cold, brittle laugh, her eyes dripping with contempt.
"It's comped because my husband has pull here. What does that have to do with you?"
She released my arm and sauntered toward the door, ripping the itemized receipt off the wall with a theatrical flourish.
"Tonight's total? Eight hundred thousand dollars. Twenty classmates. That's forty thousand each."