A Kept Woman (32 page)

‘I guess so.’

‘People are interested, aren’t they?’ Michael demanded.

She couldn’t deny it. ‘Very.’

‘Imperial is going places. Trust me. I know about these things.’

Stung by his arrogance, she couldn’t help but needle

him. ‘You’re only thirty-one Michael, and so far you

have one aborted book house to your credit.’

‘I know about these things,’ Michael said simply, shrugging.

Diana didn’t press the point. The trouble was, she believed him.

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‘Interesting,’ Ernie said.

He steepled his fingers, which he thought made him look statesmanlike. Jack Fineman’s cool, air-conditioned office looked out over Gramercy Park. Ernie gazed unseeing at the nannies walking their charges and the chess-players hustling the rubes, and considered he information, his lawyer had dug up.

‘So how much exactly would you say Cicero was worth?’ o

A nanny in jeans and a soft cashmere sweater .strolled by, pushing a double stroller. So many New York wives were on fertility treatments now that you saw twins and triplets everywhere. Ernie disliked kids. He turned back to Fineman, awaiting his answer.

‘Imperial’s just a small company.’

Fineman shuffled through his papers. Ernie was a seedy operator, no doubt about it. Fineman’s firm wasn’t used to hiring private eye to trail people, as though Ernie were some suburban wronged wife with a grudge. But they paid out the big bucks, and clients with egos were always capricious. The lawyer knew that in this matter he had to pander to his client. ‘They have an independent distribution deal, plus they write games for some of the bigger houses. But they’ve also been talking to a lot of banks, even investment banks. I’d say they’re gearing up to make an offering on Wall Street. Go public, get serious capitalisation.’

Ernie shifted. ‘You didn’t answer my question, mate.”

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‘I’m getting there.’ Fineman smiled broadly. ‘Right now he might be taking home a hundred, a hundred and fifty a year. He literally takes money from sales and pays off overheads, wages, health plans,
etc.
But he owns the company one hundred per cent. Any IPO would be based on potential, not the small numbers they’re managing right now as a boutique firm. They have a unique product in a small corner of the market, educational software. Kids like learning with their games. Word of mouth is excellent. I think an IPO would be a big success7

‘So if they go public, how much does he get?’ Ernie frowned slightly. He wasn’t interested in background, just answers.

‘The sky’s the limit. Conservatively, twenty .million

dollars. Maybe more.’

Twenty million?

Ernie felt his stomach drop. That would put the little bastard up there with him. He had a lot of toys - the chauffeur on permanent call, the charter planes, the chopper rides - but they were company perks. He was employed, and Michael Cicero owned his product. He glanced out over the park again as though he were totally unconcerned.

‘Of course, then he loses control of the company.’ ‘Not necessarily. He doesn’t have to float it all. He could sell off a forty-nine per cent share, or even less than that.’

‘I don’t like the thought of a rival taking that slice of the market,’ Ernie said calmly. ‘You know we have an interest in games, too.’

Fineman pushed his spectacles up his nose. ‘Then I can only suggest you bring your division to the Street’s attention, Mr Foxton. At the moment, his product is unique. And the market loves uniqueness.’

‘Right,’ Ernie said, thoughtfully. ‘I better be going.’

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Fineman stood and showed his client out. He wondered how Cicero would take this. They had screwed him over once. It seemed harsh to do it twice, but he, business was business.

Opie led the applause and then the dive for the beer.

‘Great speech, boss.’ He grinned up at Michael cheekily. ‘Inspiring, huh? Maybe we should get out some brass

eagles and send the legions into battle?’

There was warm laughter.

The staff were crammed into the upstairs room at the White Horse Tavern, Greenwich Village’s answer to an English pub, which Michael had hired out for the office party. There was a keg of beer and three different wines, and the trogps were getting rowdy. Not that he minded.

The Alpha Series of games had recently been launched on the market. After months of code-crunching, rushing the printers and browbeating the independent distribution system, the first Imperial games had finally landed in the stores. Opie had turned to web design and run up a site for direct sales, too, while Diana negotiated shipping contracts with UPS.

The reviewers just loved them. Even the commercial gaming mags had got into the act. Around the room were hung, courtesy of Diana, large blow-up posters of the more notable reviews. PC World screamed ‘Revolutionary’. Gamer said ‘Exciting and Addictive’. But the most prominent place was reserved for the tiny inch-long slot they’d got in Time magazine that called them, ‘The best reason for moms to love a mouse in the house’. Below the brief rave they had printed the website address. And after that, there had been no stopping Imperial. The factory could not keep up with demand. They were limiting the units per store, per region, per customer, which made them must-haves, creating a delicious, sexy little consumer buzz.

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‘Enjoy yourselves, you deserve it,’ Michael told them. He looked round at his troops. ‘I’d tell you to give yourselves a week off, but we need the product.’

‘Maybe we can have a week off when we die,’ Mary Castellano, the new PR girl, suggested.

‘Possible, but I doubt it.’ Michael grinned. He picked up a glass of champagne somebody shoved at him and motioned to the DJ to start the music.

Michael moved through his staff, pressing hands, kissing cheeks and congratulating everybody. He had the whole office here, right down to the kid who restocked the water coolers and photocopier cartridges. It was important for people to feel that they shared in the stellar success of this thing. Next week he would ask more of them and more still the week after that. Everybody needed to be pumped to put in the same kind of hours he did himself. He’d suggested to Diana that she move some beds into the free rooms upstairs so people could shower and sleep there if they wanted to. But she’d vetoed it, firmly. She said people worked better when they had a life.

He wasn’t so sure. Work was his life.

He noticed Diana wasn’t dancing and looked round for her. There she was, leaning against the back wall in some kind of suit. It was hard to tell the colour under the flashing disco strobes, but it was bound to be something subtle, something tasteful, well cut and extremely expensive. The staff had all been given raises as soon as the cash started flowing in. Diana was his number two, and her raise had been the largest.

She had wasted no time, either, he thought, critically. She had found a new apartment, a beautiful twelfth-floor duplex in a building overlooking the river. She changed her shoes each day and floated into the office in a cloud of some vitally expensive scent. It was almost the same as

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when Michael first knew her In fact, now she looked even better.

The excitement of the job gave a charge to her skill, put a glittering gleam in her eye. Her beauty was electric. Maybe he was jealous. The smartly cut suits that spanned her small waist and emphasised the flare of her breasts and her awesome butt, the colours that seemed so right, so elegant, the heels that gave a lift to the sexy curve of her calf … men noticed her. Even twenty-something puppies and teenagers. From the old weather-worn men on the construction sites outside to the harassed traffic cops, they stopped what they were doing to drool when Diana walked past. Even her soft make-up seemed unnecessary to him. She was so stunning. Her hourgiass figure and, upple, sexy sway would make a statue pant. And the way she dressed only made it worse. She was a torture to” Michael. Even when she was going out with him, she seemed unattainable. To make love to her was barely to scratch the surface of his desire. She was like a lake which, every time you drank from it, made you thirstier.

Did she really need to put on such a softly brushed, melted-butter, just over the knee Prada suit for a night at the Tavern? Did she have to have her rich brown hair gleaming like that? She looked like a princess, not an executive. But there was nothing he could complain about. Each individual thing she wore was appropriate. It was the overall effect that took his breath away.

He walked up to her and watched as those cool English eyes fixed on him.

‘Not dancing?’ Michael asked. He breathed in her scent. It was light and fresh today. Sometimes she was rich and musky, or warm and wooded. But today she smelled cleanly of meadow flowers and new-mown grass. It was good, but not as good as the woman smell of her, the personal scent of her soft clean skin. That was hdw he

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liked her best; naked, in the shower, with nothing to decorate, nothing to hide, the fantastic body. Her breasts sluicing with water, the tiny rivulets that hung on the peaks of her rose-pink nipples. Her flat belly with the small button he loved to trace with the tip of his tongue, teasing her, circling till she was hot and begging. And for an ass man like himself, the sensational flare of her hips, the rock-hard jutting curve of her butt, which walking all over Manhattan kept firmer than any personal trainer ever could. Desire rose in him. He wanted her more, he felt himself getting hard. Again. He’d thought this morning would have drained him for days, but the sight of her buttoned-up, three-quarter-length jacket was enough to wake him from the dead. She was so l.adylike, so correct. But he knew how he could make her leap. He wanted to try again. Each day was a new challenge, to drive her to places she had never been.

Diana smiled slightly. ‘I don’t like disco.’ She nodded at the Time review. ‘Looks good, huh?’

‘It does.’ He agreed at once. It was her triumph. Mary Castellano had arranged the interview, but Diana had wowed the journalist, taking him out for a meal that had wiped out a week’s petty cash, at Lutece, and dazzling him with her elegance and poise. In a masterstroke of contrast, she’d brought Opie along too. The gawky young programmer and the cold English director fascinated the writer. Diana talked about Imperial’s educational philosophy, and Opie blithered on about tight code and graphics scroll and other things the journalist didn’t understand. It was alchemy and exciting, and he’d actually sold his commissioning editor on running a tiny plug. As a result, their website was appearing in homes and stores right across the country. ‘You did good.’

Diana frowned slightly. She did good, huh? Michael was a sexist, patronising pig. She had made his damn

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company with that article. He should be on his knees thanking her.

‘Glad you think so.’

He noted the tone immediately. ‘Don’t get snappy with

me. I recognise your contribution.’

‘Big of you,’ Diana said.

They glared at each other, each thinking the other was impossible.

‘I’m a little tired, to be honest.’ Diana turned her head, and he caught a glimpse of the new diamond studs flashing in her creamy earlobes. ‘I think I might go home.’

‘Fine,’ Michael said, coldly. ‘Whatever you like. Are we still on for dinner?’

‘Why woqldn’t we be?’

‘I’ll pick you up at eight,’ he said.

She stared at herself in the mirror, undecided. What was she today? Was she strappy, sassy, pale-pink Miu Miu shot with lilac and silver, almost a hippyish, short little baby-doll thing? Or was she classic English rose, her rosy cheeks and nut-brown hair set off by a figure-hugging velvet sheath in dark green, with a rabbit-fur trim at the collar and cuffs? The sheath fell to the floor, but it was almost more revealing than the miniskirted dress. Michael had annoyed he[ today. Always the stern boss, always the workaholic. She had put in a long day with little sleep last night, and because she didn’t feel like chugging down beer in some American pub he was going to give her grief? Michael expected her to be on twenty four hours a day. She had to make it through a night of energetic love-making - well, nobody forced her, but his body gave her little choice - then get up at six, shower, dress like the businesswoman she was becoming, get into the office, put in a long day, take work home, go out on a date, and do the whole thing again the next day. Michael ‘

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was professional inside the office, but stern and forbidding. She always felt like she was doing something wrong. Despite her success, maybe he still held her background against her. He seemed so much friendlier around Mary Castellano and Opie and the other staff.

And the way she dressed. It was as though she could never please him. Diana was at her wits’ end to discover the outfit that would get a compliment from Michael. Now they were dating, she had thought he might unbend. Her suits got tighter and costlier, finding just the right blouse or pair of hose could take a-whole Saturday, and yet he never said anything. It was annoying. Other guys seemed to like how she looked. But if Michael was not kissing her, she would never know he found her attractive.

Diana decided on the pink. Drastic measures were called for. She would shock him out of his goddamn complacency. She put the green sheath back in the walk in closet and reached for the pink. Classic was failing with Michael, and anyway, the really stylish girl always nixed up her fashion. Guys needed to be challenged. They liked variety; Ernie had shown her that. So the trick was to be as many women as they could handle.

The silky scrappy little dress slithered on over her strapless bra, an amazing feat of engineering considering the over-spilling, creamy flesh it had to contain. It hugged her waist and bottom like a second skin, a luminous fish scale skin, sparkling in rainbow colours. A fluted hem followed the bias-cut of the skirt which stopped in a froth just above her slim knees and nicely turned calves. With a dress like this there were only Manolos, and she reached for her new yellow leather pair along with the gold, Versace sequined clutch purse. A necklace of pink cut glass looped round the freckled hollow of her throat and she shook her hair loose from its French braid, letting it hang shining and undressed over her shoulders. The effect