Annihilate Me (Vol. 1) (The Annihilate Me Series) (28 page)

“How
soon?”

He
shrugged.
 
“Not sure.
 
Depends on management.
 
But these things take time.
 
If they’re for it, we can finish this by
winter.
 
If they resist, then we get
more aggressive.
 
We apply pressure,
and then we make our intentions public.
 
Then it really gets ugly.
 
Either
way, we’re going forward with it.”

I
clinked my martini glass against his and we knocked them back.

“That
was refreshing,” I said.

“The
martini or the talk of the takeover?”

“Both.”

He
looked at me sincerely.
 
“I’m glad
you’re here, Jennifer.
 
I don’t
think you know what it means to me.
 
I could talk with you all night.
 
I know it’s still early, but I hope you’re having a good time.”

I certainly was back at Wenn.
 
“I just talked
about takeovers with someone who not only understands what they are, but who
actually does them.
 
Are you
joking?
 
I’m in my element.
 
Oh, and by the way, I look like I’m
straight out of
Gatsby
and I have the night’s smartest,
best-looking date.
 
Because of you,
I’m having a fabulous time.”

I
took his free hand in mine and our fingers interlocked.
 
There were no other words to express how
I felt.
 
He tightened his grip, and
then he leaned forward to give me a quick peck on the cheek.

“Your
stubble is going to do me in.”

“You
like that?”

“Please,
don’t tease me.”

“You
haven’t even seen me tease you yet,” he said.

*
 
*
 
*

Later,
when dinner was announced, we followed the crowd to Milstein Hall, which caused
me to pause when we descended the steps that led to the massive space.
 
It was lit in rippling hues of blue that
evoked the ocean, and it was filled with fifty tables set for ten.
 
Hovering just below the glass ceiling
was an enormous replica of a blue whale that I thought had to be close to a
hundred feet long.
 
I’d never seen
anything like it.
 
It was magical.

My
father entered my head again and started his bullshit rant about how I didn’t
belong here, but I mentally shook him away.
 
Or at least, I tried to.
 
I looked around at the sea of celebrities,
people I had seen for years on television and in movies, or musicians I admired,
and I knew he was right.
 
Who was I
to be here?
 
It made no logical
sense.
 

But I
am
here
, I thought.
 
And
I’m here for a
reason.
 
Where did these people come
from?
 
Did all of them come from a
privileged life?
 
Or did they work
for it?
 
I’m betting most worked for
it.
 
I bet, just like me, most never
thought they’d see anything like this.

“Are
you OK?” Alex asked.

I
realized I was gripping his hand more firmly than before, and I forced myself
to relax.
 
“I’m fine.
 
It’s just so much.
 
It’s beautiful.”

At
the bottom of the stairs, one of the hosts greeted us and took us to our table,
where none other than Immaculata Almendarez herself was seated.
 

“This
should be interesting,” I said quietly.

“She
planned it,” he said.
 
“So, it
will
be interesting.
 
Get ready.”

Naturally,
when the host seated us, Alex was placed directly beside Immaculata, while I
was asked to take the seat between him and an older gentleman.

“Alex,”
Immaculata said, turning to look at him.
 
“What a surprise.”

“Really?
 
I was thinking, ‘What a coincidence.’”

“You’re
so funny.”
 
She leaned forward to
look at me, and I saw her eyes go to the diamonds and sapphires at my ears,
neck and wrist.
 
“And I see you’re
still with Jane.”

“It’s
Jennifer,” I said.

“Right,
right.
 
Why do I always think of you
as a Jane?”

“I’m
not sure, Immaculata.
 
The only
thing I can imagine is that as we get older, our capacity to remember things
begins to fail.”

“It
begins to what?”

“Fail.
 
Like our hearing, for instance.
 
You should have yours checked.
 
Our bodies eventually betray us.”

“Mine
hasn’t yet,” she said as she pressed her fingertips against the table, and
arched her back toward them and it, thus allowing us all to glimpse the full
weight of her formidable breasts, which were barely covered by her plunging
black dress.
 
I thought she looked
desperate, and I didn’t mind when she reached for Alex’s hand when she turned
her attention to him.
 
“How are
you?” she asked.

“Working
hard, Immaculata.”

“You
always work so hard.”

“Not
as much since I’ve been with Jennifer, but work is work.
 
And work is good.”
 
He casually removed his hand from hers
and signaled for a waiter.
 
“Wenn
keeps me busy.
 
Jennifer keeps me
busy in other ways.”

Immaculata
swallowed that poison pill as if it was a clear glass of water.
 
I had to give it to her—she was
cool.
 
“The last time I saw you was
two weeks ago.
 
At The Met
fundraiser.
 
I saw you both leave in
such a hurry.
 
Everyone was buzzing
about it.”

Oh, she wasn’t going to go there.

“There
was an undercurrent,” she said.
 
“It
didn’t look good.
 
People said
Jennifer removed her jewels and then some overheard a choice exchange of
words.
 
It was on everyone’s lips
for a week.
 
I’ve been worried about
you, especially because I haven’t seen you.”

She
was talking to him as if I wasn’t at the table.
 
I rested my chin in the palm of my hand,
turned to her, and just listened with a half-smile.

The
waiter Alex signaled stopped by the table.

“Would
you like a drink, sir?”

“Actually,
we’d like another table.
 
I see only
half the room is seated at this point, so it shouldn’t be an issue.
 
Please tell your host that Alexander
Wenn and Jennifer Kent would prefer to be seated elsewhere.
 
Or I can do that for you.”

“I’d
be happy to assist you, sir.”

Conversation
at the table stopped.
 
Everyone who
was pretending not to listen to Immaculata’s conversation with Alex started to
listen and watch openly as the moment stretched and unfolded.

“Alex,”
Immaculata said.
 
“I didn’t
mean—”

“Yes,
you did.
 
You meant everything.
 
And I’m tired of it.
 
I don’t play games—ever.
 
You will not insult
Jennifer—ever—even if you fail when you try to do so.
 
She’s smarter and quicker than you.
 
You should have learned that by now.”

“I
don’t know what you’re talking about.”

One
man at the opposite end of the table cleared his throat.

I
felt a sudden rush of affection for Alex.
 
He was finished with her.
 
He
pushed back his chair and stood, and then he gently pulled back my chair so I
could stand next to him.
 

“Have
a fine evening, Immaculata,” Alex said.
 
“And please remember what you learned in boarding school.”

“Boarding
school?”

“That’s
right, boarding school.”

“What
did I learn in boarding school?”

“Obviously
not your manners, because they have been absent since we were seated next to
you.
 
Good night.”

He
took my hand and turned to find the host.
 
“Is there another table for us?
 
Or should we leave?”

“Of
course there’s another table for you, Mr. Wenn.
 
Right this way.”

“Thank
you,” he said.

As
we cut through the crowd, he pulled me near him in such a way that was at once protective,
possessive, and apologetic.
 
“I’m
not going to promise that won’t happen again, but if it does with another
person, the results will be the same.
 
No one treats you like that in front of me.”

He
was furious.
 
I could feel his anger
coming off him in waves.

“It’s
OK,” I said, wanting to calm him down.
 
“I got in a few licks.”

“You
did,” he said.
 
“But this town can
go to hell before that happens again.
 
And I’m sorry that it happened.
 
We never should have sat next to her in the first place.
 
I should have known better.
 
I should have asked for another table
when I saw that she’d set us up.
 
I
wasn’t thinking.
 
I apologize.”

I
dodged a waiter coming toward us with a lifted tray of cocktails, ducked my
head, heard his apology, and kept moving.
 
“There’s no need to.”

“Yes,
there is.”

“Then,
thank you.”

“You’re
my girlfriend,” he said.
 
“There’s
no need to thank me.
 
No one treats
my girlfriend like that.
 
OK?”
 
He turned to look at me, and I could see
on his face just how furious he was with the situation.
 
“OK?”

“OK,”
I said.

He
put his hand against my back, and we walked together toward our new table.
 
He’d just called me his girlfriend
twice, and this was only our second legitimate date.
 
That is, if we were considering burgers
at the diner a date.
 
What the hell
was I to make of that?

Nothing.

Because,
if I was being honest with myself, what he just said is exactly what I wanted
to hear.
 
We’d moved beyond the past
and into another stage.
 
I was his
girlfriend.
 
And I was as thrilled
about it as I was nervous about it.
 

What
the hell was I going to do when he wanted to become intimate?

CHAPTE
R THIRTY

The
next week passed in a blur.
 
And
while I didn’t see Alex as much as I wanted to because we both worked
nights—me at the restaurant, he at the events he needed to
attend—we met twice for breakfast, we spoke when we could by phone, we
texted each other throughout the day, and he always picked me up when the
restaurant closed.
 

Each
night, he was fresh from a party and in a tuxedo, looking dashing.
 
Though increasingly, he also looked
either distracted or stressed.
 
Tonight was no exception.
 

When
I left the restaurant, he was leaning against the limousine with his feet
crossed at the ankles and his arms folded across his chest.
 
He smiled when he saw me, and we kissed
for a long, lingering moment, but something was off.
 
I could sense it, and I had to wonder if
he was having second thoughts about reigniting this relationship, probably
because we still hadn’t slept together.
 
By today’s standards, that should have happened after the event at the
museum.
 
But, despite his efforts,
it didn’t.

At
the end of the night, he asked me up to his penthouse at Wenn and made an
effort to progress in that direction, but I told him I wasn’t ready.
 
He said there was no hurry, but he might
go nuts if he had to wait much longer.
 
He had no clue that I was still a virgin.
 
And he didn’t know the reasons why I was
still a virgin.
 
At some point, if I
was going to continue this relationship with him, I would have to tell him all
that I needed to tell him about me and my past.
 
Sooner rather than later.
 
It was unfair to him otherwise.