One Way or Another: A Novel (19 page)

Martha pulled herself together, opened the door, stepped out of the car. “That’s why we’re here,” she said briskly, grabbing her bag and the batches of samples from the backseat. “Come on, Lucy, give me some help here.”

“If you insist, but I don’t like it. I mean, look at those windows, little panes gleaming at us like eyes or something. Don’t you feel it, Marthie, like it’s watching us?”

“You’re being ridiculous,” Martha said, but she knew exactly what Lucy meant. To say the house did not have a welcoming feel was an understatement. It seemed to give off waves of animosity, something she had never previously encountered in any home she had been in.

“Just look at those beautiful birds,” she said brightly as she walked up the front steps, followed reluctantly by Lucy clutching swatches of sample fabrics to her chest. “Now, Lucy, think what you and I can do with this, bring it to life, fill it with love.…”

“You need the right people to fill a place with love,” Lucy said. Since she had been brought up in a place of love she knew about such things, and so did Martha, though now she was working, she had to look at things differently, think about what she could bring to a place, like this, that might give it “love.”

“Love” was what Ahmet believed he felt when he opened the door and stood at the top of the wide flight of four worn stone steps leading into the hallway of his house, which soon was to be made into “a home,” and saw Lucy again. He had already thought out a code of behavior for himself that would be suitable for the occasion, which was to be the perfect gentleman, allow Martha access only to the downstairs of his house, with Mehitabel to keep an eye on her, and Lucy as well, and to make sure they did not venture upstairs, where Angie was.

“That’s for next time,” he told Martha when she admired the heavy mahogany balustrade while frowning at the red-patterned stair carpet with the huge brass clips holding it in place. “Today, I would like you to start on the main downstairs rooms. Mehitabel will show you round, give you any information you need. And please remember, Martha, you have free rein.
Mi casa es su casa.
And Lucy, dear little Lucy, welcome.”

But Lucy’s absent mind was on the pizza guy. She was wondering when she’d get a chance to call the pizza place and ask to speak to him, though not knowing his name was a problem. She grinned, thinking about him. She’d had worse problems.

The huge house seemed deserted, no maids bustling, no smiling help welcoming them. Lucy remembered Patrons and the butler and the Mrs. who were part of the family all those years. Patrons could not have existed without them, and was the reason it barely did now they were gone.

“But how do you manage this big place?” she asked Ahmet.

“Well, of course, I have Mehitabel, she takes care of everything for me, hires the help and all that sort of thing. I assure you, Lucy, Marshmallows runs perfectly. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Lucy could see he would not. Ahmet was fastidious to the point of persnickety; always immaculately turned out, always with the silk handkerchief in his breast pocket. She couldn’t imagine Ahmet in a T-shirt, hair ruffled by the wind, in jeans and the sort of thing her friends wore, but of course he was an “older” man and being a billionaire she supposed he had to present a certain image. Not knowing any other billionaires, or even anyone who had millions, which she guessed might seem like small change to him, she wasn’t too sure of her facts. But what she did know about, because everybody had heard about it, seen pictures of it in newspapers and magazines, was his yacht, the
Lady Marina,
which had cost a fortune. Ahmet himself had told her so.

Two hundred million was the price of that luxury, he’d said, adding that the boat was 250 feet long.

“Expensive,” Lucy said, shocked by such numbers, but she had read somewhere that Ahmet’s worth was reputed to be more than six billion, and to him the cost of the boat was probably small change, and certainly a long way from wondering if you could afford to order the spaghetti in the local Italian. Someone had told her Ahmet had made his money in metal trading; Lucy wasn’t sure what that was but it was certainly lucrative. And the boat supposedly was spectacular; they said the dance floor had a swimming pool above it so you almost felt you were floating, and the cabins had quilted silk walls, or beautiful wood paneling, with the softest terry bathrobes, and every possible lotion and cream and powder from Paris. But his house was intimidating.

She sank into a too-deep burgundy brocade sofa which made her legs stick out in front of her like a child’s, still clutching the batches of fabric samples to her chest. She glanced round under her lashes, checking it out, hoping Ahmet would not notice, but of course he did. He also noticed the stunned expression that flitted briefly across her face as she took in the heavy wood furniture, the oversized cushions, the crystal chandelier—three, actually, all in one room—and the Tiffany lamps that did not go with anything else. And those bloody awful weighty dark green curtains looped back with gold tassels.

Shit. Lucy thought this place looked like a bordello, or anyway, her idea of what bordellos looked like.

She felt Ahmet’s eyes on her, forced herself to look back at him, smiling.

“You don’t like it,” he said.

She had been taught always to be honest. “Not much,” she admitted carefully. To her surprise, he laughed.

“Men who live alone do not have much taste. The place needs a woman’s touch, don’t you think? Soften it up a little?”

“Get rid of all the red,” Lucy advised, suddenly finding her way into the interior design world. Not that she knew much, but she did know when it was wrong. “And all those chandeliers.”

“I should take you to see my boat,” Ahmet said, coming to sit next to her on the sofa.

Uncomfortable with his nearness, Lucy edged slightly away, hoping he would not notice, though of course he did and immediately moved to the other end.

“I’m sure you would find that beautiful, more to your taste, all very simple.”

“Martha will take care of this for you,” she said, hoping her sister could see her way through all this “stuff,” all this heavy darkness, because she surely could not.

“Of course I will.” Martha strode into the room, iPad in one hand, memo pad and pen in the other, phone tucked under her chin as she waited for a call to the fabric place to go through. When it did she told them exactly what she needed, and asked if they would get back to her right away. The job was urgent. Priority was everything.

Ahmet had gotten to his feet when she walked in and now he smiled his approval. “I do like efficiency, especially in a woman,” he said. “Rarer, you see, in women than men.”

“I don’t believe I agree with that,” Martha said in what Lucy recognized as her “acid” voice. “Women have come a long way in every facet of business. Surely you have met many of them. Your own Mehitabel is one of the most efficient women I’ve ever encountered.”

“Mehitabel is a gem. I appreciate her more every day,” Ahmet agreed, making a quick decision to keep Mehitabel away from Martha. “Well, now, what do you think of my little palace?”

“It definitely needs to be less ‘palacey,’ more ‘homey,’” Martha said. “I told you I needed to rip it all out, and I wasn’t joking. Ahmet, you’ll simply have to trust me on this. I promise you’ll be happy with the result.”

He shrugged in agreement. He said, “Now, what do you say we all have some tea?”

He was, Martha thought, amazed again by him, always the perfect English gentleman.

*   *   *

Driving back in the car she said to Lucy, “So? What d’you think?”

“Of him, or that house?”

“Both.”

Lucy thought a minute, then, “He’s oddly fascinating. The house gives me the creeps. And all that green swampy stuff and that scary river. Why would anybody want to live there?”

“The previous owner was killed by his lover in the dining room. Using the knife with which he was about to carve the roast beef.”

“Jesus.” Lucy’s eyes were on stalks. “No wonder it’s creepy. What happened to him?”

“Well, he was killed, of course, with the roast beef knife.”

“No! What happened to the killer?”

“Nobody knows. It seems he just wandered off into the marshes, and nobody cared to take the risk and follow him. Never seen again.”

“OMG,” Lucy said this time. This was a long way from the cute pizza delivery guy and suddenly she wanted to get back to him, and that “normality.” “Are you sure about this, Marthie? Doing this house over? It’s so far from anywhere, it seems almost uncivilized, with the river and the marshes and the red brocade sofas.”

“We’ll change all that, you and I,” Martha said, just as her phone rang. It was Marco. She pressed Answer and kept her hands on the wheel.

“Am I glad to hear your voice,” she said, astonished by the sudden feeling of relief that swept through her. Today had been exhausting in a different way; challenging, in fact.

“You hadn’t even heard my voice yet,” Marco said, and she heard the smile in his voice. “Are you alone in the car?”

“Lucy’s here.”

“That’s okay then. Besides wanting to hear your voice, and tell you I’m missing you, I wanted to tell you I’m on the track of Angie Morse. I’ve found out where she lived and I’m going there to see if anybody knows what happened. And it’s my belief she is the girl I saw murdered.”

“Jesus.” Martha said it this time.

31

Ahmet was alone again. The place he seemed always to be. Even Mehitabel was gone, off to check on the yacht, make sure supplies had arrived, make sure the crew was not roistering round ports at all hours of the night, causing trouble. It wasn’t easy keeping a crew, even with the generous wages Ahmet paid. Men got bored and bored men got into trouble. Mehitabel knew that from experience and Ahmet appreciated her concern, but he missed having her to share his thoughts with, to plot with, to prowl those ports with in search of the next young woman. It was surprising how easy Mehitabel made those searches; she knew what those young women on the make wanted and she told them she could give them their dreams. And they believed her.

It was rarely Ahmet who made the first move. It was usually she who found them.

“It’s so easy,” she’d told Ahmet once, sitting and drinking very good brandy with him after a long night in the port of Piraeus, Greece, where they had dined and danced and even thrown plates around, though Ahmet had no girl on his arm. There’d been none he’d fancied. That, or he simply had lost the desire. The urge. It worried him, and Mehitabel of course noticed that.

They sat on deck, gazing at the lights twinkling on shore, the flickering red and blue bar signs, the yellow streetlights, the darkness above picked out with a few stars and no moon. Both were comfortable with the dark, comfortable with each other, neither had any secrets the other did not know. At least that’s what Ahmet thought. Mehitabel knew differently.

She recognized that Ahmet had the ability to overcome his circumstances, to become whatever any new situation asked of him. Ahmet was mercurial, a personality jack-of-all-trades: humble when needed, authoritative when he wanted; and always, underneath, the one in charge. Except with her. She was the only person Ahmet needed. She believed that without her, Ahmet could not exist. He’d asked her the other night what they should do about Angie.

She kept her eyes straight ahead. “Nothing,” she said. “For now, anyway.”

“She bothers me,” he said. “Her very presence bothers me.”

“Is that why you want Marco to paint her portrait?”

He sipped his brandy silently for a while, thinking about it, then he said, “I want that portrait so I can forget the look in her eyes when she was drowning. I have to change that. Remove it from my mind permanently.”

“I can do that for you.” Mehitabel thought of how much pleasure she would derive from that.

Ahmet thought about it too. “Later,” he said finally.

32

Rather than do battle with Brooklyn’s motor traffic, Marco rented a bicycle. The fact that it was bright orange and had racing wheels made him feel ready for the Tour de France, though Brooklyn’s downtrodden streets seemed light-years from the cobblestones and small cafés, the cups of coffee under yellow umbrellas with the wind blowing your hair and Em tucking into the croissant Marco always shared with her. So, all right, it wasn’t good to feed a dog a croissant, but it made a change from the mastodon bones and Em loved it. She would eye him guiltily, as though she knew it was wrong, always licking off the strawberry jam first, like a child with a treat. Marco knew of no other dog that liked strawberry jam, and of course he gave it to Em infrequently, and never, ever gave her chocolate, even when she asked for it. Dogs and chocolate were a no-no.

But Em was not with him today. His trip to Brooklyn promised the unexpected and he would never subject his dog to any possibility of danger. What that danger might be, as yet he had no clear idea. Just that something was not right.

The apartment building Angela Morse had lived in was brick, faced with peeling limestone of a color that Marco thought might be described as dung. Dingy too; definitely not a place any parent would want their daughter to live, with its unwashed windows, dirty front steps, and the swing door propped open with a pile of bricks that looked permanent.

He climbed off the bike, wondering what to do with it. On this street, even chained up, it would be gone in minutes. Finally he hefted it under his arm, negotiated his way past the pile of bricks into a foyer—it was a hallway; “foyer” was too grand a word for the long, narrow area overlit with fluorescent tubes so every crack and crevice, every dust ball and pile of unswept litter showed up in fine detail. He felt very sorry for Angie Morse.

A handwritten sign on a flimsy wooden door to the left of the hall said this was the manager’s office, and gave a phone number in case he was out. Which, after ringing the bell and standing waiting, then hammering on the door and waiting, Marco decided he was, when he showed up. Right behind him. A big man with the overstuffed body of a weight lifter, muscles bulging, neck straining, wife-beater shirt sweat stained.