The Deal (43 page)

“Jonah, please. Can’t a man just—”

“There’s only one man involved in this conversation. It’s not you. You’re the scumbag who should have watched where his ash fell.”

Silence.

“That’s right, you fuck. I’m on to you.”

“I know this must be a difficult time.”

I was seething. There were so many things I wanted to say. Instead I hung up.

I reached the top of Summit Rock and the beautiful amphitheater that sat on top. I was alone. Often I had longed for just a glimpse of the original view, a panoramic shot of not just New York City, but across the Hudson River to the New Jersey Palisades, but now I was thankful for the towering trees giving me privacy and shade. I walked across the grass that in a 1997 renovation replaced the cracked, broken pavement from the 1950s, and found a bench overlooking the wooded eastern slope.

I put my jacket down and sat next to it, placing the briefcase on the ground in front of me between my legs. I opened it and removed the letters. One by one I went through them. All were signed by Galina, confirming my suspicions and making me sick for my mother. Each letter accompanied one of the four Ia originals lining the townhouse staircase, and was an innocuous note offering birthday wishes, brief updates on life, and thank-yous for little gifts from Pop like Writers Edition Mont Blanc pens. There was also an explanation of each artwork’s centerpiece animal consisting of its background, location, things like that. The subjects, as the descriptions explained, were re-created exactly as seen in the Russian far eastern territory of Primorsky Krai, the location of Russia’s most pristine forest. There wasn’t much more, aside from all five concluding the same: “Look Close. Enjoy the gifts (so much in a name). Yours, Galina.”

“Look close.” The same words, or instructions, on the back of Andreu’s baby picture. But what could “so much in a name” mean? Especially when each drawing’s title was essentially the depicted animal?

The letters came a few years apart. Each date on the front of an envelope matched the year on one of the pictures lining the staircase. There was one inconsistency.

Four Ia original drawings.

Five letters.

Chapter 44

9:03
p.m.

After stopping home for a shower, I walked past the entrance of the neighboring Hotel Ganesvoort and into ONE. Two beautiful hostesses greeted me. I told them my name and the taller of the two blonds then escorted me to my requested table, the only table on the premises that had no surveillance on it whatsoever. A friend of mine, Miles Rockwell, had designed the space. One night, while we were both plastered, he spilled it that this had been done at the request of one of the owners. The specific table was secluded in the rearmost corner of the champagne lounge, where my guest was already waiting.

As I was led through the seductive space, past the chic and wannabe chic, eyes moved toward me in the way I once enjoyed. Cocktails of all shades and sizes adorned the tables along with plates of ideal food for sharing, like Lobster and Goat Cheese Quesadillas and Chicken and Scallion Dumplings. I had my briefcase with me for no other reason than to hold my pistol. I knew there would most likely be an immediate hug from Krissy so I decided to keep my suit jacket’s pockets free of anything but the essentials.

As I approached the table, Krissy stood up. The first thing I noticed was the gauze wrapped around her left forearm. To any male she wasn’t psychotically stalking she looked incredibly hot. Tight, black satin pants, a sexy black tank top, nicely spiked black, strappy Manolos, and smoky makeup. I was starting to have trouble seeing her as anything more than a pile of shit with eyes. As she greeted me, every guy from the surrounding tables, no matter who they were with, glanced in her direction.

“Enjoy your evening,” the hostess said before turning away.

Krissy, an overdramatic look of sadness across her face, wrapped her arms around me.

“I wore black out of respect for your father,” she whispered into my ear.

We broke apart. Unable to find the right words for such nonsense, I simply nodded. Then, startling me, a hand grabbed my right arm, the one holding my briefcase. Eyes squinted, intensely sharpened, my head swung around as if I was a lion ready to size up whatever offering had presented itself. I was ready to kill, run, maim, lie, do whatever I had to do. My instincts were in overdrive.

“I’m sorry,” the hostess who hadn’t yet left went on, eyes dilated. “I was just wondering if you wanted to leave your briefcase with the coat check.”

I looked down at her hand, the one on my arm, then right back into her eyes.

“I’m fine,” I said. “I think I’ll keep it with me.”

“Are you sure you want to be here?” Krissy asked as the hostess left us. “Would you rather we go somewhere more private?”

I knew ONE was a risky choice the night before my father’s funeral, but my plan for Krissy required this specific table in this particular restaurant. Anyway, it was a non-holiday Monday night in the summer. Can you tell me of a night with a potentially lighter restaurant crowd during a calendar year in New York City? I didn’t think so.

Krissy and I sat down. Our rear, corner table enabled me to have a clear view of the entire dining space, something that in the recent weeks had become protocol. As soon as we hit the cushions of our banquette, a waitress appeared and we ordered drinks. Then we were alone. Before I could turn in Krissy’s direction, she had already taken my hand on top of the table.

“I need to start by apologizing, Jonah. I just hate myself for acting like such a pest.”

I gently took my hand from her grasp and moved it lightly over her skin, up her forearm toward the gauze.

“What does the L stand for?”

She paused. Then, accepting my faux trusting vibe, she smiled.

“Lockhart. Krissy Lockhart.”

Relieved, as if a burden had been lifted, she let out a sigh.

“Can you ever forgive me for acting like such an ass?”

Demonstrate control. Get what you need.

“You don’t need to apologize, Krissy.”

“I do, Jonah. If I hadn’t been so quick to feel discarded, I could have been helping you through this all along. It makes me sick to feel I’m responsible for this being so much harder for you.”

“Go easy on yourself. I imagine if the situation had been reversed, and I hadn’t heard back from you considering how—close we had become, I might have gone a bit overboard as well.”

“That’s sweet of you to say. But I’m going to do whatever I need to in order to make it up to you, and you can’t stop me! Don’t you see—”

Just like that, her starry-eyed gaze laced itself with a potent, yet subtle, dose of fury.

“— that’s why it has to be like this. That’s why we always need to be together.”

The look in her eye was astonishing. She was speaking so matter-of-factly, from the farthest corners of her disturbed core. She really believed everything she was saying.

React.

“Actually, Krissy, I couldn’t agree with you more.”

I needed to play the game, so play the game I did. With each phone call, with each psychotic instance, it was becoming more and more clear that Krissy didn’t seem to be part of the other million dramas that swirled around me. She was number one million and one, and perhaps something more combustible than all the others put together. Yet as far as I was concerned, she was, albeit indirectly, a big part of everything that had happened. If it weren’t for her, chances are that time would have run out on Robie/Hart. He wouldn’t have had the opportunity to plant Danish Jubilee Egg on me. I would have been free and clear, and Andreu Zhamovsky’s scheme might have been thwarted. Because of her, my guard had been down. I took to her, got completely loaded then took to her even more. As a result, Robie/Hart saw his opening. Had she turned out to be the real thing, I probably would have been forgiving about her timing and felt different about including her in my plan. My revenge. Unfortunately for her, she turned out to be little more than an infection I couldn’t shake or go to the cops with. So, as clouded as such judgment seems now, I was ready to cure myself of her. Like I said earlier, all she now truly needed, for reasons I imagine neither she nor I could accurately articulate, was to see me, be with me. My sole purpose, with regard to Krissy L., had become to feed off that.

For the next thirty minutes, over a second round and a couple of appetizers, I spoke a little about my ordeal while Krissy spoke a lot about our destiny as a couple. Then, the proper opening arose.

“Oh, by the way,” I said.

I reached into my left, inside jacket pocket.

“I found this in one of my suits. I figured it was probably yours.”

I placed in front of her a Spanish Fly MAC lipstick. I had finally found a use for all of the ridiculous cosmetic information I had picked up as a result of dating beautiful cosmopolitan women.

She picked it up.

“I do wear MAC.”

She gave it a once over. She looked at the end of it for the color
.

“Just not this color. But it’s pretty. Spanish Fly,” she went on. “I need to remember that. Nope.”

She placed it back on the table in front of me, wearing an enigmatic grin.

“Must belong to one of your past flames.”

I didn’t touch the lipstick, I just stared at it for a second before responding.

“I’m surprised,” I said, moving my eyes back in her direction. “I really figured it was yours.”

“Oh yeah? And why’s that?”

“Because you’re who comes to mind when I think of sexy. The name Spanish Fly just oozes sexiness to me. I just figured it was yours.”

I looked deeply into her eyes.

“You know—”

I looked away.

“No, forget it.”

“What?”

“Forget it. Really. You’ll just think I’m nuts.”

“What, Jonah?”

Under the table, she placed her hand on my thigh.

“I want to be here. What?”

Again I stared into her eyes. I spoke in a half-whisper.

“I’ve been dying to be close to you, to your body. So much has happened in these past few days that my emotions have just been all over the place. There’s been so much inner tension. I have all of these pent up feelings.”

I felt her grip tighten.

“I just feel like I’m about to explode. And I would do anything to release this energy.”

She slid her hand farther up my thigh and moved her lips to my ear so she could whisper.

“A chance to ease your pain and fuck you at the same time? You have no idea what you’re doing to me.”

She backed away.

“Why don’t you ask for the check?” she said with a gentle lick of her lips.

“I don’t think I can wait that long.”

I reached into my pocket and pulled out a stack of cash.

“Tell you what—” I started.

I handed her two hundred dollar bills under the table.

“Why don’t you go downstairs to the men’s room and give this to the attendant. Then tell him to get lost for about fifteen minutes.”

A smile crept across her face.

“I’ll follow you by about sixty seconds.”

Krissy took the cash from me under the table, grabbed her purse, then stood up. As she walked away she blew me a kiss. Once she was out of sight, I quickly pulled a small, plastic bag from one of my pants’ pockets. Then, using the cocktail napkin I took from under my drink, I carefully placed the lipstick into the plastic bag and placed it back in my jacket pocket.

The plan was to leave once she was out of sight. Only once I got up, and started for the door, something occurred to me. To leave, to just walk out, would crush her. Once that happened, on top of how much I had already tried to blow her off, it was quite possible she would take “relentless” to a whole new level. I needed to satiate her. I needed us to part ways with her thinking we were cool, at least for now. It could buy me some time. I looked again toward the front of the restaurant. Then I looked at my watch.

I walked into the bathroom, briefcase in hand and my suit jacket slung over my arm. The lights were dim. The attendant was nowhere to be seen. Krissy, in just her black heels and forearm gauze, sauntered out of one of the stalls. I locked the door. For a few moments the two of us just stood there, drinking the other in.

We met like animals in the center of the room. Just before she reached me, I dropped my case and jacket on the floor. She jumped up and wrapped her legs around me as I carried her over to the sinks. She had no idea fifteen minutes later I’d be leaving her behind, fucked in more ways than one.

I had the cab drop me at a pay phone a few blocks from my building. I dialed L’s apartment.

“Hello?”

“Do you have them yet?”

“I’m meeting him in front of the plant in an hour.”

“Beautiful,” I said. “Fucking beautiful.”

“Jonah, when are we going to discuss all of this?”

“Your office, tomorrow morning. Ten ”

L didn’t respond.

“Did you hear me?”

“Jonah, we have your father’s funeral at—”

“No we don’t, L. I can’t go.”

“What do you mean you can’t go?”

“It’s complicated. Just trust me.”

“Jesus Christ, Jonah. Don’t do this.”

I slammed the pay phone with my fist.

“Please, L. Just be at your office at 10
a.m
. I promise to explain all of this.”

His voice was a combination of concern and aggravation.

“Anything else?”

“Yeah. I need you to research a girl named Krissy Lockhart. She’s around our age, and I think she’s from the Hamptons. Start by Googling her, and go from there.”

I entered my apartment, having just been told by doorman Parker a detective had come by looking for me, and locked the door. Neo came charging and we went through our greeting ritual. I fed him. My mind and body were exhausted.

I looked at my wrist: 10:58
p.m.
I had a few hours until I’d be moving. I kept the lights off and fell back onto the couch, my gun and cell phone on the glass table in front of me. Neo, one of his favorite toys in tow, jumped up next to me. I grabbed hold of his toy with one hand for a game of tug-of-war, and I picked up the remote with the other. I switched on the plasma.