The Deal (7 page)

“Please, Dad, the only reason we’re even having this conversation is because of your relationship with Alexander and Galina.”

“That’s probably true. But what if you had turned out like Jerry Mandel’s kid? All into heroin or crack or whatever it was that got him killed. What would this opportunity have meant then?”

“How do you know I haven’t? You know—gotten into heroin?”

Pop just laughed.

“I don’t care if you eat the shit for breakfast. Whatever it takes to keep your focus, your edge. You keep closing deals, that’s what matters.”

He took a long gulp of his whiskey.

“It’s no different than when you were in high school. I knew you were smoking pot and into all kinds of shit, but I didn’t bother you. You were kicking ass in the classroom. And that’s what counted.”

He scooped some salted almonds from a dish on the bar and flung a couple into his mouth.

“What have you come up with?”

I brought him up to speed not only with regard to what it was Andreu wanted, but what our initial game plan was. My father, dapper as always, looked especially good that night. He was dressed in Brioni from head to toe, highlighting his navy pin-striped suit and white spread-collar dress shirt with a silver necktie that was perfectly knotted as always. Pop was ever a big believer in the perfect knot. Not the little shit four-in-hand knot that most guys’ fathers teach them when they’re eight, but a classy, almost regal Windsor knot. True, it takes a few more steps than the four-in-hand or even the semi-Windsor, but it’s worth it. Pop truly felt it could make or break even the finest suits. The perfect Windsor knot:
serious width and thickness, symmetrical, perfect center dimple, and just a touch brash.

“You look good, Pop. Almost like you’re up to something.”

More laughter.

“What does that mean? Can’t a man look sharp?”

“It was you who once told me that looking sharp is one thing; looking ready to make a deal is another.”

Pop flashed me an approving smile.

“You’re finally fucking learning something. I’m meeting Joe Kelso for dinner.”

“Who?” I asked.

“Cherry-Vail. He’s the CEO.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere.”

Cherry-Vail, one of the largest advertising companies in the country, was in the process of looking for a large block of office space in Manhattan. My dad had known a guy on the board of directors for years, so they had come to him directly to discuss a deal for a new Manhattan office. My father had a block of sixty-five thousand square feet coming up the following year. Cherry-Vail was looking to take that sixty-five and add it to another fifteen thousand contiguous feet he had available. In a situation like this it wasn’t just about the eighty thousand square feet being leased in a recovering market. It was more than that. It was about the constant quest to add as much prestige as possible to the tenant roster.

“A little dog and pony show tonight,” I continued.

“Kelso is the decision maker. He wants to meet in person to
discuss some of the specifics. I figure why not do so over Bellinis and the best Veal Milanese in the universe.”

When it comes to the art of the deal, few possess the unshakable focus of my father. It is from him that I learned you have to be willing to go beyond the facts and figures of a term sheet, you have to be bigger than the amount reflected by your net worth, which for him is roughly between seven and eight hundred million dollars. Like anything in life, he taught me, you always need to remember that without the little parts the big parts don’t work. You have to be willing to go the extra yard, not sometimes, but all the time, to get a deal done. A businessman in the game is only as good as his last deal, the same way an athlete still playing is only as good as his last season.

I often remember a conversation we had when I was in business school. I was involved in some mock trial based around a huge corporate scandal. I was an expert witness for the defense. I explained to him that our grades would be affected by the trial’s outcome, and that it appeared we were going down in flames.

“I’m in a corner, Pop. I need this grade.”

“Then what the fuck are you doing wasting your time calling me? Get out there and attack the situation head-on!”

“How, Pop? I told you, I’ve exhausted all of my options.”

“Bullshit. Don’t ever let me hear those words come through your lips again. That kind of a statement only comes from a soft, weak business mind. Options are infinite. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise. If the rules don’t work, then you throw those fucking rules out the window.”

“But Pop, when—why would—”

“If there’s a trial going on, then there must be a jury. Am I right?”

“Of course.”

“You find out who the poorest students are on that jury, the students on financial aid, and you float them a sizable incentive to ensure a certain outcome. Mission accomplished. Everyone gets something they need.”

“Yeah, but what if—”

“Stop thinking so much, Jonah. You need to learn to react. You need to understand that the ability to pull the trigger, in any situation, is what separates the men from the boys.”

I sat silently and processed the words.

“You must always stay on the offensive. You must always keep pushing forward at all costs. Are you hearing me?”

“Attack the situation. Go get what I need.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere.”

His answer was to pay the jury off.

I did.

We won.

“Enough about this boring crap,” Pop went on as he crunched on some more nuts, “Tell me what you’ve got for Andreu.”

My father, the man who taught me to tell time in a meeting by glancing at the other guy’s watch and never my own, also taught me that you never unveil the full picture until you have your facts 100 percent in order. Not 80 percent, not 99.9 percent—100 percent. As with life, in business you have to own everything that comes out of your mouth. You have to be the words, regardless of whether those words are true or false, regardless of whom they may hurt. There can never be one shred of doubt. Every syllable that passes your lips, every thought, fact, must come out as if it were carved in stone someplace.

“I still have one or two questions that need answering before I’ve got it all lined up.”

“He came to you because your team’s the best. Because he has confidence in your ability to dazzle, as he should. At least tell me this—you going to dazzle him?”

“So far, Pop, my hunches have been right on.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Frankly it wasn’t just the Andreu Zhamovskys of the world who I had ever been concerned with dazzling.

“With all due respect, I may even dazzle you with this one.”

His eyes started to wander over my shoulder, around the dining room.

“Yeah, well, I guess we’ll see about that.”

Then, as if he’d been tagged with an epiphany, he returned his vision to me.

“Actually, you came kind of close with that last deal. The Levingworth Building. Down on Water Street.”

“Nothing like this, Pop. I mean it, nothing like this.”

“You keep it up, one day I just may let you work for me.”

I felt lucky, honored by this comment. I felt chosen, almost loved.

If only I’d had the clarity to be confused, and not awed, by such words.

“This is a huge opportunity, Jonah. Don’t fuck it up. Remember, you see an opening, you pull the trigger. There’s always time to clean up any leftover mess later. You just do whatever it takes to make Andreu happy and get this done.”

At this moment I absolutely felt as if I had stumbled on to the perfect deal, an ideal, creative fit for Prevkos. Little did I know that what I had conjured up in my mind would prove to simply be the tip of the iceberg.

Release time.

Table for eight in the center of the dining room at davidburke and donatella. The space was subtly bold, crisp, sleek. It was white, warm, kissed with shades of red, and quietly flaunting flowers. To my left was my best friend since I was four years old, Tanqueray Luckman. In case you are wondering, yes, his parents are in fact alcoholics. And no, they are not into whiskey.

Everyone else at the table was friends of either L, what I’ve called him since we were kids, or me in college. The whole group together has been close since we all graduated and moved to the area. Across the round table from me were Lance and Michael, both married. The rest of us were single, something probably obvious to those who have witnessed our times out together on the town.

Dinner had been fantastic, and by eleven thirty-five we were all sitting around the table pretty hammered. L and I headed to the bathroom to pull a couple of lines. We crammed into the tiny unisex cell, and turned on the water to smother our sharp, deliberate snorts. L pulled out his vial and, on the marble around the sink, dumped a small, snowy pile. He broke the mound into two thick tracks then leaned over them.

“Just like our days at Helton,” he muttered right before sending the turbo-charged powder towards his brain, “No one looking after us then, no one looking after us now.”

The Helton School was the snobby, uptown private high school we attended. Since every kid there was more screwed up than the next one, it was basically just a day-care center for rich teenagers with both the means and desire to self-medicate, to slip their respective realities.

We took one step out of the bathroom and both stopped as our eyes scanned the dining room from afar. Everyone back at the table was ordering coffee or another cocktail, but the atmosphere had quickly gone somber. Before my mouth could even quiver, L had read my mind.

“Bar.”

We made a right, climbed a two-step staircase and headed back toward the entrance. A long banquette that had sprouted candlelit tables for two lined the wall on the right, the length of the bar ran parallel on our left. Once we settled in at the end, where the long, smooth wooden plank and its base curled toward the wall and we could turn and see the whole spread, I noticed something else. Or, I should say, someone.

Elizabeth Heltman.

Elizabeth and I had dated a couple years earlier. As for the last time we had sex, that was this past New Year’s Eve in Aspen when we randomly ended up at the same party.

“Two Sapphire and tonic,” L ordered.

I took another glance at Elizabeth who was tall and slim with fantastic straight red hair that ended just past her shoulders. She didn’t see me. Though sitting at the bar, she was engrossed in the conversation she was having on her cell and staring at her near-empty wine glass.

L continued with the story he had started telling me.

“I’m telling you, man, I wanted to wring the little stain’s neck. You think I need this chump slinking in through my back door like we’re in high school sneaking in through your kitchen at four
a.m
.? I mean who does he think he is, all five foot two of him, coming into my family’s warehouse and demanding cash from me like that? Like we’re trying to scam him or something? Shit, we’ve been the biggest distributors in the city for three generations.”

Luckman Meat. That’s the name of L’s family business. They have been the largest meat distributor in New York City for the last, well, you know. They are loaded, which is a good thing, since I can’t imagine L poor. His tastes and preferences in life simply wouldn’t allow it.

“Such nerve,” I continued, mocking him.

L grabbed the drinks from the bar and handed me one. As he did, I snuck another peek at Elizabeth who still didn’t see me.

“Hey, don’t come off acting like that shit should fly,” L went on. “You if anyone knows how irritating it is when someone steps on your toes. Especially in your own backyard. To make things worse, he had this crazy Rottweiler with him. Just walked right in with it.”

“Dogs are only crazy because of the people caring for them,” I commented.

“Anyway, the only way he could calm him down was to rub him on his dick.”

I choked.

“What did you just say?”

“You heard me. The dog just turned over on his back and the guy—”

Unnecessary for this story maybe. But I often find in life you can gauge how close two people are by what they are willing to say to each other. I couldn’t resist this example. It’s amazing what comes out of his mouth.

“It’s amazing what comes out of your mouth.”

We each took a huge gulp from our drink.

“It’s not like you to be so quiet about what deals you’re closing,” L said. Something going on?”

“You might say that.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t tell you about it. Not yet anyway.”

L hated when I did that. He always took it personally, like I was making it out to be that he wasn’t important enough to hear about it.

“See, why do you pull that? What, you think I’m gonna start running around the restaurant screaming about your fucking business?”

I started laughing. Watching L get worked up was truly hilarious. The best part was how mad he got when you laughed at him for it.

“Seriously—” he went on.

“I’m sorry, Man. It’s only fair to—”

“The team. I know, I’ve heard it all before.”

L picked up his cocktail and took another long sip.

“At least tell me this—”

His smile returned.

“— Good shit?”

“Tremendous.” I responded.

We clinked glasses.

L started another story, but because I was so fucked up he
quickly lost me. My mind started twisting, working furiously, as I careened into thoughts of Andreu Zhamovsky and my team’s assignment. I looked once more at Elizabeth and began to find myself a bit tense, an oddity for me. So I pulled out my leather cigar case from my inside pocket and removed a Monte Cristo #2, which where I come from is a delicacy.

Yes, I’m fully aware that New York City has become one large nonsmoking section. But since I knew both David Burke and Donatella from their past restaurant successes, and since the crowd had thinned a bit, I lit up anyway. L didn’t flinch. It was a couple others, including Elizabeth, who did.

We stared at one another for a brief moment. Then, glint in her eye, she ended her phone call and started my way. Just as she almost reached me the front door opened to my left and some guy walked in. Elizabeth immediately disengaged. She turned toward the bar and put her glass down. Mr. Anonymous, his noticeably taller-than-average height and nice suit providing an interesting contrast with his fading hair line and weak chin, shot right toward her.