Tara was wide-eyed with wonder. Between the hard wood floors with thick Persian rugs, the spiral staircase with hand-worked filigree railing and the series of small but elegant chandeliers that led to the living room on one side and a long narrow, high-ceilinged hall on the the other, the whole place spoke of old money.
“It’s not old money,” Greta said leaning in towards her, her voice hushed with the same awe Tara felt. “You can buy old money in New York, but I read the first thing people do is renovate and ruin the charm. Whoever owns this place…” she paused and shot a piercing look towards Nick. “Whoever bought this place appreciated what it was.”
Tara could only nod.
“Living spaces are on the second floor,” Nick finally said. “Third floor is offices, a library, a gym, a dark room. Kitchen is down that hall and to the left.”
“I’m staaaarved to death.” Greta said, her eyes still fixed on Nick. “I could eat a Giant’s bowl of Lo-Lo Roos.”
Too fascinated by her study of the old world charm of the brownstone, Tara didn’t pay any attention to Greta’s antics until her peripheral vision caught the motion of Nick’s head whipping around to give Greta a sharp look. The blond shrank under his fiery stare.
“But some Dweener Dogs would fit my tummy just right,” Greta continued, a great deal more subdued. Tara saw the two lock eyes. It was more attention than Nick had paid her friend since rescuing her two days earlier. Something Tara didn’t understand passed between them, then Nick gave one of his minuscule nods and the two broke eye contact.
“I just want a stiff glass of wine and to stretch out in a big, safe, real bed,” Greta finally said.
“There’s a little kitchenette area on the third floor at the top of the stairs. I’d bet you’ll find something to take the edge off.”
Greta started up the stairs. Tara gave Nick a glance. His face was as unreadable as ever as she moved to follow her friend whose agenda matched hers.
“I’m going to put some coffee on. I have some phone calls to make,” Nick said, holding her eyes longer than she meant to hold his.
Confused Tara just nodded, broke eye contact and headed up the stairs
CHAPTER 37
Greta, in a bathrobe, was lounging in a chair in a room that Tara could only think of as the solarium. It had a telescope, but, more importantly to the photographer, also had windows along one entire wall that not only stretched from the floor to the ceiling, but beyond. The glass actually wrapping around the first four feet of the roof. It allowed an unobstructed view of the the slowly darkening afternoon sky.
“Thanks for calling out to me, Gret. This place is too huge to go wandering about in. I would have thought you’d be downstairs.” Tara moved the blond’s feet aside so she could plop down on the couch next to her. Once settled she pulled her friend’s feet onto her lap.
“Sure. I guess you needed the sleep more than I did. I’ve been up for awhile. There’s no milk in the place. I don’t think anyone has lived here for awhile, but I think people have been by.”
Tara quirked an eyebrow in question. Greta held up the gossip magazine she was reading.
“October. Not even a month old.”
Tara nodded. “Where’s Nick?”
The tightening of her friend's face and the long pause raised small alarm bells in Tara.
“He, uh, he made his calls. Oh, he makes a mad good cup of coffee by the way. You gotta go down and try some; I left you a little.”
Seeing the distraction was not working, Greta continued. “He made his calls, cleaned himself up some and we talked. Then he had to go out for a meeting. He won’t be back tonight. We’ve got the place to ourselves. We’re suppose to meet him here,” Greta reached out and pushed a slip of paper on the marble and wrought-iron metal coffee table from her side over to Tara's, “tomorrow morning at 10.” The anxious brunette picked it up and looked at it. The address meant nothing to her.
“He’s fine, Tare. The guy can handle himself, and, like he said, now he’s in his fortress.” Greta waved her arms to indicate the spacious brownstone. “We don’t leave here, no one knows we’re here. Nick gave me the number for a service that they use here that can deliver anything we need, so please, settle, just relax. In some ways you’ve had a harder week than me. “
Tara found that hard to believe. True she’d almost died twice, been kidnapped and rescued, and been fleeing across the country ever since, but in the meantime she’d met an intriguing man and had some of the best sex of her life. She shifted, feeling embers stir in her pelvis at the thought and memory. The bed she'd passed out in was more than big enough for two, and very sturdy. She realized she’d planned on making good use of it once they were all recuperated. The idea of not being with Nick that night left her feeling anxious and at loose ends.
Greta wiggled her toes to grab Tara’s attention away from her dark musings.
“I need a pedicure,” she said playfully. “I’ll bet you do, too. They’ve got every channel on earth here. Did you know there is an Eskimo reality TV show?”
Tara slapped the feet in her lap and laughed.
“It’s almost over,” Greta said. “We can relax. It’s almost over.”
CHAPTER 38
The night without Nick had been even worse than she’d expected.
After drinking two bottles of wine and doing each other’s toes and watching the most mindless TV on any continent, Tara had to face going to bed alone. She almost asked Greta to come sleep with her, but she knew her friend, despite her brave face, needed her own down time, both mentally and physically.
The huge four-poster canopy bed was almost more of a mockery than a refuge with her alone in it, so when the Uber car dropped them off at the address Nick had left for them the next morning, Tara was excited to see her mountain man again, but also disjointed and distraught.
Per Nick’s instructions Greta had the driver, whom she flirted with shamelessly, drop them off two blocks down the street. Dressed in the clothes of their choosing courtesy of the concierge service, Greta in her high heels and tight, hip-hugging skirt, had a hard time keeping up with Tara who opted for jeans and some rather sexy medium-heeled boots.
Tara scanned the street in front of them as Greta fell behind, barely noticing the man leaning, knee bent, foot on the wall, beside the entrance of their destination. She registered that he was tall and well-built with luxurious chestnut hair, but the hyper-expensive shiny, perfectly tailored suit and $500 shoes immediately classified him as one of the ultra-rich, self-absorbed trust fund playboys that teemed the streets of the Financial District in arguably the most powerful city on earth.
Until she heard Greta behind her speaking to the smarmy man.
“That looks suits you,” her friend said, “and trust me, women like all that nice smooth skin.”
Tara stopped and pivoted, unable to believe that Greta was flirting with a complete stranger, especially THAT kind of stranger.
Then his eyes caught hers, a deep rich hazel. She stumbled as the world around her spun, the memory of those same eyes, determined and intense, staring down at her as she dangled helplessly over the torrential mountain waters that had swept her tent and all of her belongings away into oblivion.
Then Greta was beside her, helping to hold her up.
“Come on, you can’t make a scene now. Nick went to the trouble of cleaning up for this meeting. You have to buck up as well,” her friend said, voice deadly serious.
Nick pushed away from the wall and held a hand out to her. Tara took it, unable to look away from the dramatic lines of his handsome face. Cleanly shaven, his skin had the glow of health and the vitality of a young man while the high cheek bones, deep-set eyes and strong jaw spoke of an enticing maturity.
Always comfortable with silence, Nick said nothing. For her part Tara was too shocked to speak. Greta took up the rear as Nick led them through the marble and glass atrium of the art deco skyscraper, past the door man and the security desk, past even the regular e
levators, to another set. He produced a a key from the pocket of his waistcoat, unlocked it, then pushed the button.
In moments the car door opened in front of them The ornate, almost garish style left over from the gilded age screamed for there to be an actual elevator operator but there wasn’t. Nick took it upon himself to close the security gate and hit the button to the top floor.
“You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to,” he told her. “My mother gathered everyone in the city who owes her a favor; that is a very long list. This is a strategy meeting to figure out how we are going to get Cirq off your back. We just felt that since this all revolves around you, you should be fully briefed before we set any wheels in motion. There are a few big wigs, but they’re just men.”
“Yeah,” Greta said. “Just imagine them in their underwear.”
When Tara glanced at her friend to reprimand her for the inane comment she saw that Greta was doing just that with Nick. She looked up at Tara and wiggled her eyebrows.
The overwhelmed photographer managed a laugh just as the elevator stopped and she stepped off to meet her fate.
CHAPTER 39
There were handshakes, promises of calls to do lunch and mentions of golf as the small crowd of men and women cleared the room. Tara didn’t notice any of it as any more than background noise. She was numb. Too much had been covered, and the amount of power in the room had both impressed and sickened her. It was the kind of power that bought elections. The kind of power, that could, if applied at the right time, bring a nation to war.
As the men cleared out, Madeline remained seated, her eyes fixed on the young photographer from Ohio.
Nick glad-handed several men as they left, but remained at the doorway of the huge glass-enclosed conference room waiting for Tara, Greta and his mom to move out as well. The older woman, however, stayed seated.
Madeline Kendrick was nothing short of completely intimidating. Seated at the table across from and several seats down from her, Tara could sense the woman’s force of will and confidence. She had handled the roomful of men with casual ease. It seemed a foregone conclusion that she would get what she wanted. The meeting had been largely a formality, though a lot of fact sharing and brainstorming had gone on.
“Nick, could you take Ms. Fuller for a cup of tea, please. I would like to speak with this young lady in private.”
Tara wanted nothing less than to be left alone with the woman.
Nick nodded and left her. Tara was frozen in place.
Madeline Kendrick, widow and mother of Nick Kendrick, stared unabashedly at Tara. The younger woman saw that Nick had his mother’s eyes, and, as she rose to come over to Tara’s side of the conference table, the same poise and control of movement. The major difference was that Madeline was a slender, almost bony woman. Tara assumed Nick got his physique from his deceased father.
Madeline stood before Tara in a crisp dark blue business jacket and skirt that cost more than Tara made in any two months in her life. The woman wore it like she was born into it. After a long pause she reached a hand down.
Tara stared at the perfectly manicured, tastefully adorned fingers and rings and took it. She came to her feet.
With Madeline in heels and Tara in boots with a conservative functional heel, the two women were about the same height.
Then the regal reserve broke and the slim older woman grabbed Tara in a heartfelt embrace and hugged her so tightly Tara was afraid something was wrong with her.
“Thank you. Thank you for bringing him back to me. Thank you,” Madeline said quietly in her ear, her voice quavering just short of sobs.
After a long moment Mrs. Kendrick took Tara by the shoulders and gently pressed her away. The shocked photographer saw that the emotion in the woman’s voice was matched in her eyes which were red rimmed with un-shed tears. Tara was left speechless.
“I will not cry,” Madeline said, brushing a knuckle against her eye to make the lie a truth. “I’ll be damned if I am going to reapply my face.”
Tara let out a bark of a laugh.
“I thought I’d lost him twice, you know. Did he tell you that?”
“I-I, until I stepped out of the elevator I didn’t know he had a family…a mother…anything.”
Madeline laughed. To Tara’s surprise it held no bitterness.
“Yes, he was always a bit cards-close-to-the-chest kind of boy, but more so after his tours of duty. Then, after he came back from that…god, those were horrible weeks, he just wandered around. He… he kept saying nothing fit, then he…he just disappeared. It wasn’t until four months later that I got a letter from him and found out he’d joined the French Foreign Legion.”
The older woman shook her head and Tara knew it was partially to keep from crying again.
“When Nick was eight, two years after he started modeling, a year after he began Capoeira, he got injured. Things like that happen in martial arts. Capoeira isn’t a violent sport, more like dance than a martial art, but still, he took a very powerful kick to the head. He had a concussion, and even though they couldn’t find anything really wrong, all of a sudden he had a fever. It lasted for days; his father and I thought we were going to lose him.”
Madeline was silent. She put a hand on the conference table and looked out the glass partitions at the world of money and commerce that was the silent and disconnectedly buzzing around them.
“He came out of it, but he was different,” she continued looking down at her hands. “He’d always been bright, but after that he was so…focused. He was like a sponge. That’s when he became dedicated to acting, and we learned he had such a gift for languages.”
Madeline paused and looked out into the busy offices. She didn’t speak again until she located her son, standing by the coffee kiosk. Tara followed her gaze and noticed with a pang of jealousy that her gruff mountain man, transformed into a good looking playboy millionaire, was a babe magnet. The usually terse man was holding court with three very attractive women. Tara forced her attention back to Madeline.
“He was such a good looking kid, and so precocious. My husband, Rex, and I wanted him to try modeling just to bring in a little extra money; we were struggling. After the fever Nick…he just blew up. He nailed all his lines, all his auditions. He was in a lot of commercials; cereal, water skiing, hot dogs. We’d gotten by with so little for so long we almost didn’t know what to do with all the money.”
She paused again, looking around the conference table. Tara was sure the other woman wanted a drink, but if it was water, coffee or something stronger she couldn’t tell.
“We might have made a lot of mistakes, but you know who saved us from ourselves? Nick’s Capoeira teacher. As it turns out there are a lot of life lessons people can learn from fighting. We put our energy into making sure Nick would always have everything he needed to be all he could be. We saved and chose our battles carefully. Rex was a smart man, he loved doing research, so he researched, we invested…things kept growing.”
Tara found it harder and harder to take her eyes off the activity at the coffee machine as the man she loved, but, as it turned out, barely knew, effortlessly handled all the attention from the admiring, fawning women. Somehow, in her heart, she’d assumed he was just hers.
“What do you mean ‘brought him back to you’?” she finally said to Madeline, knowing engaging in the conversation was the only way to get her mind back from the jealous meadows it had been wandering in. “He saved my life, this was all his idea. He brought us back. Brought himself back.”
Madeline searched her eyes and Tara felt the woman was seeing far more than she wanted her to see.
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