Independently Wealthy: A Novel

by Lorraine Zago Rosenthal

  When we hung up, I put my cell on the table and glanced down at my salad and my Village Voice. Tina’s lunch had been so much better than mine, but I wasn’t jealous. I was happy that her move back to Charleston was working out.

  My phone rang again. I picked it up and read a text from Alex: Miss you a lot. Love you more. Can’t wait until Sunday. I smiled and shot back a similarly mushy message before I put my cell in my purse and resumed people-watching. My eyes went to Celeste, who was still alone at that corner table, sipping soda through a straw. I thought she might be as bored as I was, so I picked up my salad-in-a-box, crossed the room, and stopped beside her.

  “We’ve run into each other before Christmas after all,” I said.

  She smiled. “I’m glad. Do you want to join me? Solo lunches aren’t fun.”

  I slid into the chair opposite her and noticed Celeste’s bracelet, which was made of crystals strung together with a gold chain. “That’s beautiful,” I said, nodding toward her wrist.

  She touched the bracelet like she’d forgotten it was there. “This? Thanks. I made it.”

  “You did?” I leaned forward to get a better view. “It looks vintage.”

  “It is,” she said. “My great-grandmother died a few years ago, and there was this gorgeous chandelier in her house … which everyone else in my family thought was gaudy. Personally, I adore things from the 1920s—”

  “Me too,” I said.

  “Then you’ll understand why I held on to the chandelier. I’d planned to hang it in my own house when I got married, but…” She stopped, looked at the people in white who were dishing out food, and then turned her eyes back to me. “I didn’t get married. So I took the chandelier apart and made jewelry out of it. This way it’s honored rather than forgotten.”

  “You’ve got some impressive DIY skills,” I said. “I could never turn a chandelier into anything … you’re obviously very talented.”

  She shook her head. “Thanks, but … I’m more of an aficionado than an actual artist. I majored in art history at Fordham … which, of course, has nothing to do with my job here. Fortunately, I took a typing class in high school.” She chuckled, but it was one of those laughs that people use to cover something not so funny underneath. “I worked at NBC for a few years before I came here … and I’ve tried to get a job that uses my degree … but they’re hard to find,” she went on, like she needed to convince me. “It’s okay, though. My salary’s decent and my boss is nice … and your brother is so patient with new employees.”

  He wasn’t with me.

  “He’s also incredibly swamped,” she said. “He’s been doing a lot of interviews lately, too. I’m sure he told you that he’s featured in the January Biz.”

  Biz was a monthly publication like Forbes and Details and Maxim rolled into one, and I had no idea that Ned was in it. I shook my head, and Celeste twisted in her seat to unzip the purse hanging over the back of her chair. She reached inside and pulled out a shiny new magazine that she slid across the table.

  I picked it up. Ned was on the cover. He was in a black suit, standing against a white background, giving the camera a serious stare and looking more like one of this year’s Most Beautiful People than the head of a corporation. “‘How the New Chairman of Stone News,’” I read, “‘Will Lead His Company into the Future.’”

  “It’s a great picture, isn’t it?” Celeste asked.

  I nodded, scanning the titles beside Ned’s face: “Ten Ways to Improve Your Style,” “Stocks to Watch,” and “The Ultimate Guide to Pleasing a Woman.”

  “I guess Ned asked you to pick this up for him?” I asked.

  “No,” she said. “I wanted a copy for myself.”

  I heard sirens, bells, a high-level Lust Alert. It reminded me of Ned’s affair with Kitty’s ex-best friend/Stone News anchor Darcelle Conrad, but even more of Ainsley Greenleaf—the eighteen-year-old intern who’d fawned over Ned last summer and ended up underneath him.

  This worried me. Despite Ned’s obvious regrets about what he’d done to Kitty, he’d proved to be a wolf—and capable of luring an unsuspecting female like Celeste into his trap.

  She shifted in her seat. “I mean … I bought the magazine because I thought it was cool that my boss is on the cover. How often does that happen, right?” She laughed nervously and sipped her soda, but there wasn’t much left so all she got was a hollow noise inside the straw.

  I stared at her, wondering if every premenopausal woman who worked in the corporate division of Stone News developed aching loins for Ned. It was like a plague that spread its sinister bacteria throughout the fiftieth floor.

  “How old are you?” I asked.

  “Twenty-seven,” she said.

  She was twenty-seven, she sounded like a native New Yorker, and she was a Fordham grad. She wasn’t a friend of Kitty’s or a teenage virgin from the Midwest. She was probably experienced and sophisticated and didn’t need a lecture from me about avoiding Ned. Besides, any lecture I’d give would have to include unseemly details about his marriage, and it wouldn’t be fair to Kitty if I broadcasted that. And maybe Ned wouldn’t bother with Celeste, anyway. Maybe he’d learned from experience to keep his hands off the employees.

  *

  I sat at my desk at home that night, searching through a Web site that held information pertaining to just about everyone—full names, ages, closest relatives.

  It had been easy to find Senator Caldwell. I’d spent the hours since dinner reading her official bio and lots of articles written about her political views. I wasn’t exactly sure what else I wanted to know, but she was right there on the screen in front of me: Carys Bowman Caldwell; Age: 53; Relatives: J. Caldwell and W. Caldwell; Current Residence: Larchmont, New York.

  Full Report Here—that’s what I clicked next. But the report wasn’t free so I sprang out of my chair to get my credit card from my purse, which I’d left on the couch a few feet away. I slid the card out of my wallet, heard a knock, and walked to the living room. I opened the door and found Alex standing in the hall. A warm rush of adrenaline flowed through me.

  “I thought you had to work,” I said as I noticed the bruise on his cheek was fading.

  He smiled, crinkling the corners of his eyes in the cutest way. “The flu is going around.”

  It couldn’t have gotten to him. He looked so healthy and strong. “What do you mean? The people throwing the party got sick and canceled?”

  He took a step forward and pulled me toward him. “No … but I pretended I did.”

  He kissed me with a mouth that was fresh and minty. “Did you eat a candy cane?” I asked. “You taste like one. But then … you always do.”

  Alex laughed as he walked into the apartment and I shut the door behind him. “I got another bartender to cover for me … so I didn’t leave those people shorthanded,” he said, taking off his jacket. He hung it in the closet, turned toward me, and looked at the card between my fingers. “Doing some online shopping?”

  I shook my head. “I was trying to find information about Senator Caldwell … and maybe her husband, too. I’ve decided that since Ned’s PI didn’t solve anything, I’ll do try to do it on my own. Let me show you,” I said, grabbing Alex’s hand. I led him into the office and took my seat at the computer, and he stood next to me. “See?” I said, pointing to the monitor. “I don’t even know what I’m looking for, but I’m going to buy this report and go from there.”

  I put my credit card on the table and started typing its numbers into a form on the screen, but I didn’t get far because Alex picked up the card and put it on a nearby shelf.

  “C’mere,” he said, then took my hand and led me toward the couch, where he gently pulled me onto his lap. “Listen,” he began, “I know you want to find out what happened to your father. I know it’s been eating away at you for months. But like I’ve told you before … obsessing isn’t healthy. You mentioned that Ned’s got another detective on the case now, so let this guy do his job. And you stay out
of it.”

  I noticed he was wearing Acqua Di Gio. I tensed up, got off his lap, and stared down at him. “I don’t care for your tone, Alex. It sounds like you’re giving me an order.”

  He paused. Then he exhaled a heavy breath. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to sound that way. What I mean is … it’s just … well, by digging around in this … you could get in trouble. You’d be messing with powerful people … and that could be dangerous.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Ned said something similar.”

  “He did? Then I’ll have to agree with him. And he is your brother. Maybe that’s finally starting to mean something to him. Did it ever cross your mind that he might genuinely be concerned about you?”

  “Not really. But there have been some hints in that direction.”

  “He probably doesn’t want you to get hurt,” Alex said. “And I don’t, either. That’s all.”

  Of course that was all. What was wrong with me? My shoulders slumped, my body relaxed, and I leaned down to press my forehead against his. “I know,” I said.

  He wrapped his arms around me. “I’ve got something to take your mind off Edward.”

  I slipped back onto his lap. “What’s that?”

  He nodded toward the living room. “Have you looked under your tree lately? I left something there when you were asleep on Sunday night. I wanted you to find it on Christmas morning, but … maybe now is a better time.”

  I kissed his bruised cheek. Then we stood up and he followed me into the living room, where he sat on the couch and I kneeled by the tree. I’d bought so many gifts, it took a while to find the one that didn’t match the rest—a flat, square box wrapped in gold foil.

  Alex stretched out his legs while I sat on the floor and opened my gift, which turned out to be a necklace—an aquamarine in the shape of a teardrop suspended from a heavy chain.

  “This is my birthstone,” I said.

  He nodded. “Yeah … I looked it up. You told me your birthday is at the end of March.”

  I’d only mentioned that once. He’d actually looked up my birthstone? I just gazed at him.

  “The chain is white gold,” Alex said. “Fourteen karat … it’s engraved on the lock.”

  As if I’d check. “Do you really believe that matters to me?”

  “I just don’t want you to think—”

  I held up my hand. Then I joined him on the couch and leaned my head on his shoulder. He circled his arm around my waist and we sat there together, admiring the lights and the tinsel on my Norway spruce. We didn’t talk, and we didn’t need to. I knew what he didn’t want me to think—that he’d bought cheap metal and a lab-created stone.

  But I would’ve loved a cubic zirconia with a chain that turned my skin green as long as it was from him. And I didn’t say he shouldn’t have bought such an expensive necklace or remind him that he couldn’t afford to run up his credit card bill. He’d looked so happy when I was opening the box, and there was snow falling outside my windows and landing on Central Park, and everything was too good to spoil with the wrong words.

  Seven

  I woke up on Saturday morning to crystallized snowflakes on my windows and Alex beside me in bed. Our clothes were scattered on the floor, and the only thing between our bare skin and the air was my plush comforter with its dahlia design.

  My landline rang. Alex’s eyes fluttered open. I reached over to my night table, picked up the receiver, and heard Mom’s voice. “Still in bed?” she asked. “It’s after ten.”

  I sat up straight and held the comforter to my chest. “Mom,” I said, glancing at Alex. Being only three months away from twenty-five didn’t make me any less uncomfortable about talking to my mother when I was within inches of a naked man.

  “Darlin’,” she said, “I was just remembering how much you love my grasshopper pie, and I thought I’d make one and bring it in a cooler on the plane so we can eat it after Christmas dinner. Then I figured they won’t let me through security with a cooler … will they?”

  She wasn’t exactly a frequent flier. I leaned back into my pillows and rubbed my eyes, almost tasting her grasshopper pie—a luscious mix of mint and chocolate and whipped cream.

  “I wish they would, Mom. But I doubt it.”

  “So I guess I’ll make some praline cookies and smuggle them on board in my purse.”

  I chuckled. “Desserts exist in New York, you know.”

  “Don’t get sassy. Now let me say hello to your boyfriend.”

  I stiffened as I looked at Alex, who had just turned on the TV with the remote control and was watching ESPN on mute.

  “What?” I said.

  “Oh, stop stalling. He’s right there with you, isn’t he? I was young once, too, Savannah … and your existence is proof of that. Now put him on.”

  I felt even more awkward imagining what Mom had done to cause my existence, but I got her point. So I handed Alex the phone and relaxed into my pillows while he chatted politely with her. When he gave the receiver back, I told Mom we’d meet her at the baggage claim inside Kennedy Airport on Tuesday morning.

  “Tina and I will be there with lots of cookies,” she said.

  “I’m sure they’ll be more delicious than anything in Manhattan. See y’all soon.”

  “She’s sweet,” Alex said after I hung up. “I can tell where you get it from.”

  I slid down into the comforter, wrapped my arms around his waist, and rested my head against his bare pecs. “Thanks for talking to her. I don’t know how many guys would be so patient with their girlfriend’s mother.”

  “I didn’t mind. If my mother were here, I’d want you to get to know her, too.”

  He was stroking my hair. A hush fell—the kind that happens when something sad unexpectedly pops to the surface. I straightened up and put on a cheerful face.

  “You’re free all day, right?” I asked.

  He nodded. “I’ll head to work at the same time you leave for your party.”

  He meant the Stone party in Larchmont. Caroline had given me an elegant invitation that had Virginia’s monogram and was printed with gold letters on heavy green paper.

  I snatched my pink robe off my bedpost and put it on before I dashed to the window, where I looked at the Upper West Side beneath a foot of snow that had fallen while we’d slept. Flurries swirled in the blustery air, all the trees in Central Park were frosted white, and people eleven floors below were tottering around on the sidewalk that hadn’t yet been shoveled. My view had magically transformed into a living Christmas card.

  “Let’s stay in,” I said, spinning around. “Let’s order Miracle on 34th Street—the original version, of course—and drink hot cocoa and string popcorn and lounge on the couch in our robes all day. Won’t that be fabulous?”

  I stopped, feeling like I’d taken an embarrassing tumble on my self-imposed Path to Sophistication. Then I sat on the windowsill and felt icy glass against my back. “That was a dumb idea, right? You probably want to do something else.”

  He gave me the warmest smile. “There’s nothing I’d want to do more.”

  I smiled, too. Alex reached to the carpet for a pair of shorts, slipped them on, and joined me on the windowsill. “It looks nice out there,” he said, glancing over his shoulder.

  I dangled my bare feet over a vent in the floor, feeling the heat on my toes. “I love a white Christmas,” I said.

  “As much as being a Secret Santa?” he asked.

  I felt my forehead wrinkling. “What do you mean?”

  “Allison told me about the ten grand,” he said. “But don’t be mad at her … she only brought it up because she knows my brother’s a stockbroker, and she wanted me to put her in touch with him for some investment advice. Then she had to explain why I shouldn’t mention it to Tony. So you’re not mad, right?”

  “Not in the least. Just make sure you don’t tell him.”

  “I promise I won’t,” Alex said as he put his arm around me and kissed my cheek. “You did a
great thing for Tony and his family … without expecting any credit for it.”

  I thought about my weekly ten-thousand-dollar checks. They were going to increase to fifty thousand in July, and it made me feel like what I’d given Tony was nothing at all.

  I shrugged. “It’s no big deal.”

  Alex laughed. “Savannah,” he said, “sometimes I think I couldn’t love you more. But when you say things like that … I do.”

  *

  The snow had been shoveled and it was dark outside when Alex and I walked past my doorman. Alex wore his leather jacket with his bartender’s uniform underneath—black pants and a matching shirt with a white tie—and his color scheme matched mine. I’d learned that a black dress fit just about every formal or semi-formal occasion, so that’s what I’d chosen to put on tonight with a brand-new, winter-white coat from Bloomingdale’s on Third Avenue.

  “There’s Tony,” I said, pointing toward the sedan waiting at a red light down the street. “I hate for him to be working tonight, since it’s so close to Christmas … but he wanted to. The trip to Westchester and back is worth a lot of overtime. If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t have given in … I would’ve just rented a car with GPS and driven up there myself.”

  “I wouldn’t have let you. The roads are too slick tonight for you to drive alone.”

  The light turned green. I moved my eyes from the street to Alex, who was blowing on his hands and rubbing them together to keep them warm. I knew he was only looking out for me, but I still bristled. I’d been driving alone since I was in high school and I could handle slick roads, and I wouldn’t have let you rang in my head.

  “Here he is,” Alex said as the sedan arrived at the curb. He walked toward the car, but I stayed where I was. I glared at Alex, who turned around and gave me a puzzled look when he was halfway to the street. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  What’s wrong? I’m a grown woman and I don’t require your permission for anything and I’ll do whatever I want. That’s what’s wrong.

  He clearly had no idea what I was thinking. He just stared at me as his breath floated from his mouth in puffs of steam. Then I remembered waking up together after ten this morning, making love in the shower at eleven, and whiling away the afternoon, cuddled up on my couch.