by Nele Neuhaus
Oliver was no longer sleepy. He looked at her with his full attention.
“I admit that I was flattered by his interest in me,” Alex continued. “He once reserved an entire restaurant for us. We flew in his private jet to see a boxing match in Las Vegas and to the Academy Awards. It was totally crazy and exciting.”
“He wanted to impress you.” Oliver put on his glasses.
“Yes, I’m pretty sure that’s what he wanted to do.”
“And why were you so mad at him tonight?”
“Because he stood me up three weekends in a row while I sat at home waiting for his phone calls.”
“Aha. And when you were really mad and hurt, I came along.”
“You ran me over with your bicycle,” Alex reminded him and smiled. “But that night it became clear to me that I didn’t feel anything for him. It was simply exciting to be with him. An excursion into high society.”
“Great.” Oliver acted unimpressed and sat up in bed. “But how could this man—for whom you supposedly have no feelings—make you so angry that you went after two men just to let off some steam? Wouldn’t you have to feel something for him to get so angry?”
Alex looked at him in bewilderment. Was he mad at her now?
“Would it have been better not to say anything?”
“You show up here at two thirty in the morning, have sex with me, and then you tell me about another guy,” replied Oliver. “What should I make of that?”
“Okay, then I won’t say another word.”
She smiled and stretched out her hand toward him.
“Does this Park Avenue guy also have a name?”
“Yes. I’m pretty sure that you’ve heard it before. His name is Sergio Vitali.”
“Holy shit!” Oliver suddenly threw back the blanket with a jerk. He fished for his boxers and jumped up. He turned on the light switch and left the bedroom. Confused, Alex squinted into the bright light. She got up and followed him into the kitchen.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked. Oliver turned around quickly. There was no trace of a smile on his face, and his gray eyes were ice cold.
“It would be better if you got dressed now and left,” he said, opening the refrigerator door. Alex instantly regretted her honesty, because she felt true affection for Oliver. She didn’t understand what had made him so angry.
“Leave!” he repeated, not looking at her. “I’m better off if I forget you as quickly as possible.”
His voice sounded bitter.
“You can’t just throw me out like this,” Alex began timidly. “Just because I—”
It was very important for her to stay in his good graces. She didn’t want to leave now with such hard feelings between them. Oliver slammed the refrigerator door and turned around. Alex was frightened when she saw the angry glint in his eyes. What had set him off?
“You’ve breached my trust,” he snarled.
Alex stared at him without understanding.
“I promised not to mention any of those monstrosities at LMI that I uncovered over the past months and years. I accepted the fact that you didn’t want to know anything detrimental about your employer, hoping that you’d recognize it yourself one day, and preferably before it’s too late. I really started to like you. Not in a million years would I have thought that you could be involved with Vitali!”
Alex was taken aback and swallowed hard.
“I’ve formed a pretty comprehensive opinion about this guy over the past few years because I kept stumbling across his name over and over again during my research. This man has his fingers in almost every criminal business in this city. Among other things, he’s a shareholder of LMI. His entire empire is built upon blood and crime. He’s an unscrupulous and brutal gangster. I just can’t associate with people like that. It’s a cruel twist of fate that I would end up in bed with a woman who lets him fuck her!”
His brutal frankness hit Alex like a slap in the face.
“What a shame, Alex, it’s really a shame.” Oliver let himself sink onto the kitchen chair. He looked at her with a mixture of pity and disgust. “I really thought that you were different. But you’re apparently just another one of those women who close their eyes and ears to reality, driven by pathological ambition.”
She was shocked by the coldness of his words.
“None of this is true,” she responded. “Sergio has nothing to do with LMI.”
“Are you kidding me, or are you really that naive?” Oliver shook his head and burst out laughing, but it wasn’t a happy laugh. “He sits on the board of directors!”
“Yes, I know, but he sits on a dozen boards. I would know if he had something to do with LMI’s business,” Alex whispered, perplexed. “He would have told me!”
“Unbelievable,” said Oliver, more to himself than to Alex. “I’ve banged a gangster’s whore!”
This left Alex speechless for a moment. Gangster’s whore! How outrageous! Hot anger rose within her.
“How dare you!” she screamed, and tears sprang into her eyes. “Who do you think you are to judge other people so harshly?”
“Incidentally, this is a free country, and I can judge whomever I please.”
He stood up and pushed past her.
“I wish you the best of luck,” he said and opened the front door. “Go to your Mafia lover! If you keep on like this, you’ll be on LMI’s board in no time. I hope that it’s worth your investment. Good-bye.”
“Can I get dressed first?”
Oliver didn’t respond. He seemed to have lost all interest in her. Alex’s blood hissed in her ears. She let her tears run freely only after she had closed the apartment door behind her. Oliver’s cold contempt and hurtful words stung like salt in a wound. The sky reddened to the east as she stumbled along the street, blinded by tears and bewilderment. A gangster’s whore! The insult echoed in her ears, and she cried angry tears of desperation and humiliation. Why did she always end up with the wrong men? First Sergio, who stood her up, and now this! The tears stopped, and a paralyzing chill took hold of her. The clicking of her high heels on the pavement echoed in the empty streets, and she felt more miserable with every step. Oliver’s reaction had struck a sore point she preferred not to think about. She had managed to mentally block any speculations about Sergio’s connections to the underworld she saw in the press. She had refused to listen to Oliver’s accusations against LMI. But Alex suddenly realized that she couldn’t ignore these signals any longer. She realized how lonely she was. She had no one to talk to, no one to trust. Her whole world started to crumble before her eyes. Her certainty that what she was doing was right had just vanished.
Three hours later, Alex was at her desk with swollen eyes and a pitch-black cup of coffee. The week ahead promised to be very exciting. A hostile takeover battle involving merger negotiations between the country’s two leading waste management companies was coming to a head. For weeks, United Waste Disposal had been defending itself to the best of its ability against Waste Management’s advances. Alex observed this attentively and called Fred W. Watkins, CEO of A&R Resources, to suggest he step in as a white knight. Watkins, who’d met Alex a couple of months ago through Sergio, was more than excited by this proposal. A&R Resources was a highly specialized company that primarily handled military waste disposal, but Alex found out Watkins was looking to diversify his business in order to expand. Without hesitation, Watkins hired Alex and LMI to work on the acquisition of United Waste Disposal; as a result, she was now involved in this hard-fought takeover battle.
The atmosphere on Wall Street was tense as bankers anticipated a Federal Reserve interest rate hike. Alan Greenspan had hinted at an increase to combat inflation. Investor nerves were on edge waiting to see whether such an interest rate hike would lead to consolidation or plummet to a crash. The noise on the trading floor was deafening as traders tried to placate their clients. The NASDAQ started sliding in the first few minutes after the opening bell. Alex hadn’t even turned on her Mac yet whe
n Marcia entered with a pile of notes.
“The appointment with the A&R lawyers is confirmed for noon,” she announced. “Mr. Watkins and Mr. Levy will be there, Steve Cavanaugh from Schuyler & Partner asked for a call-back, as well as Franklin Mills and Mr. Weinberg. And Mr. Vitali called. I told him that you’re still in a meeting. Was that right?”
Yes. No. Alex rubbed the bridge of her nose with her index finger and thumb. Marcia had been on strict orders to put Sergio off by all possible means for the past three weeks.
“He said that he’ll call again.”
“You can put him through then.” Alex typed in the password on her keyboard and was happy that Marcia hadn’t mentioned her disastrous appearance this morning. By now, last night seemed like a crazy nightmare or a bad movie that she had watched half asleep and could only recall in fragments. She obviously should have talked to Oliver about Sergio a long time ago, but she still felt incredibly humiliated and hurt by his reaction. Alex really liked Oliver, but that made her even angrier. How could he insult her this way without giving her a chance to justify herself?
Just as she was checking her e-mails, Marcia transferred a phone call to her. It was Sergio. Her heart fluttered.
“I spent the whole night thinking about what you said,” he began, not even bothering to greet her, “and you’re right. What would you say if we scratch everything that happened so far and make a fresh start?”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?”
“Join me for dinner tonight, cara. Let’s talk about everything in peace and quiet. Please.”
A light was flashing on Alex’s telephone.
“I have one appointment after the other today,” she replied with hesitation. “The board of a new client from Texas is in town.”
Sergio couldn’t let her get away with such a lame excuse. Despite all of the doubts that Oliver had sown in Alex’s heart, Sergio was still the most important person in her life.
“I need to see you, cara,” he said in a pleading tone that Alex had never heard before, “and I have a surprise for you.”
Alex hesitated. Sergio’s surprise could turn out to be a trip to Las Vegas or dinner in Miami.
“Okay,” she said halfheartedly.
“Wonderful. I’ll come over to your place at eight. Ciao, cara.”
The spacious penthouse apartment with a terrace and winter garden was located directly on Central Park West at Sixty-Sixth Street and offered a magnificent park view. Eight tastefully furnished salons on two levels were distributed over more than three thousand square feet. They were pure luxury, the dream of millions of New Yorkers. A single elevator led from the parking garage directly to the penthouse, and the all-around rooftop terrace was accessible from every room. A starry night sky arched across the city, and the air was mild and soft. The luxuriantly blossoming roses twining around a pergola exuded a bewitching fragrance.
Sergio observed Alex as she walked through the rooms in amazement and finally stepped out onto the terrace. He could tell she had spent the night with that guy again. Silvio had seen her arrive in a limousine at two thirty in the morning and walk into the building on Barrow Street. The hidden cameras that Silvio’s men had installed throughout the apartment recorded her doing it with this guy. Sergio watched the tape thirty times, listening in cold anger to what she’d said to him. “On that night it became clear to me that I didn’t feel anything for him. It was simply exciting to be with him. An excursion into high society.”
Sergio also heard what the guy had said, and the sheer desire to kill him had risen up inside of him. After much drama, Alex had left the house shortly after five and walked home.
While he and Alex had a sophisticated dinner at Le Cirque, Oliver Skerritt had a painful encounter with three of Silvio’s men. If someone had already found him, he was certainly in the hospital by now. With a feeling of spiteful satisfaction, Sergio thought about the images of Skerritt’s disfigured face Silvio had sent to his cell phone about an hour ago. The bastard would stay away from Alex in the future. He was pretty sure about that.
“Do you like the apartment?” He leaned against the open terrace door and looked at her.
“Are you kidding?” Alex turned toward him. “Who wouldn’t like such an apartment? Who lives here?”
Until three days ago, some other tenants lived here. But Sergio had them thrown out without notice so he could show Alex an apartment that she would definitely like.
“You mentioned once that you would like an apartment with a view of the park,” he said casually. He grabbed a bottle of champagne from an ice cooler. “And when I heard that this apartment was vacant, I thought of you. You can have it.”
Alex leaned on the railing and smiled. Her smile attracted Sergio like a compass needle is drawn to the North Pole.
“I can’t afford an apartment like this.”
“You don’t even know what it costs yet.” Sergio poured champagne into two glasses and held one of them toward her.
“Are you serious?” She tilted her head in disbelief.
“It’s a coincidence that the entire building belongs to me,” Sergio responded. “I would rent it to you for twenty-five hundred a month.”
“That sounds like a bad deal for you.”
“I never make bad deals.” He was standing very close to her. “So?”
She gave him a look that was hard to decipher. Her thick, glossy hair fell over her shoulders. She was so beautiful and desirable that he could hardly bear not to touch her. Strangely enough, he didn’t even care that she had slept with someone else not even twenty-four hours ago.
“When can I move in?”
This made Sergio smile. She had swallowed the hook.
“Today, if you like.” He took the glass from her hand. Before she could say a word, he lifted her up and carried her into the bedroom.
Long past midnight, as they were lying on the bed exhausted and breathing heavily, their sweaty bodies wrapped around each other, Alex remembered the things that Oliver had said about Sergio. She decided to take advantage of this moment of intimacy.
“Sergio?” She kissed his naked shoulder.
“Hmm…” He was lying on his back and smiling sleepily.
“I’d like to ask you something, but please only answer if you’re telling the truth.”
Sergio’s eyes opened wide.
“Okay.”
“They keep writing in the newspapers that your father was a Mafioso.”
“Yes, he probably was.” He turned his head so that she could see him better. “His bad reputation still haunts me today, as you’ve noticed. Unfortunately, people automatically think that you’re with the Mafia if you have an Italian name and are successful.”
“They claim that your father killed many people.”
Sergio looked at Alex pensively.
“I was nineteen when my father was shot,” he said slowly. “I think that he deserved it because he killed a lot of people.”
Alex shivered. “That sounds intense.”
“Intense?” Sergio grimaced. “My father was a hit man. He came to America from Sicily as a young man knowing nothing but tending sheep and handling weapons. He did that in order to survive, because legal jobs were hard to come by back then. Life in the 1930s was very difficult. Honest work was hard to come by and poorly paid.”
“Did you like your father?”
Sergio contemplated for a moment before he replied.
“To be honest, I don’t remember. I hardly knew him. He sent me off to boarding school when I was six. My brother had been killed, and he didn’t want me to get into any kind of trouble. For ten years, I just came home for Christmas. I didn’t move back to New York until after my father was dead.”
They lay next to each other in silence. Far below them, the city that never sleeps was bustling, and they could hear the muted sounds of street traffic.
“Have you killed anyone?” Alex asked quietly. Sergio looked at her with a spark in his eyes.
/> “Why do you want to know that, cara?”
“There are so many stories in the newspapers,” she replied, “all these things about the Mafia and crime syndicates. I want to know if any of it is true.”
Sergio kissed her, gently disentangling himself from her, and got up. Somehow his naked body didn’t make him seem defenseless or ridiculous. He held himself with the nonchalant self-confidence of a classical statue.
“Is it important to you?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said as she calmly returned his look, “it’s important to me.”
“Would it make a difference to you if you found out that I am all the things that the press claims? Would the past matter so much that you wouldn’t want to see me anymore?”
“No.” Alex shook her head. “It has nothing to do with that.”
She knew he had secrets, and it didn’t bother her. But since Oliver said those harsh words last night, she felt the need to know some general truths.
“What is it then?” Sergio asked, and Alex straightened up. She thought about the Downeys and the trusting affection between them.
“I want to hear from you if what the newspapers write is true. If it’s the truth and you tell me, then I can live with it. I simply want to be able to trust you.”
Sergio sat down at the edge of the bed and looked at her. For a split second he felt tempted to tell Alex what she wanted to hear, but then he remembered Nelson’s warning and the guy with whom she had cheated on him. Reason regained the upper hand. He was still as unable to read Alex’s face as on their first meeting. He knew he desired her like no woman before. He wanted to own and dominate her, but that was exactly what she didn’t allow him to do. No, he must not show any signs of weakness. He could not possibly tell her the truth because he had learned never to trust anyone very early in his life. Generosity and openness were weaknesses that could be deadly. Since the potential for false friends was high, Sergio preferred not to have any friends at all. He had reliable business partners with whom he had no emotional ties. But people who knew too much about him could possibly hurt, weaken, or even destroy him. He couldn’t really trust anyone, even within the ranks of his own family, and Cesare’s ridiculous threat was proof of that. The tough struggle for survival growing up on the streets of Little Italy and the Lower East Side and the brutal murders of his brother and father had changed him forever. This made it impossible for Sergio to be completely open with anyone.