* * *
“This couldn’t have worked out more perfectly. We can speak freely.” Noah was pretending a nonchalance he didn’t feel. To further convince his visitor of his insouciance, he idly twirled the skewered olive in his martini glass. “Maris went out of town again.”
“Is this typical of her?”
Morris Blume had arrived at the Reeds’ West Side co-op, wearing his condescending attitude like a fashion accessory. Noah had insisted that they meet informally and alone, without Blume’s flunkies. They were like hummingbirds around a tropical blossom, hovering when they weren’t actually fluttering.
Noah had given his doorman an exorbitant tip to admit Blume and to ensure his memory loss about it later. He’d been hospitably waiting for Blume when Blume stepped out of the elevator. Blume had practically marched into the apartment, surveying it as a drill sergeant would a barracks, his colorless eyes seeming to be searching for flaws. Apparently it passed inspection. “Very nice.”
Noah had attributed the tasteful decor to Maris. “She has an eye for such things. Drink?”
Now they were seated on facing sofas, Tiffany martini glasses in hand, and Maris’s name had entered the conversation again. “She goes away frequently, doesn’t she?” Blume asked.
“Not until recently when she began working on a project with an author who lives on an island off the coast of Georgia.”
“You’re sure of this?”
Since Noah felt his control over his wife and his mistress had slipped lately, Blume’s insinuation smarted. “Sure about what?” he asked testily. “My wife’s whereabouts?”
Blume stretched his colorless lips into his distinctive facsimile of a smile. “I knew a man whose wife was allegedly interviewing interior decorators to redo their recently purchased winery in Sonoma. Turns out she was consulting with a notorious divorce lawyer in LA who did his best work in bed. The wife wound up with the lawyer, the winery, and just about everything else. Once the fleecing was over, the man considered himself lucky to come away with his dick still attached. There’s a lesson to be learned there.”
The implied criticism rankled, but Noah chuckled. “This writer is shriveled and disabled, wheelchair-bound. Passion hasn’t drawn Maris to Georgia.”
“The draw could be something more damaging than a love affair.”
Noah pulled the olive off the skewer with his teeth and chewed around his lazy grin. “If you’re suggesting that Maris is up to some corporate subterfuge, you truly don’t know her. She doesn’t think as we do, Morris. She’s a bookworm. A romantic, a dreamer. Head in the clouds. Trust me, she won’t be springing any nasty surprises on us.”
“I assume she’ll be surprised when Matherly Press becomes part of WorldView.”
“We’ll know soon.”
“I like the confident ring of that.”
Still smiling slyly, Noah set his glass on the coffee table and reached for his briefcase. With a flourish, he clicked open the latches. “Delivered on time, as promised.”
He passed Blume the document prepared by Howard Bancroft. After finding Nadia naked in bed and reeking of another man’s sweat, following closely Maris’s inconvenient and unexpected disappearance, he had determined that his next action must be bold and definitive.
He was tired of playing cautiously, tired of other people—women, for God’s sake!—dictating what he did and when he did it. He must move quickly and aggressively. It was time to take care of Noah, and only Noah, and let the rest of them go fuck themselves. Or their meatheaded personal trainers. Jesus.
Blume scanned the document, rapidly flipping through the pages. He was familiar enough with legal jargon to catch the gist of it. Noah waited to be congratulated.
But when Blume finished glancing over the last page, he returned the document to the coffee table. “Very nice. Now all that’s needed is their signatures.”
Noah’s inflated chest emptied like a punctured balloon. “Not necessary, Morris. Didn’t you read—”
“That it’s valid with your signature alone?” He chuckled as he stood up and buttoned the top button of his perfectly tailored gray suit jacket. “A problematic clause, Noah. Very. I’m already dodging antitrust laws and myriad other trade regulations.” He waved his pale hand in a dismissive gesture. “They’re nothing more than time-consuming nuisances. But only if everything else is in perfect order, and I mean all the i’s dotted and t’s crossed.
“I couldn’t swing a deal of this magnitude with a legal trapdoor like this waiting to open up beneath me. I wouldn’t even want to try. This document, as it is now, would flag the feds. Even if it didn’t, the Matherlys could raise a hue and cry, and then we’d all be screwed. I don’t know about you, but when I get screwed, I like it to feel good.”
He winked and Noah wanted to kill him.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a dinner date.”
He turned and headed for the door. Noah blinked the pulsing red lights out of his vision and followed. “Not to worry, Morris. I’ll get the signatures.”
Blume said, “I never worry.”
He opened the door, then paused and turned back to Noah. “One of their signatures would probably be sufficient. Either your father-in-law’s or your wife’s.” He mulled it over for several seconds, then nodded. “Yes. I’d feel protected with only one in addition to yours.”
“You keep the antitrust thugs off our backs,” Noah said stiffly. “Leave the Matherlys to me.”
“Gladly. Between the two, I’d rather take on the federal government.” His grin made him look like a leering skull recently exhumed. “Call me when you have that signature. Only when you have it, all right? My time is extremely valuable, and this has taken far too long already.”
Then he was gone.