Phoebe pounced on Jake the moment he walked in on Tuesday evening, barely letting him put down his briefcase and take off his jacket. She followed him to the kitchen. Her anxiety about Eva, Linh, and Zoya had eaten at her since the previous day. Jake hadn’t come home Monday night until long after she fell asleep, and then left before five this morning. He’d been in no mood to talk.
Now, by the time Jake finally walked in, all she cared about was getting his reassurance. Moments after flinging a plate of crackers and cheese in front of him, she began relaying the conversation she’d had with the women at the Cupcake Project and the promises she’d made.
He dropped a cracker, uneaten, on the table. “You said what?” Jake ran his hands through his hair. “Are you nuts?”
“They were almost hysterical. They can’t afford to lose anything!”
“You don’t do that!” Jake paced the floor, slamming his fist into his palm. “You never tell people you will cover their losses. Are you fucking nuts?”
“I can do whatever I please with my money. What better way to use it than helping people like Zoya and Linh? Eva?”
“Your money? Do you honestly think your cupcakes make a dime? Who do you think is underwriting this project of yours? Every penny of your business belongs to JPE in one form or another.”
“These are my friends. Who need everything they have.”
“People shouldn’t invest what they can’t afford to lose. Bottom line, if you need every cent, you stuff it under your damned mattress.”
“Fuck you, Jake. Just because you can be a heartless bastard doesn’t mean I have to follow you to hell.” She wanted to strike him. For the first time, she understood how couples ended up attacking each other. Why weapons should never be at hand.
Jake bent with his hands on his knees, took a deep breath, and then straightened up and walked away.
She heard him at the liquor cabinet in the next room. Glass clinked. A bottle opened. He poured. A moment passed, and then he poured again.
He came back carrying what looked like undiluted Scotch.
“Here. Drink this.” He handed her a glass. “Calm down.”
“You had some?” she asked.
“A sip.” He nodded as she drank. “Listen closely. One, we will be fine. We will get even more clients from this. Two, you never—do you hear me—never interfere with the business. Half of our friends and family are in the Club, and I do not want any one of them to think they can go to you. Not your mother or father, not your sister, and not your golden Mira House buddies. Capisce? This is mine. Only mine.”
Jake’s now-soft voice carried menace. Her heart raced as she wondered how she could keep her promise to her friends and keep her husband.
“Your girls will lose nothing. Not because they are different from any other client but because they have their money with me, damn it. Do you hear me?”
Jake being the only one in America able to deliver good news made no sense. She’d read the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Daily News, and the Post while waiting for him to come home. Blood ran in the streets.
What magic did Jake possess? Could he be brilliant?
“When people question you, this is what you say: ‘I shouldn’t say this, but if it were me, I’d double down with Jake. He won’t say a word, but he knows exactly how to play a down market. Whatever you do, don’t sell. These are the times when people become wealthy.’ Say nothing if you can’t say that, but say what I told you, and you’ll speak the truth.”
For the first time, it seemed, Phoebe felt the weight of what people said about Jake: that he truly was a money magician. He could end up in history books, mentioned along with Peter Lynch and Warren Buffett. Being with him since she was fifteen limited her understanding. To her, he remained Jake from the neighborhood. But he was more. Perhaps even a genius.
“You truly are this smart, aren’t you?” Phoebe whispered.
CHAPTER 21
Phoebe
“Aunt Deb’s crying. She sounds hysterical.” Noah held out the phone toward Phoebe.
She grabbed the receiver, apprehension hammering. Ben’s checkup last week had revealed blood pressure problems, high cholesterol, and weight gain—each one an ingredient for a heart attack.
“Is Ben okay? The kids?”
“Mom. And Daddy . . .” Thick sobs choked away her words.
“Deb! What happened?”
Ben’s voice came from the background with the sound of the phone being transferred. “Phoebe, it’s me.”
“What’s wrong?” Brittle cold invaded her chest.
“Are you alone?”
“Noah’s here. Just say it. Tell me, Ben!”
“Your parents. They were in a car accident.” He paused. His labored breathing and Deb’s sobs panicked her. “Your father didn’t make it. Your mother’s in Bellevue.”
Blinding pain pierced Phoebe’s head. She sank to her knees, sucker punched by Ben’s words.
“Mom! Mom, what’s wrong?” Noah knelt beside her and took the phone from her hand. “Uncle Ben, what happened?”
The drive to the hospital took seven hours or seven minutes—Phoebe wasn’t sure which. She’d locked her eyes on Noah’s hands gripping the steering wheel, as she entered suspended animation: muscles contracted, balled fists, her heels pressed to the rubber mat as though moving the car with her inaction.
Bellevue Hospital’s ancient systems and signs defied Noah’s teenage parking skills. After the second time circling from the FDR service road to First Avenue and back again, Phoebe pointed out the window.
“Park there.”
“That’s a delivery entrance, Mom.”
Park.
He pulled into the spot. “They’ll tow the car.”
“I don’t care.” This was the real power Jake bestowed. Having enough money to not give a shit. The car could explode moments after they walked away, and she wouldn’t turn around.
Phoebe and Noah trekked through dingy hallway mazes to reach her mother’s room. Not dirty, but unpleasant, and unbroken by reminders that life might be better than the grim interior of this hulking building.
Noah took her hand as they entered her mother’s room. Ben stood in the corner, arms folded across his chest as he leaned against the radiator.
Lola lay in the bed closest to the window, forcing them to walk past her roommate, an ancient wraith of a moaning woman. Deb sat in a chair pulled close as possible to their mother.
Her mother’s stillness frightened Phoebe. Traces of eyeliner on her closed lids were the only remnants of the face Lola showed the world.
Ben put a finger to his lips and gestured with his chin toward the corridor. The two of them walked out and leaned against the wall.
“How is she? Should we call a nurse for the woman in the other bed?”
“Deb already asked twice. This place is a zoo.”
“Why’d they bring them . . .” Phoebe stopped. “Why did they bring her here?” Thick beige paint seemed designed to dull all senses, drown the urge to complain, muffle screams.
“Bellevue’s the best for trauma,” Ben said.
“What does she have?”
“A fractured pelvis.”