Annihilate Me (24 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“Thunder
Hole?” Alex said in a bemused voice as we walked into the crowd.
 
“Really?”

“I’d
like shove her into it.
 
She
obviously doesn’t like me.”

“I’d
say it’s mutual.”

“If
she had been civil toward me the first time we met, I never would have behaved
that way.
 
But she wasn’t—she
was a snob.
 
She looked down upon
me.
 
Remember?
 
I’m not in the book.
 
Oh, how she brings out the devil in
me.
 
I hope I didn’t embarrass you.”

He
squeezed my hand.
 
“Actually, I
wanted to laugh a few times.
 
So did
Addy—I could see it on his face.
 
She’s a nasty woman—always has been.
 
That’s probably one of the reasons she
and my mother were such good friends.
 
Nasty attracts nasty.
 
I’ve
never liked her, either.”
 
He leaned
toward my ear.
 
“Are you really
still sore?”

“Not
that
sore.”

“Good
to hear.”

“Naughty
boy.
 
So, where is Dufort?”

“Holding
court over there.
 
Do you see?
 
Down about halfway to your right.
 
It looks as if he’s sitting in some kind
of antique gilt chair.”

“It’s
like a throne.
 
And why not?
 
He’s king here tonight.
 
How old is he today, anyway?”

“The
invitation said he was celebrating his sixtieth, but everyone here knows it’s
at least his seventieth.
 
Though I
have to hand it to him—he looks good for his age.”

“He
probably pays his toxes.”

“He
pays his what?”

“Botox.
 
His toxes.”

“You’re
in a mood tonight,” he said.
 
“I
like you like this.
 
It means you’re
going to be fun in bed later.”

“You
really need to focus, Alex.
 
That’s
me consulting you.
 
That’s me
earning my salary right there.”

“Noted.”

I
stopped walking and became serious.
 
“Look who else is here.”

“Who?”

“About
a hundred feet ahead of us.
 
Just to
your left.
 
Darius Stavros and his
son, Cyrus.
 
We probably should go
over and say hello to them.”

“I’d
prefer that Cyrus gets nowhere near you.”

“We’re
beyond that now, aren’t we?”

“I
suppose we are.”

“You
don’t have to worry about me with Cyrus or with anyone else.”

“Why’s
that?”

“Because
I’m with you.”

He
clutched my hand harder.
 
“You don’t
say that enough for me.
 
You don’t
know what that means to me.
 
I’m
trying my best to convince you to come closer to me, but you keep throwing up
walls.”

“I
didn’t this weekend.”

“I
don’t mean physical.
 
I mean mental.
 
Emotional.”

“Alex,
you’re the only man I’ve ever been interested in.
 
You’re the only man I’ve
been
with.
 
Doesn’t that tell you something?”

“It
does.”

“It
should tell you everything you need to know about where I stand in this
relationship.
 
Let’s just enjoy what
we have.
 
Let me work through my
trust issues.
 
The more I’m with you
and the more seamlessly things go between us, the more those walls of mine will
come down.
 
But right now?
 
Now, we’re here, and I’m happy to be
here.
 
I’m eager for what’s coming
later, after the party, when it’s just the two of us.
 
But we’re working now.
 
As your consultant—and I’m not
joking about this—we need to go over and do our duty.
 
Through Cyrus, you got your deal with
Stavros Shipping.
 
We have to go
over and greet each of them in order to keep everyone happy so that when it
comes time to renew the contract, we’re able to just slide into it without a
hitch.”

“You’re
right,” he said.
 
“Let’s do it.”

In
my clutch, I felt my cell buzz, which likely was a text from Lisa.
 
“Just two seconds,” I said.
 
“She knows I’m here, and would never
interrupt unless it was important.
 
Let me check.”
 
I put my
glass of champagne down on the table next to me.

“Take
your time.
 
I’m in no hurry to see
Cyrus.”

“Cyrus
is greasy, but he got you the deal,” I sang as I removed my cell.

“So
he did.”

I
flicked on my phone and saw that it wasn’t a text, but an email sent to the
corporate account I had with Wenn.
 
Its subject line read, “Dead soon.
 
Maybe tonight.
 
Maybe
tomorrow.
 
Or not.
 
But soon.”
 
I didn’t recognize the sender’s address,
and was about to delete it as SPAM when I noticed that there was an
attachment.
 
Out of curiosity, I
clicked on it, and a photo of me leaving the limousine when we first arrived
here tonight filled the screen.
 
I
felt a chill.

“Is
she OK?” Alex asked.

“It’s
not from Lisa.”

“Who’s
it from?”

“I
don’t know.”

He
turned to me.
 
“You sound
tense.
 
Is something wrong?”

I
needed time to process this, and didn’t want to send him off his game before he
spoke to Dufort.
 
I deflected.
 
“Let’s say hello to Darius and Cyrus,
then you can work your magic with Dufort.
 
Then we can go back to your place.”

“What
did you just receive?”

As
unnerved as I was, I still wasn’t sharing this with him now, so I kept focused
on the task at hand.
 
“I’ll tell you
later, but time is running out.
 
We
have work to do.
 
You’re getting
that deal with Dufort.
 
Or at least
you’re going to tempt him with it.
 
Come on,” I said, putting my phone in my clutch and willing myself to
relax.
 
I was shaken, but I couldn’t
let it show here.
 
I smiled at
him.
 
“Let’s finish this so we can
go home and tend to some unfinished business.”

*
 
*
 
*
 

Thirty
minutes later, our conversation with Darius and Cyrus over, Alex spoke with
Dufort while I hung back and watched the crowd.
 

I
recognized many of the guests from their photographs in the
Times
, in the
Journal
, on television or on the Internet, but I
also recognized two other faces in the crowd, one of whom was looking at me
with open hostility.
 

It
was Immaculata Almendarez.
 
Alex had
snubbed her at the fundraiser for the National Museum of Art when she had tried
to set Alex and me up by having us sit next to her at dinner so she could
belittle me by flirting with Alex.
 
All of that failed spectacularly for her when Alex took her down with a
fistful of words before he got us another table.
 
Here, she was with an older gentleman
who looked familiar to me.
 
And then
I recognized him—Richard Gould, the CEO of AT&T.

I
glanced away from her and looked over at Gordon Kobus, whose airline Alex was
preparing to take over.
 
He was
talking to a beautiful blonde woman half his age, thus underscoring the playboy
reputation Alex had told me he was known for.
 

I
watched him for a moment, and was surprised when he turned his attention to
me.
 
His face showed no sense of
surprise at seeing me here, which suggested that he’d already seen Alex and
me.
 
Instead, he just held my gaze
while his mouth tightened into a thin line of hatred.
 
I’d done nothing to the man, but
apparently my association with Alex was enough for Kobus to take a dislike of
me, especially because he knew that Alex was currently wooing Kobus’ management
team in an effort to make the potential takeover go smoothly.

Did one of them send me that
email?
 
Or did it come from someone
else on this roof?
 
I wondered if I was being paranoid.
 
Certainly, the people in this room had
better things to do than send threats.

Or
did they?
 
Over the years, since
he’d assumed control of Wenn, Alex had made his share of enemies.
 
He’d undertaken several hostile
takeovers, and by merging his company with others in an effort to downsize,
he’d left plenty without work in an already difficult economy.

As
friendly as everyone appeared to be tonight—with the exceptions of
Immaculata and Kobus—I could sense a toxic undercurrent, likely because I
still was an outsider and not used to playing their games.
 
Dufort had invited the most powerful men
and women in the city to his birthday bash, all of whom were competitive
overachievers who knew that at any moment, any person on this roof could turn
against them in ways that might ruin them.
 

Perhaps
now more than ever, I saw Alex’s professional life as it was, and I didn’t like
any of it.
 
At least not the social
part of it.
 
Working behind the
scenes as his consultant was another story.
 
That made perfect sense to me because I
knew I could benefit him there.
 
But
this was now the third time I’d played dress up and gone out to a party with
him, only to have a snob, a competitor, or a woman who wanted Alex for herself
look down upon me.
 
I’d never played
those kinds of games with anyone, but without question, that sort of behavior
was deeply rooted here.

I
looked over at Alex, and saw, with a sense of relief, that he had Dufort’s
attention—the man was listening intently to him and was often nodding as
Alex spoke.
 
All good signs.
 
I hoped he was teasing Dufort just
enough to get a meeting with the man.

A
server stopped beside me and asked if I’d like a canapé, but I declined.
 
I looked around the space with a sense
of cynicism I didn’t have when we first arrived—and for good reason.
 
Since then, I’d had to deal with the
email, and then the harsh looks from Immaculata and Kobus.
 

I
thought about the email, and was convinced that it either came from somebody
who was here right now, or from somebody who obviously wanted to rattle Alex by
using me as a target.
 
Whoever sent
it was expecting me to share it with him for that reason, but should I?
 
Was someone seriously out to kill
me?
 
Now that I’d had time to
reflect, the idea seemed absurd to me.
 
What initially felt like a genuine threat, now felt more like a cheap
prank that I shouldn’t be concerned with.
 

Whoever
sent it didn’t exactly have to be a genius.
 
I was on Wenn’s website.
 
My email address was listed there.
 
If, for whatever reason, someone wanted
to shake Alex by threatening me, they had everything they needed—my email
address, a photo taken of me when we arrived tonight, and a death threat.
 
All were effective.
 
As Alex continued to talk to Dufort, I
decided to enjoy the rest of the night and dismiss the email as a jolt intended
to throw me—and potentially him—off guard.

Welcome to the world of big business
,
I thought.
 
Maybe
this is what Alex was talking about yesterday when he said that whatever was
happening to him was normal and under control.
 
Maybe this is my new normal.
 
Maybe I need to accept that.

I
thought of the note Alex gave me.
 
While he was with Dufort, I finally saw my chance to read it.
 
I turned my back to him, and removed it
from my clutch.
 
I unfolded it and
was surprised by how long it was.
 
It wasn’t a note, but a letter.
 
With a sense of trepidation, I read it.