“I hate it.” Madison was leaning forward, her face intent, eyes roaming over everything. “Mommy, I hate it. It looks like a witch's house. And there's nobody to play with.”
For once, Natalia ignored her, and then they were climbing out of the car, Sandman grinning and Janice Levy watching them with the keen eyes of a behaviorist, watching for nuance, the slipup, anything that would give him away. “Wait'll you see inside,” Sandman was saying. “This place is you, man, I told you.”
Sandman was right. It “was” him, sure it was, no doubt about it. Even if the inside was as vacant as a barn or redecorated in motel revival with cottage cheese ceilings and lime-green paint he would have taken it on sight, the deal already done and awaiting only his approval. And Janice Levy's approval of them, on behalf of the Walter Meisters, who were already in West Palm Beach because Mrs. Meister, at seventy-two, could no longer take the winters and didn't care how muggy and buggy Florida got, it couldn't be any worse than a New York summer, even with the breeze off the river. Muggy was muggy. At least that was what Janice Levy told them, pinching her voice just this side of caricature to impersonate the old lady as she showed them through the place, pointing out the amenities and spewing away non-stop.
Sandman-he looked good, looked respectable, his tattoos covered up under a long-sleeved button-down shirt in a pale banker's blue that brought out the color of his eyes and his facial hair reduced to a single strip of dirty blond soul beard depending from his lower lip-grinned and tugged at his sleeves and dropped his baritone down to its most soothing pitch as they shuffled through the rooms and Janice Levy waved and jabbered and professionally ingratiated herself. “And the bar,” he said. “Look at the bar.”
They were in the main room, with its fireplace and views out to the river, oak floors, golden with age, the bar-sink and mini-fridge beneath it-tucked in against one white-plastered wall. “Yeah,” he heard himself say, “nice.” He was wearing his expressionless expression beneath the new mirror shades he'd picked up in a mall someplace in Utah, give nothing away, though the price had already been set and there was no reason or room for bargaining, sign the papers or walk. But this was how he did business: never let them know what you're thinking.
Natalia ran a hand over the burnished surface of the bartop and turned to Janice Levy to ask about storage space. “Are there not closets?”
Balancing one elbow in a cupped palm and tilting her head in what was meant to be an ingenuous way, Janice Levy assured her that the closets were more than adequate, though, of course, in an old house-a classic house-you did have to be creative. And didn't she know just the antique dealer to find her some real period pieces, wardrobes, chiffoniers, breakfronts, but really, a house like this- That sold Natalia right there-that and the kitchen, which, as Sandman had promised, had been upgraded to the highest haute bourgeois standard (the Meisters were real foodies, Janice Levy confided, with over five hundred cookbooks alone). The kitchen pleased him too-granite countertops, a prep island, hooks for the saucepans, the big Viking range every bit the equal of the one they'd left behind-and he made the mistake of saying so.
“Oh, are you a foodie, then, Mr. Martin?”
He gave her a stare, then removed the shades to fix his eyes on her, to show her he was sympathetic, handsome, dashing, a ladies' man, nobody to fear. “I wouldn't go that far,” he said. “I like to cook. And I like a good restaurant too.”
Natalia was fully warmed up at this point-he could see the let's-go-shopping look settling into her pretty dark whiskey-colored eyes, a whole new house to fill, a real house, a country estate surrounded by antique dealers and Manhattan just over an hour away. “He is the best. A cook to dream for. And wine. His own sommelier.”
Janice Levy was watching him. So was Sandman. The time had come to sign the papers, two-year lease with an option to buy, break open the Perrier-Jouët and get the real estate lady out the door so she could drive overfed couples around in her white Land Cruiser and sell, sell, sell. She knew all about him. Knew the amount he kept in his bank accounts, knew how much equity he had in the condo in Mill Valley, knew he was clean, debt-free, and that he was twenty-nine years old and had a degree from the USC film school and money to burn. “So,” she said, laying her briefcase on the bar and snapping the latches with a practiced flip of both thumbs, “what is it you said you did? For a living, I mean?”
“Investments.”
“Oh,” she said, “of course. Yes, I knew that.” She was marshaling the papers for his signature, the handing over of the check, the first six months paid in advance, Sandman to get his deposit back, when she mused: “You're in the film business?” In the background he could hear Madison's piping skirl of a voice, “Mommy, Mommy, there's a swing set!”
“No,” he said, moving up to stand beside her and run his gaze over the first page of the agreement, “that's an amateur's game. It's like gambling, know what I mean?”
Her eyes-they were green, sharp, attractive, definitely interested-shifted to him. He could smell her perfume. Like all real estate women she had terrific legs, which she showed off in a skirt that fell just below the knee. “No, not really. But I do have a client looking for a house now who works in TV, in Manhattan, and he-”
“Investments,” he repeated. “Keep it real.”
“Yes,” she said, nodding vigorously. “Oh, yes. Definitely.”
The trip cross-country wasn't exactly what he'd envisioned-they'd stretched it out to two weeks and a day, and they did manage to see the Great Salt Lake, an Amish village and the world's biggest longhorn steer, all for Madison's benefit, but there was no Tahoe and no Vegas. Once he'd got back on I-80 he just kept going, his mind working round the sharp edges of what had happened back there outside of Sacramento, and after he crossed the state line he began to rethink things. For one, there was no real reason to dawdle-a little R & R, sure, please the kid and Natalia too-but the sooner he got settled in New York and started making some real money again, the better. And the car. He'd been in panic mode there for a while, the adrenaline scouring his veins and seriously impairing his judgment. He had ID. He had papers for the car. It was his, no question about it, and once he was out of California he didn't have to worry about the cops either-if that was even a worry to begin with-and plus he had money in the thing. He'd paid ten thousand down, cash, on Natalia's Z4 and had better than a year's payments in it too, and so no, he wasn't going to unload the Mercedes. Dealer plates were nothing-he'd just toss them, make up a phony pink slip and register the thing in New York. And when Bob Almond of Bob Almond Mercedes/BMW wanted to know where his payments were, well, he could go on down to San Roque and try to shake them out of Bridger Martin, the asshole.
And so he'd kept going, Natalia dozing, Madison awake now in back and playing her videos over and over, the maddening rupture of the kiddie soundtrack better than the claws-bared assault of Natalia's nagging, and that wasn't over yet-she was just giving her vocal cords a rest. Scenery-or lack of it-fled by the windows. He kept his foot on the gas and his eyes on the rearview. It must have been four or so before Madison started whining and Natalia lifted her head to give him a stare that burned right through him, Winnemucca bleak, Elko bleaker, and in a withering voice wondered if he intended to drive all day and all night without stopping even to perform their natural functions or consume-that was the word she used-anything of nourishment. “Are you planning to stop,” she said, and he wouldn't look at her, his eyes on the road, “or are you still running?”
“I'm not running.”
“Then what are you doing?”