Never Too Rich (39 page)

Her nostrils narrowed of their own accord and her
eyes expressed disapproval. The air stank, a mixture of one part
oxygen to two parts carbon monoxide, and the sidewalk thrummed from
the constant pounding of hundreds of pairs of swiftly moving feet.
Whichever way she looked, she could see the bobbing of the crowd,
like a single surging liquid entity topped by uncountable human
heads.

All at once, excitement suffused her, and Edwina got
moving. Entering 69 Wall Street with five minutes to spare, she
crossed rapidly through the lobby and pushed her way into an
overcrowded elevator.

Beck, Flood, and Kronin, Inc., occupied the
twenty-first through twenty-eighth floors.

She got off on the twenty-first.

It was like entering another era and another
continent. The reception area could best be described as clubby.
There were masculine leather chesterfield sofas and Queen
Anne-style leather chairs. Gloomy paneled walls. Somber yellowed
portraits and hunting prints. All of it, Edwina knew, had been
designed to impart an air of solid, unshakable permanence—as if
Beck, Flood, and Kronin, Inc., hadn’t been formed a mere four years
earlier, but had been there since Henry Hudson had sailed along
these shores.

The receptionist smiled up at her and made a hushed
call. Soon a woman in a severely tailored dark blue suit and white
blouse arrived. Edwina followed her down a muffled corridor. They
passed traditionally decorated offices and conference rooms, and at
one point Edwina caught sight of a giant glass-walled room filled
with computer terminals, in which gesticulating young men were on
telephones while simultaneously keeping an eye on the electronic
stock-market board sliding by up near the ceiling.

Presently they came to the executive offices. The
transition was instantly obvious. The English portraits on the
walls were bigger and better: dukes instead of rich merchants. And
the antiques were genuine instead of reproductions.

And there in Leo Flood’s outer office, behind a
three-hundred-year-old desk, sat Miss Locust Valley Lockjaw
herself. She was a cold fish. Aloof, thin, and superefficient.
Dressed in gray pinstripes, the silken ruffle at her collar unable
to soften the edges. Edwina’s keen nostrils didn’t detect so much
as the faintest whiff of perfume.

“
Mr. Flood is in conference at the
moment and apologizes for the delay,” she said dismissively from
between clenched teeth. “Please have a seat. I’m sure he’ll be with
you shortly.”

Edwina smiled brightly, sat down in a Chippendale
chair, and crossed her legs. Presently four stoic Japanese
businessmen left the inner office, identical briefcases in hand,
and the intercom on Miss Lockjaw’s desk sounded.

Miss Lockjaw looked up. “Miss Robinson, you may go
in now,” she said, getting up to show her into the inner sanctum.
As she held the door open, she smiled. Actually showed teeth.

Edwina stepped into the office. The first thing that
hit her was the silence. The place was like an undiscovered tomb.
Obviously a lot of soundproofing had gone into it. And then she
looked around and was
really
impressed. It was a corner
office with two walls of windows and had been carved out of two
entire floors. The ceiling seemed to reach to heaven. Sleek
laburnum paneling shone like glass. There was no desk, but there
were no fewer than three coffee tables. And three groups of leather
seating arranged around them. All in electric-blue glove leather!
Her very shade!

Her estimation of Leo Flood instantly rose sky-high.
Weather permitting, she wished she’d worn her sheared
electric-blue-dyed mink cape.

Leo Flood was standing by the windows, hands clasped
behind his back. Sensing her presence, he turned around and strode
across the vast expanse of carpeting. “Miss Robinson.”

Edwina took his proffered hand. Gripped it as firmly
as he gripped hers. “Mr. Flood.”

He grinned. “Leo,” he said reprovingly. “If we’re to
do business, you’ll have to call me by my first name.”

“
And you,” Edwina laughed, “can
call me Eds. All my friends do. I’ve been stuck with it since
childhood.”

“
Your mother must have had some
sense of humor. Do you know, you’re the first Edwina G. Robinson
I’ve ever met?”

“
I can believe it.”

He looked her over. “I like your suit.”

She looked down at herself and smiled wryly. “You
should,” she said, looking back up at him. “It’s Antonio de Riscal.
Spring 1988 collection.” Bought in flusher times, with her
twenty-five-percent employee discount, she didn’t add.

“
I’m surprised you’re not wearing
one of your own designs.”

“
That’s because I’ve only just
begun. Everything’s still in the planning stages.”

“
If all goes well, maybe you can
give de Riscal a run for his money, eh?”

“
That’s exactly what I intend to
do,” she said with quiet conviction.

He grinned broadly. “That you will, I’m sure.”
Suddenly he laughed. “You know, you remind me of myself when I
first got started. It was, oh . . . eight, nine years ago. Someone
had set up an interview for me at Salomon Brothers for a real
low-echelon job, but one I would have killed for at the time.

“ ‘
What do you really want to do?’
I was asked by the man in personnel.

“
Would you believe I had the gall
to say, ‘I intend to be a multimillionaire by the time I’m
thirty’?”

Edwina laughed. “And what happened?”

“
Needless to say, I didn’t get the
job. But the thing that got me was the guy’s reaction. He just
stared at me and said, ‘What’s supposed to happen to your job if
you do become a multimillionaire? Then we’re out of an employee
trained at our expense.’ At first I thought he was joshing me, but
he was serious! Of course, the reality of my doing that was
practically zilch. But the fact remains, it
did
happen, Eds!
And I learned three valuable lessons from that interview that I’ll
never forget.”

She looked at him, intrigued.

“
Lesson number one,” he said
softly, “is that dreams can come true. Number two, that Salomon
lost one hell of an executive—and potentially tons of money—by
turning me away. And number three, the most important lesson of
all: had I worked for them, all this”—he gestured around the huge
office—”would never have happened.”

Edwina stared at him.

“
It makes you think, doesn’t it?
Come on, let’s go sit down.” He took her by the elbow and guided
her over to one of the seating groups. She noted that he placed her
so that she faced a Goya painting, while he faced an electronic
stock board built into the laburnum paneling.

But all he seemed to have eyes for was her. The
green quotations slid by silently and unnoticed.

She took a moment to assess him. From the top of his
ebony hair to the unmarred soles of his beautifully crafted
hand-sewn black shoes, everything about Leo Flood was beautifully
turned-out and exceptionally groomed. The tailor-made silver-gray
silk suit, obviously from Savile Row. The lightning-bolt slashes of
his Slavic cheekbones. The manicure. The tan. The twin rows of
Hollywood-perfect teeth, marred only by the too-sharp predatory
canines. Had he not smiled so much, he would have been almost
frightening in his cold physical perfection.

But handsome, she conceded, feeling a sudden
tightness squeezing her gut. Unsurpassingly handsome. No. His looks
went beyond handsome, she amended. He was almost beautiful in a
Dark Angel kind of way.

As she suddenly realized that he was examining and
assessing her just as keenly as she was evaluating him, a blush,
like two scarlet lollipops, burned through the brilliant makeup on
her cheeks. Quickly she looked away.

“
I suppose,” he said, breaking the
awkward silence, “my call must have come as a surprise.”

She turned back to him. “It did,” she admitted, glad
their mutual inspection was over. “But what I don’t understand
is—why
me?
With everyone out there, what do you want with
me?”

“
Simple.” He looked at her
shrewdly. “I think you’ve got what it takes.”

“
I see,” she said
dubiously.

His eyes were riveted on hers. “Unlike that fool at
Salomon Brothers, I make it a point to seek out and back bright
young talent.”

She frowned. “Okay. But I’m curious about another
thing. Why fashion? The garment industry doesn’t seem to be what
this place is all about.”

“
This place is about business,” he
said, “about the lowest common denominator: profits. And fashion
is
a business. I don’t think I need to tell you that the
garment industry is the biggest industry in this city.”

“
No,” she murmured, “I already know
that.”

“
And just so that we’re clear about
one thing, when I say fashion, I’m not talking about a few ball
gowns here or a few couture suits there.”

She sat up a little straighter. “Then what
are
you talking about, Leo?” she asked in a hushed
voice.

“
A big, brand-new major firm,” he
said. “One that will become a power to be reckoned with and will
eventually go public for big bucks. Something more along the line
of Liz Claiborne than Scassi.”

She could only stare at him. “You’re talking about a
billion-dollar-a-year business!” she said, shocked.

“
Yep.” He leaned back and grinned.
“That, in a nutshell, is my long-range plan.”

“
And the short-range
plan?”

“
To back you financially and see
that you help get us a goddamn foot in the door.”

She was silent for a moment. “I won’t be just a
figurehead, Leo,” she warned. “If that’s what you want, we don’t
need to discuss it any further.”

He laughed. “That’s fine by me. I’m not looking for
a figurehead; those come a dime a dozen. I want you.”

“
You sound very sure of yourself.
As if we
are
going to be working together.” She frowned
slightly and held his gaze.

“
Yep.” He grinned again. “That we
are.”

“
But you haven’t even seen anything
I’ve done!” she protested. “For all you know, I can’t design my way
out of a paper bag.”

“
On the contrary,” he said levelly.
“You’re good, Eds. Very good, in fact.”

She looked at him intently. “How do you know?”

He smiled slightly. “Because these tell me so.” He
sat forward, reached over to an end table, and picked up a sheaf of
drawing boards. Wordlessly he handed them to her.

One look, and she recognized them instantly. “How
did you get hold of these?” she demanded, slapping them down on the
coffee table.

“
Will knowing that decide you one
way or the other?”

She hesitated. “No,” she said finally.

He smiled. “Your ex-husband gave them to me.”

“
Duncan?” She couldn’t believe
it.

He nodded.

“
But he . . . he hasn’t even been
to the house since I did these!” she exclaimed. “How could he . . .
?”

“
It seems the people around you
care deeply about you, Eds. Your daughter gave them to him to show
to me.”

Anger rose like boiling lava inside her. It was all
she could do not to have a major temper tantrum. She crossed her
arms and sat there tight-lipped and fuming, tapping her elbows.
Vibrating lethal energy seemed to come off her like sparks.

“
You’re angry,” he said.

He wasn’t prepared for the way her silver-gray eyes
darkened to pitch black. “You bet your sweet patootie I’m angry!”
she said bitterly. “No one—
no one
—had the right to take off
with these! They’re
mine,
goddammit!”

As if on cue, a uniformed butler approached on
silent feet, cleared his throat, and announced that most hackneyed
of phrases: “Luncheon is served.”

Chapter 41

It was impossible for Edwina to sustain her anger
over lunch. Especially with Leo’s charm and attentiveness, the
luxury of the private dining room, and food that would have done
the chefs at Le Cirque proud. There was a terrine of fois gras,
followed by a saddle of venison with wild mushrooms, a salad, and
warm rhubarb tarts. All washed down with Dom Ruinart Rosé and
Château Pichon-Lalande, 78.

“
Ideally,” Edwina said, her eyes
fixed on his, “the first collection will be completed within the
next eight months and be in the stores by the middle of next
year.”

Leo was silent for a moment. “In other words, May or
June,” he said thoughtfully. “That makes it the summer collection.”
He frowned slightly. “Won’t it be a little late in the season for
that?”

“
Yes.” She nodded. “Under normal
circumstances it would be. But you see, that’s the beauty of it. We
won’t
be launching the first collection late.” Something sly
came into her eyes and shone brightly. “We’ll be launching it
early.” She picked up her wine, swirled it around in the glass, and
sat back, waiting for his response.

He looked at her with new respect. “In other words,
you’re proposing we unveil the fall collection in the
beginning
of summer?”

“
Right!” She nodded, looking at him
warmly and feeling very pleased with herself. If she had to say one
thing about Leo Flood, she thought, it was that he caught on
fast.

“
Hmmm.” He chewed a bite of venison
thoughtfully, then gestured with his fork. “Don’t you think that’s
jumping the gun a little?”