Rich People Problems (41 page)

PLACE DE FURSTENBERG, PARIS

Scheherazade padded into the gleaming, state-of-the-art kitchen of her apartment in Saint-Germain, lifted the lid from her frying pan, and put a finger on the crust. Not ready yet. She put the lid over the pan again, went back into her dressing room, and took off her sheer ruffled Delpozo blouse. She had just returned from a party at the loft of a fashion photography couple, where the former pastry chef at Noma had cooked up the most elaborate feast ever, but all through the dinner, Scheherazade only dreamed of getting back to her place, heating up some two-day-old pizza in her frying pan,
^*
opening a bottle of red wine, and catching up on
The Walking Dead
.

Changing into her pajamas, she brought the plate of pizza into her living room, sank down into her gray suede sofa, turned on her television, and selected the latest episode. As her favorite show began to play, the dialogue was suddenly drowned out by the sound of muffled music outside her window. Scheherazade turned up the volume on her TV, hoping to drown out the noise, but it only got louder. Cars started honking on the street and a neighbor could be heard screaming out his window.

Getting annoyed, Scheherazade paused the show, walked over to her balcony, and opened the glass-paned doors. Suddenly the full force of the music flooded her ears, and as Scheherazade peered over her railing, she saw the most curious sight. Carlton Bao was standing on the roof of a Range Rover parked outside her building, holding up a boom box that was blasting Peter Gabriel's “In Your Eyes.”

“Carlton! What the hell are you doing?” Scheherazade shouted down at him, absolutely mortified.

“I'm trying to get your attention!” Carlton shouted back.

“What do you want?”

“I want you to listen to me. I want you to know that I'm not some reckless killer! The only thing I'm guilty of is falling—”

“What? Turn down the music! I can't hear you!”

Carlton refused to turn down the music, but yelled louder, “I said the only thing I'm guilty of is falling in love with yo—”

At that moment, four bodyguards dressed in civilian clothes suddenly grabbed him by the legs, yanked him off the car, and body tackled him onto the ground.

“Oh fuck!” Scheherazade started giggling. She ran out the door, down four flights of stairs, and out the front door. “Get off him!” she told the security guards that were now standing over Carlton.

“Miss Shang, are you sure?”

“Yes, I'm sure! He's fine. He's with me,” Scheherazade insisted.

The beefiest guard reluctantly released his knee from Carlton's back, and when Carlton got off the ground, Scheherazade saw that the left side of his face was all cut up from the asphalt.

“Oh no. Come upstairs—let's get some disinfectant on that,” Scheherazade said. As they entered her building and rode up in the ornate wrought-iron elevator, she looked him over again.

“What did you think you were doing?”

“That was my wildly romantic gesture!”

Scheherazade frowned. “That was supposed to be romantic?”

“I was doing my best John Cusack impersonation.”

“Who?”

“You know,
Say Anything
.”

“Say what?”

“You haven't seen the movie, have you?” Carlton said, suddenly crestfallen.

“No, but you did look cute standing on top of that car,” Scheherazade said, pulling him in for a kiss.

At the other end of Paris, Charlie was walking back to the Hotel George V after a very frustrating dinner with Astrid's old friend Grégoire L'Herme-Pierre. Grégoire had been more charming than usual, and Charlie suspected that he knew far more about Astrid's whereabouts than he let on. She had been in Paris for probably three days, Grégoire surmised, and then she was gone.
No, she hadn't seemed distraught—I just assumed she was making her usual semiannual trip to the city for her couture fittings.

Over the past two weeks, Charlie had crisscrossed the globe frantically searching for Astrid. Mad with worry, he had started in Singapore, then Paris and London, going to all their familiar haunts and speaking with all her friends. He then headed down to Venice to see if she was hiding out in her friend Domiella Finzi-Contini's palazzo, but Domi, like so many of Astrid's friends, remained as silent as the Sphinx.
I haven't heard a peep from Astrid, but then I've been in Ferrara for the past month. We always spend the winter in Ferrara. No, I didn't hear about the scandal at all.

Now he was back in Paris, trying to retrace her steps, trying to understand how she could have abandoned her entire life, and how her family didn't seem to care that she had been missing for the past month. Entering the hotel, he went to the reception desk to see if there had been any messages.
No, monsieur, nothing for you tonight.

Charlie went up to his suite and opened the doors to the balcony, letting in some fresh cold air. The cold air kept him on his toes, helped him to think clearly. Paris had been a dud. She had been here, but she clearly wasn't coming back. He should try Los Angeles next. Even though her brother Alex had assured him she wasn't there, he was still suspicious. His entire security team and all the private investigators he had hired had been poring over everything since day one. Astrid had been meticulous. She hadn't left any sort of paper trail, no bank transfers, no credit card charges in more than five weeks. Someone had to be helping her. Someone close.

He stepped out onto the balcony and leaned against the railing, gazing at the soft golden glow that always seemed to hover over Paris at night. The city, breathtakingly lovely as always, suddenly seemed so lonely. He should never have let her come to Hong Kong. She had insisted on coming, wanting to help him through his crisis, but when she saw Isabel in the ICU, hooked up to all those machines…he knew she was trying to be strong for him, for the girls, but he could see that it just devastated her. And then when Isabel's mother saw Astrid at the hospital, she went berserk, and that's when she gave the whole story to
The Daily Post
, breaking the scandal wide open. It was all his fault. His stupid damn fault.

Charlie went back into the suite and sat down on the bed. He opened the drawer beside the bed and took out a small brown padded envelope. It was an envelope that had been mailed to him in Hong Kong from this very hotel a few weeks ago, and inside was a box containing the engagement ring he had given Astrid, along with a handwritten note that he had now read hundreds of times:

Dear Charlie,

I've been doing a great deal of thinking over the past days. Ever since I came back into your life five years ago, I've only caused you heartache. I dragged you into my problems with Michael, I dragged you into my horrendous divorce, and now I have dragged you and your daughters into an unthinkable tragedy. Chloe and Delphine almost lost their mother, and I am the only one to blame. I feel like no matter how hard I try, nothing I do ever leads to anything good, and so the best I can think to do is to simply go away so that no more damage can be done. I don't think I will ever be fit to be your wife, and I can only hope and pray that you and your family will in time be able to find happiness and peace again.

Yours truly,

Astrid

P.S. Please give this ring to my cousin Nicky when you next have the chance. He should have it for Rachel.

Charlie put down the note and reclined on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Astrid had been lying on this very bed, probably staring at the same view. It was her favorite suite at the George V and he had been the one to introduce her to it the first time he brought her to Paris back in their university days. It seemed like a lifetime ago, and he wished he could just go back to that time and do everything differently. Charlie rolled over and buried his face in the pillow, inhaling deeply. He thought that if he breathed deep enough, maybe her scent would return.

*
Truly the best way to heat up two-day-old pizza. The crust gets crispy and the cheese gets cheesy if you leave a lid on for a minute at the end.

TYERSALL PARK, SINGAPORE

Rachel was walking through the rose garden, looking at the fresh new blooms and inhaling their deep, intoxicating scent when Nick returned. He had been to see Alfred Shang in the hope of raising enough money to buy Tyersall Park from his aunts.

“How did it go?” she asked as he entered the garden, although from the look on his face she already knew the answer.

“I walked him through the entire proposal, thinking he would at least throw me some kind of bone since Tyersall Park had been his father's estate. Do you know what he told me? He thinks that we are in the midst of another financial bubble waiting to burst, and when that implodes all of the property markets in Asia will collapse. He said, ‘If this idiot really wants to give you ten billion for Tyersall Park, you would be an even bigger idiot not to take it. Take his money and go buy some gold. It's the only asset worth keeping in the long run.' ”

Nick leaned into one of the rosebushes and said, “This is maybe the third time I've actually stood here and smelled the roses. It's funny how one takes things for granted when they've always been around.”

“We'll plant our own rose garden,” Rachel said encouragingly. “I think we can afford a little country house now, don't you think? Maybe in Vermont, or even in Maine. I hear North Haven is beautiful.”

“I dunno, Rachel. With four billion dollars, it's going to be tough finding something out there,” Nick deadpanned.

Rachel smiled. It was still impossible for her to fathom that kind of money coming into her life, especially since Nick had just spent the past month desperately trying to raise funds and not getting anywhere close to what he needed. Now that the deadline was up, and his last-ditch effort with Uncle Alfred had failed, Nick had no choice but to give in to his aunts' demands.

Picking a beautiful blossom that was dangling from a half-broken stem, Rachel looked up at Nick. “Shall we go in?”

“Yes, let's do this.” Nick took her hand and they walked up the stone steps into the house, where Nick's aunts sat pensively around a table in the library.

Alix looked up at him. “Are we ready to make the call?”

Nick nodded, and Felicity picked up the telephone in the middle of the table and dialed Oliver's number. “Hiyah! It's his international cell phone. Now we'll have to pay the long-distance rates,” Felicity grumbled.

The phone rang a number of times before Oliver picked up.

“Oliver, can you hear us? We have you on speakerphone here,” Alix shouted into the phone.

“Yes, yes, you can lower your voice. I can hear you just fine.”

“Where are you right now, Oliver?”

“I'm back in London at the moment.”

“Ah, how lovely. How's the weather today?”

“Hiyah,
gum cheong hay!
^*1
Let's just get on with it, Alix!” Victoria scolded.

“Oh, okay…um, I'll let Nicky speak, since he is technically the majority shareholder,” Alix said.

“Hi Oliver. Yes, I just wanted to inform you that we've reached a consensus.” Nick paused for a moment, took a breath, and then continued. “We're ready to take Jack Bing's offer of ten billion dollars for Tyersall Park.”

“Okay. And I am accepting on their behalf. We have a deal!” Oliver replied.

Felicity leaned in. “And Oliver, we'd like your expertise on valuing the furniture. We'll sell him most of the furniture and objects in the house, with the exception of a few things that we wish to keep.”

“He's not getting Mummy's Battenberg lace doilies, that's for sure,” Victoria muttered under her breath.

“Super. The Bings will be thrilled, and I know it hasn't been easy for all of you to reach this decision, but I can tell you that you have made a superb deal. This is a record-breaking amount for real estate, and I don't think you would have realized a price like this from anyone else on the planet. Great-aunt Su Yi would have been pleased.”

Nick rolled his eyes, while Victoria and Alix nodded.

“You'll let them know, Oliver?” Felicity asked.

“Of course. I will call Jack right after we get off the phone, and then I'll e-mail Freddie Tan to begin drawing up the contract.”

“Okay then, goodbye.” Nick turned off the speakerphone.

The ladies sighed collectively. “It's done,” Felicity muttered, as though she had just drowned a litter of puppies.

“It was the right thing to do. Ten billion dollars! Mummy would be so proud of us,” Alix said, dabbing her eyes with a rolled-up tissue. Felicity looked at her sister, wondering if what she said was true. Would her mother ever be proud of her?

Nick got up from the table and walked out the French doors into the garden again. Rachel was about to go after him when Alix placed a hand on her arm. “He'll be fine,” she said to Rachel.

“I know he will,” Rachel said softly.

I just put four billion dollars into his pocket and that fucker didn't even thank me
, Oliver thought after Nick had abruptly hung up. Then he picked up his phone again and called Kitty's cell phone.

“Kitty? It's done. The Youngs have accepted the offer…Yes, really…No, no, you can't move in next week, it's going to take a few months at the very least to get the deal done…Yes, they will sell some of the furnishings…Of course I will tell you what's worth acquiring, don't worry…I don't think we can pay them more to move out tomorrow. This has been a home to the family for more than a century, Kitty. They need some time to get things sorted and dismantle the estate. The silver lining is that you'll have time to plan the new interiors…Henrietta Spencer-Churchill? Yes, I do know her, but Kitty, why would you want the same designer who's already doing Colette's new house?…I know she's related to Princess Diana, but I have an even better idea…I can think of only one person in the whole world I would trust with a redo of Tyersall Park. Can you meet me in Europe next week?…No, not Paris. We're going to Antwerp, Kitty…No, it's not in Austria. Antwerp is a city in Belgium…Oh, you'll swing by London to pick me up? How awfully kind of you…Perfect. Look forward to it.”

Oliver hung up the phone and stared into his computer screen for a few minutes. Then he clicked on iTunes and scrolled through his albums until he found a song. He clicked play, and Puccini's “Nessun Dorma” came blasting on.
^*2
Oliver sat in his chair and listened to the first few verses of the aria. As it reached the crescendo, Oliver suddenly leapt out of his chair and started dancing madly around his flat. It was a wild, Dionysian release, and then he collapsed on the floor and started sobbing.

He was safe. Safe at last. With the commission earned on the sale of Tyersall Park, the long nightmare of the past two decades was finally over. His 1.5 percent commission on the Tyersall Park sale would garner $150 million, enough to pay off all his student loans and his parents' crushing debts. They wouldn't be rich, but at least they would have enough to survive. His family could be restored to a proper level of respectability again. He would never, ever have to fly economy again. As Oliver lay on the carpet of his London flat, staring up at the cracked plasterwork on the ceiling that had needed fixing ten years ago, he cried out in joy, “
All'alba vincerò! Vincerò, vinceròòòòòòò!
”