The Golden Girl (7 page)

“Sounds delicious.”

“Then hop aboard my magic carpet and off we go.”

The ride back to the city was uneventful, but Maddie kept looking over her shoulder anyway, and John kept glancing in his side-view mirrors. Finally, they reached the outskirts of the city. As they sped along the streets of Harlem, they eventually reached an area that was gentrifying. Buildings were spruced up, townhomes were showing signs of renovation, and small shops and groceries and bakeries were bustling with afternoon activity.

John pulled next to a small town house, and parked his bike in a spot next to the building. Painted on the blacktop was white paint that read Apartment 2B.

They took their helmets, and she followed him into his building, a brownstone divided into two apartments on each floor.

Apartment 2B was a one-bedroom with a large, open living-room area that doubled as a dining area, and a decent-size kitchen. Long, narrow windows with crown molding let in a little afternoon sun onto hardwood floors.

“This is really lovely,” Maddie said, looking around. “I like the floors—old-fashioned hardwood.”

“Did ’em myself,” John said proudly. “They were here, but under the most god-awful carpet you ever saw. I had to refinish them. I got into this building ages ago when, trust me, you wouldn’t even want to walk down the block. I fixed the apartment up, put in the crown molding, did those shelves there. Spruced up my place, and little by little, the neighborhood spruced up, too.”

Maddie looked around. His furnishings were eclectic—if she had to put her finger on it, she’d say there was a vague Asian influence mixed with some flea-market finds. On one table sat what looked like a real Tiffany lamp. She walked over and touched it.

“That was my grandmother’s.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“What’s your apartment like?”

“Oh…you’ll see it one day. It’s nice. You know…um…a little more traditional. But nice.”

She felt herself getting in deeper and deeper with her lies.

“Come on over here, and I’ll pour you some wine while I cook.”

He uncorked a bottle of cabernet, and Maddie sat on a wicker stool at his breakfast bar and watched him while he carefully prepared dinner.

“Can I help?”

“No. I decided yesterday I would rather cook for you and spend an evening alone together, talking, instead of in a noisy restaurant, so I’m all set. If you want, go turn on the stereo over there. I have it preset to some stations. I think the second button is a jazz one. The first is classical. Moving up it gets into rock. One hip-hop.”

Maddie climbed down from the stool and turned on the stereo, ultimately choosing the jazz station. She pulled out her cell, text messaged Troy “IM OK,” then she went back to watch John as he busied himself in the kitchen.

Funny, she thought, she had grown up with a chef in her home. But he treated the immense kitchen with its restaurant ranges and subzero refrigerators, and built-in wine coolers, like a restaurant. Joseph would chase her out of “his” kitchen, and because her mother insisted on a macrobiotic diet—the better to avoid adolescent weight gain, she told Madison—the “poor little rich girl” had never even licked cake batter from beaters. Or watched anyone prepare an entire meal. She tried to imagine Ryan Greene—or any of the men she knew, for that matter—chopping onions or peeling garlic.

Over wine, John told her more about his childhood, and his first forays into the gang.

“Have you ever really hurt someone?” she asked him, thinking clearly for the first time of pulling the trigger at the warehouse.

He nodded. “One of the requirements for getting into the gang was you had to commit a mugging. So I did. I was so tired of getting jumped on my way to school. The gangs offered a street family. So I mugged someone—an older guy on his way home from work. He had on a uniform for a gas station. Old guy, like I said. Looked a little frail. But he ended up having a gun. I wrestled him for it…and I hit him on the head.”

“Was he okay?”

“Yeah. I mean, I’m sure he had a big welt the next day. But I felt terrible.”

“It’s hard to picture you doing something like that. When I see you in class, those kids absolutely revere you.”

“Well, at the end of the day, it’s about making a difference. It’s not about how much money you have, or your possessions…”

She thought about being an agent. Would she be able to make a difference so that Claire did not die in vain? That was part of how Renee put it. She had a chance to
do
something.

After an hour or two of simmering, dinner was done. John uncorked a second bottle of wine and lit some candles. While he did that, she helped set the table. On his refrigerator, she noticed pictures of his class—including one of her, front and center on the fridge, leaning in next to Anna as they worked on the computer. She smiled to herself.

Over dinner, they sat and ate, as usual the conversation not lagging. After they finished, he invited her into the living-room area. “When we’ve digested dinner, I’ve got a homemade dessert. I made flan yesterday, but I’m too full—unless you’re still hungry.”

“Not me. Stuffed for right now. But dinner was wonderful.”

He refilled her wineglass and sat next to her on the couch, draping an arm around her. She was surprised at how comfortable she felt around him. She was so used to being cautious.

He turned his face to her, his dark eyes full of passion and intensity, and began kissing her neck. He moved his arm from her shoulder to take her face in his hands. Soon, they were kissing ravenously.

Madison had never felt anything that she would describe as raw passion before. Her few boyfriends over the years had been as tightly wound in their careers as she was. They scheduled sex into their PalmPilots and BlackBerry PDAs and arranged dates after board meetings—often canceling at a moment’s notice for business reasons. But this, with John, was a hunger, and they hurriedly undressed each other, moving from the living room to his bedroom, which was cozy and lit by a small night-light.

When he entered her, she was amazed at his strong, hard body, but more than that, she was breathless from the emotions he seemed to project, this intensity that took her breath away. He grabbed at her hair, and she found herself wrapping her fingers in the dark curls at the nape of his neck, moaning in rhythm to the way he made love—because that’s how it really felt—to her.

When they were both spent, it still wasn’t over—not the way she was used to. They kissed for an hour, maybe more, eventually their passion growing again. And in some ways, Madison Taylor-Pruitt knew she would never again be satisfied with trust-funders again. It was John Hernandez she craved.

After he finally fell asleep, his breath heavy on her shoulder, his arms tightly wound around her, she thought again of the bad guys following her. They were just one of many secrets she now kept from John, and she found she wanted to wake him up and tell him everything, but something held her back. And she hoped, and even prayed a little, that one day John would understand.

“S
lumming?”

She and Ashley were drinking Blue Pearl martinis at the Blue Pearl Club, known for its signature drink. At sixty bucks a pop, the martinis had an ever so slight bluish tinge, almost like an abalone shell, and real pearl dust—edible, Ash explained.

“I’m not slumming.”

“Well, you’re screwing some hot Latino lover from Harlem, honey, what would you call it?”

“Ashley…give me a break. I’ve known him a long time through my charity. This has been developing.”

Ashley tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear—where diamond earrings hung from her delicate lobes.

“I once went slumming. It was the summer of my senior year of college, and my boyfriend at the time—you know, the rum-and-whiskey heir I told you about…the one with the big bankbook but the tiny penis—well, he was boring me to no end. Knee deep in some kind of merger. Always at the office. And things in the bedroom weren’t exactly rocking my world.”

Madison sipped her martini. It was delicious, she’d give Ashley that. “And?”

“
And
my father was whisking me off to Monaco for a little R&R while he handled some kind of business. And I met a Frenchman.”

“Since when is a Frenchman slumming it?”

“When he’s a croupier, darling. He worked in a casino in Monte Carlo. And he looked absolutely delicious in a tuxedo.”

“You’re incorrigible.”

“You don’t know the half of it. As a lover, he spoiled me for eternity, Maddie. Oh, what that man could do in bed. But, after a while, I realized it was somewhat mechanical. You know, like he was such a good lover, it was all about how he could play me like a violin, rather than any real passion. Still…a great summer.”

“Well…” Madison mused. “This was real passion. Real.”

“So what does he think of the fact you don’t blink at dropping sixty bucks on a martini? Or the fact that your great-grandmother used to spend the summers with Eleanor Roosevelt? Or the art collection…?”

Madison blushed.

“What?”

“I haven’t told him yet.”

“You are kidding me.”

“Nope. I kind of wish I was.”

Ashley shook her head. “Girlfriend…you are asking for trouble. Because the way you talk about this guy, I think you really care about him. And that’s dangerous. Have your boy toy, Madison, but settle down with someone like Ryan. Someone who really gets you. Otherwise you’re going to have a mess on your hands, I promise you.”

“Give me a break. Look, even when socialites wed ‘their own kind,’ like you’re talking about, it doesn’t usually work out. Can you honestly tell me that you would really be satisfied having a boy-toy gardener or whatever on the side while pretending to be happily married in some socially acceptable marriage?”

Ashley had a twinkle in her eye. “Ever notice how my mother always looks so refreshed? Well, trust me, my father is gone on business—with his secretary—about a hundred days of the year. And Mom? She’s got a very hot yoga instructor who gives her private lessons right in her home.”

“You’re horrible, Ash!”

“No, just practical.”

The two women soaked up the scene. Madison spotted Tatiana—one of the other Gotham Rose agents. Tatiana walked by her and Ash and winked at Madison.

“What was that?” Ash asked.

Madison shrugged. She decided to head home. Ash volunteered her limo, but Madison wanted to clear her head from the events of the weekend.

She walked the fourteen blocks to her building, every nerve on fire. She kept waiting to run into the Russian. She stayed alert, and felt at her back for the gun she wore. She wondered if she would ever get used to wearing a gun as an agent. She wondered if she would ever get used to being an agent.

She knew though she couldn’t see them, Troy and another agent were watching her. She spied a white van and assumed it was them.

At her apartment, the doorman, Jean-Paul, tipped his cap and opened the heavy glass-and-brass door for her. Stepping into the lobby, the nighttime concierge stopped her.

“Ms. Pruitt?”

“Hmm?”

“A package arrived for you this evening.”

“From whom? It’s Sunday.”

“I know. It was hand delivered. By a chauffeur, by the looks of his uniform.”

“Did he say who he was or anything?”

The concierge shook his head. “He just said he was asked to deliver it.”

Madison eyed the box suspiciously but took it. Then she went to the elevator. The Sunday elevator operator, Antonio, pressed the button for the penthouse and she rode in silence to the top, staring down at the box in her hands. It wasn’t too heavy. And it wasn’t ticking. She half smiled to herself. She couldn’t believe how her mind was starting to work. She assumed the box wasn’t a bomb, but she still found the whole thing curious and couldn’t wait to be alone and open it. Then she stopped herself. Maybe it
would
be better if Troy was there.

She called him and he arrived within ten minutes. She let him into her apartment, and he went over to the box with some equipment similar to the wand used at airport security. He declared the box safe, and sliced into it with a sharp kitchen knife.

Madison peered into the box.

Inside was a strange collection of objects that seemed unrelated to one another, and a letter in a white envelope.

With shaking hands, Madison opened the letter and read it aloud to Troy.

Dear Madison,

This box is from Claire. She made me promise that if anything happened to her, I would have it hand delivered to you.

As you know, her father and I never approved of what she was doing at the end. And I know I will never get over her death. I would have some small measure of peace if I knew that the bastard responsible was in prison…but I am as confused as ever over the whole thing. And this box confused me, too. Did she know she was going to be murdered?

Part of me was tempted not to have it delivered. And I wish with all my heart I knew what these things meant. Maybe you do. If you figure it all out, maybe you can call me someday and tell me. I’d like to know what was on her mind in her final week on earth.

Her father and I were always very, very fond of you, Madison. Do keep in touch.

Sharon Shipley

Madison took out the objects one by one and laid them on the table:

A travel brochure from the Caymans

A key

A photo of the Manhattan skyline

Claire’s passport

A seashell

And finally, a map of New York and New Jersey.

Maddie opened the map, and there was a tiny red dot of ink on a town she had never heard of. Venetian Lake. In the upper corner of New York near the Canadian border.

“Looks like we’ll be taking a road trip,” Maddie muttered.

Then she sat down at the table with Troy and tried to figure out just what Claire was trying to say to her from beyond the grave.