One Way or Another(73)

Even the sea had not wanted Angie, despite all his efforts. He himself had brought her back from the Aegean, and from those marshes as if to prove his power over her, so she would know he was playing with her life and death. He’d enjoyed torturing her but now she was becoming a liability; people were inquiring after her, the media were onto it, the police were involved. It was dangerous to keep Angie around any longer and equally dangerous to try to dispose of her here. It would have to be Marshmallows.

Ahmet wondered why, for a man who had everything and who had been everywhere, his house on the bleak marshlands was his favorite, the one place in the world he could find peace of mind. Not always, but there were some nights, alone there, not a sound to be heard, not a footfall, no person, no animal, no ghost even to come back to haunt him, it was there he felt alive.

All the rest was just a fa?ade: the glossy yacht soon to be transformed by Martha into something even more spectacular, more in keeping with his new stature in the society to which he was introducing himself and the new people who had come to his party and would attend the ball he was to give, people who would be glad finally to call themselves his friends. He also wanted to be known as a man who helped his friends, a charitable man, which in truth he was, though he preferred to keep that a secret, never wanted anyone to suspect his background might have been the same as the poor vagrants he helped from the dark alleys into new lives. Sometimes he failed, of course, some did not make it, but he gave them a shot at a new beginning, as he was now about to give himself. He was going to become Ahmet Ghulbian, friend to everyone that counted, host supreme, generous to a fault. And, in private, a killer. Which brought him back to Angie again.

Mehitabel kept her closeted in the guest cabin. “A prisoner of luxury,” she told Ahmet with that slow smile that changed her eyes to stone. He admired Mehitabel, though she seemed to be getting a bit out of hand lately, a little “above herself,” as the saying went. In truth, he no longer trusted Mehitabel, and he knew enough to believe the old adage credited to Mephistopheles, that if a man was only ninety-nine percent and not one-hundred percent with you, he was not your friend. Mehitabel had dropped to that ninety-ninth percentage; he could sense it in her body language, in the captured disdainful expression when she thought he was not looking, in the faint air of impertinence with which she turned and walked from a room. He had made Mehitabel, and he could break her. Without those emeralds around her neck she would be back to being a nobody. Or perhaps even, when he had used her for the final time, she would be nonexistent, the way Angie would.

What he needed now was to get back to Marshmallows, taking Angie and Mehitabel with him. The problem was that Marshmallows was still in the process of being renovated. The last report from Martha was that her assistant, a Mr. Sorris, was taking care of the final details, as was her sister Lucy.

Lucy! Dear God, he had not so much as considered Lucy in the scheme of the events he was planning. His little Lucy, who was to be the light of his life. Finally, he would have a reason for existence other than just the making of more money, of being the richest of the rich, the revered businessman admired by all and friend of none. He had not thought anything of her being alone at Marshmallows with one of Martha’s male employees but now it bothered him enough to get Martha on the phone.

“Just to thank you again for the wonderful yacht party,” he said, almost purring his gratitude, pleasing her.

“The first of many, I hope,” Martha said, a little absently because she was facing ten different logistical problems of “how to” and “why not” and “where is it” and “what happened,” and wondering if she was in over her head with this Ghulbian job anyhow. In fact Ahmet was the very last person she wanted to talk to right now, when all her plans seemed to be falling apart. Why was it people promised to fix, to alter, to make, to deliver by a certain date, then later told her it was impossible, and that was, as she reminded them fiercely, after she had paid a hefty deposit, the remainder of which money would not be forthcoming until she saw the end result. The “end result” usually came through after that, but not without some wrecked nerves on her part, which interfered with her relationship with Marco, who couldn’t stand her when she was stressed out. He simply took himself off to paint and left her to it.

Martha did not blame him, but she did miss him. She had not seen Marco since the yacht party and the lovely time together in the hotel in Nice, just the two of them. Of course Lucy had been with them too and the dog. Martha thought it was a good thing the old family home was still standing because the numbers were growing; when you added together family and friends she was going to need all the space she could get. She also needed the commission from Ahmet to make enough money to redo Patrons the way it should be done, that is, to restore it to the way it was when her mother and father lived there. Martha wanted it to be exactly the same only repaired, refinished, shiny with love and newness. “Home” would definitely be where her and Marco’s hearts would be.

And now here was Ahmet Ghulbian on the phone demanding that his hideous place, Marshmallows, be finished even before the day of the party, which gave her less than a week. Of course much of the work had already been done. Morrie confirmed that it was looking good, apart, he said, from Mehitabel being there, and him telling Martha he would never go back because it was haunted. That was all she’d needed; it meant now she would have to go there alone to check on how work was going. She couldn’t send Lucy, not after Ghulbian helicoptered her off with him like that, wining and dining her, coming on to her. Marco might have to remind Ghulbian that Lucy was only seventeen, that his behavior was not appropriate, that, in fact, he had better lay off. Meanwhile she would keep Lucy out of his way, take care of Marshmallows herself. In fact, she would go there today, check what was left to be done and see if what had been done was correct. She had time to get there and back to London before dinner.