One Way or Another(76)

“But I wanted to tell you,” he’d said to Marco. “I thought it important you know, because of Martha. After all, you’re painting the man’s portrait, you’ll see enough of him to know the truth. But me, well I’m f*cking scared of that place, and of him. I want nothing more to do with any of it.”

The other call Marco was surprised to receive had been from Mehitabel.

He was alone in his studio, the light was fading and he was cleaning up, contemplating taking Em for a walk to the café on the corner where he always had a ham sandwich, no mustard, which he shared with the dog. He wasn’t too happy to answer the phone call, especially when he saw it was “caller unknown,” but he did, and immediately wished he had not.

“You remember me” was her opening gambit. “Mehitabel.”

“The woman with only one name,” he said. “And the wonderful emeralds.”

“Unfortunately the emeralds have gone back to Cartier. I had them only for the night.”

The mention of Cartier brought an image of the gold panther necklace and Angie. “What can I do for you?” He was curious despite his antipathy for Mehitabel, and besides he would still like to paint her. Like Ahmet, whose sketches and Polaroids he’d pinned to the studio walls in preparation for the portrait, she had an arresting quietude that hid all emotion. What you saw in Mehitabel was definitely not what you got. She was a cipher. An enigma. A question mark.

“I need to see you,” she said. “To talk to you. About Ahmet. There are things you don’t know.”





55

Ahmet puzzled over Mehitabel’s behavior; about the way she avoided his eyes, her sudden secretiveness. Entering his office unexpectedly, he’d caught her mid–phone call, which she had immediately cut off. When he questioned it, she’d told him it was a jeweler interested in lending her a necklace for the ball.

“Of course they’re only after the publicity,” Ahmet said. “We’ll use Cartier, as usual, but get diamonds this time, not colored stones.” He looked at her, standing nervously in the doorway, obviously dying to get out.

“Mehitabel, come back in here.” It was not a request, it was an order and, as always, she obeyed.

She stood looking down at the papers arranged so neatly on his desk.

“I put everything about the ball there for you to approve,” she said.

The slightly higher pitch of her voice told Ahmet his suspicions were valid. “Better tell me what you’re up to,” he said, very cool, very calm. “Before I find out for myself.”

Mehitabel did not remove her eyes from the desk; obviously wondering what to say, how to avoid his suspicions, how not to let on that she was planning her attack on him, not of course in the physical way a man like him might anticipate. Her strike would be emotional, and it was Lucy she planned to use as her weapon.

“I’m simply trying to protect you,” she said. “You are my only concern, Ahmet. You look after me, I look out for you. I know where to find enemies, I know when you are being cheated on.”

He glanced sharply at her. “What do you mean by that?”

“Cheated on? Why, by little Lucy, of course. And her pizza delivery boy, the one that comes over to her apartment after he’s finished work, the one that stays the night with her. The one she’s probably f*cking, of course, Ahmet.”

He was out of his chair, a powerful man, towering over her, his hands on her throat.

“Oh, God,” she whispered, terrified. “God, Ahmet, allow me to finish … it’s for your own good.”

He flung her away from him. She fell back against the desk, a hand to her throat where his fingers had almost prized the life out of her. She hated him so much at that moment she could have killed him too, with the sharp paper knife he used to open envelopes and that he played with, constantly toying with it in his fingers while staring absently into space, as though remembering times past, when, Mehitabel had no doubt, he had used it. How many men, she wondered, had Ahmet killed, or caused to be killed? More women than men, she guessed now, seeing the bitter anger on his face, noting the tremor in his hands as he took a seat behind his expensive desk, in his expensive leather chair, straightening his expensive jacket. She could almost see him reminding himself who he was. His eyes, when he finally looked back at her, told her exactly who he thought she was. And that he could not do without her.

“We are comrades in arms, you and I, Mehitabel,” he said. “You need me in order to exist, and I need you to take care of my very existence. To carry out my wishes, almost before I have thought of them myself.”

She nodded, her hand still at her throat where she knew his fingerprints stained her neck.

“You will not touch Lucy,” he said, in that cold, emotionless voice that held more threat than an angry shout ever could. “You will see that she is taken care of. You will become her friend, take her shopping for a dress to wear to the ball, make sure her hair is fixed properly, her makeup done professionally. I myself will choose the jewels she will wear. Please keep the dress simple, black, velvet, long sleeves; she is not to be made outrageous in any way. She will look like the well-brought-up young woman she is. The young woman,” he added with a sharp glance at Mehitabel, “who I intend will become my wife.”

“Hah!” Mehitabel threw back her head in a laugh. “And who is going to tell Lucy that she’s going to become your wife? She’s not one of your young sluts anxious for anything you throw their way. Believe me, Lucy Patron knows exactly who she is, and where she comes from, and even if she is thinking of f*cking the pizza guy she’s still the kind of proper girl who’ll save herself for the marriage bed. And that bed will not be yours, Ahmet. How do I know that? Because Martha Patron will make sure it’s not. If you doubt me, ask Marco. He will tell you the truth and I promise you won’t like it.”