and her companion, dark complexioned, sunglasses, a little younger, in a navy cashmere blazer and jeans. The woman stopped at the top of the steps and said a word of thanks to the pilot, complimenting him on the landing.
“Always perfect, Mike.”
“Always a pleasure, Mrs. Simons. We’ll wait to hear from you on the Anguilla trip.”
“I’ll have Pam be in touch as soon as I know. You have a nice week.”
As they stepped down to the tarmac, both wore the tan of a week of spring skiing in Aspen.
Merrill Simons was forty-four and a household name around the charity circuit in Greenwich. Over the years she had chaired dozens of balls, served on a thousand committees, pretty much knew everyone. That went hand in hand with being married for twenty-three years to Peter Simons, chairman of Wall Street’s Reynolds Reid.
But that was all ancient history now. Their divorce had been finalized a year ago, six months after he had moved in with Erskina Menshikova, the Victoria’s Secret lingerie model, granting Merrill the house on Dublin Hill, the place in Palm Beach, and the penthouse overlooking the park on Fifth Avenue, not to mention continued use of the private jet.
The very same six months before the divorce was final, Merrill acknowledged, with a certain degree of relish, Reynolds Reid’s stock had begun to collapse, due to the firm’s heavy exposure in the mortgage crisis and the resulting wave of global sell-offs. She’d always suspected Peter didn’t know shit about dealing with a balance sheet, any more than he knew about being a father or keeping a marriage together.
She’d gotten that one right!
Now she enjoyed the thought that he was probably sweating bullets with a net worth about a quarter of what it was at the time of their settlement and was probably no longer able to get it up with his silky-thighed, golden-haired trophy catch. Which was only a matter of time anyway, she knew firsthand—regardless of Reynolds’s stock plunge.
Merrill had found her own “new chapter to write” for herself as well, as Pete had aptly phrased it the day he told her. Dani Thibault was handsome and successful in his own right. He had business interests throughout Europe—hotels and commercial office deals—partially financed by his ties to the Belgian royal family. He was a breeder on the polo circuit. Windsurfed. Skied like he’d been born on them. He didn’t seem to need her money, and he seemed to love how he had awakened her forty-four-year-old body from its long slumber. He did things to her that her husband hadn’t done since he was a trainee back in the bond department. Actually, had never done, if she was truthful! Dani seemed to know the world—he could line up fabulous evenings at private clubs in London, could get a table at El Bulli near Barcelona or Robuchon in Paris. Even her kids—Louisa was in L.A. working at a production company, and Jason was still a junior at GW—were taken with him too and loved the fact that their mom had pulled herself up and transitioned to a new and happier life. That she was getting laid. Merrill’s girlfriends in town, mired in their own tired, unfulfilling marriages, were ogling her in jealousy too.
It was just that a few details that concerned her had recently come up. Regarding Dani.
She hadn’t shared them with him. She’d been keeping them to herself the entire trip. Things were getting deeper between them, and she’d begun to realize just how little she actually knew about him. About the man she was falling in love with.
And a little of what he had told her just wasn’t adding up.
As they deplaned, two cars were waiting on the tarmac. One, a black, chauffeured Mercedes C 63 AMG, was Dani’s. His familiar driver opened the door. The other was Merrill’s own silver Audi wagon.
“I have to head into the city,” Dani said in his hard-to-pin-down but definitely sexy European accent. She had guessed German; he said Dutch, with a touch of French in it, maybe, from Brussels. “I have meetings until five. Then we have this thing at the library tonight, right? I’ll change at the apartment, if that’s okay.”
“Of course. I’ll have Roger bring me in.”
“Look smashing.” He grinned, his hand sliding underneath her fur jacket and giving her butt a squeeze. “I’ll walk around until I spot the sexiest woman there.”
“Better be on time then,” Merrill said, winking coyly. “Someone else may have the same idea.”
“It’s been lovely sharing the slopes with you, Ms. Simons.” Dani clasped her fingers in his. “Let’s do it again.”
“And you, Sven,” she giggled, using the ski-instructor fantasy name she had given him after two bottles of champagne. “Please feel free to come off the trail whenever you’re in town.”
He smiled, drawing her to him to give her a kiss. Merrill put her palm against his shirt and held him off just slightly, brushing her lips across his cheek. “I’ll see you there.”
His BlackBerry rang. He sighed when he saw the caller. “I have to take this,” he said. He motioned to the driver and climbed into the back seat of the Merc. He waved to her. “Until tonight.”
The black doors shut and the darkened window rose, slowly obliterating Dani’s face.
Merrill’s houseman, Roger, packed her bags in the Audi. He opened the door and she got in.
Yes, everything is perfect, she reflected. The Audi passed through the wire gate of the private terminal and wound onto the access road leading from the airport.
Everyone loved Dani. He was charming, affable, and successful, and he made her feel twenty years younger in bed. She’d be a fool to let something get in the way.
She didn’t like the sensation of distrust gnawing inside her.
There was just this one thing.
“Back to the house, Ms. Simons?” Roger turned around and asked.
“Yes. I have to change. I have an appointment in town.”
They didn’t talk about it much. Over their coffee. The grisly scene on TV.
Only that it was someone Hauck had known from around town, Annie lamenting how these break-ins were getting crazy and how lots of people were buzzing about it, even at the restaurant. She shook her head, bewildered. “And what kind of person could have done that to such a beautiful family? For what? Money?”
Hauck shook his head in dismay. He didn’t know.
He chewed on seven-grain toast, quiet, leafing through the papers, until Annie realized he was still affected by it. There was something there that didn’t seem to be going away.
“I know you feel you have to do something about this.” She came around the counter and put her arms around him from behind, stroked her knuckles softly against his face. “But that’s over now. You’re a businessman now, right?”
He nodded halfheartedly.
She winked and pinched his nose. “So, go biz.”
Hauck
