“What would she be hoping to get out of it? Is this about the prenup she signed when she married Addison?”
“Sylvia told you about that?”
“A bit. Tell me more.”
“The old guy’s worth two, maybe three hundred million bucks. Yvette gets chump change when he kicks off. Don’t ask me how much because I don’t know. But none of his fortune. None of the vacation getaways that he has scattered all over the damned place. None of the royalties from his backlist, which pay off like a slot machine, year after year. All of that goes to Sylvia. Take it from me, if you want that manuscript back, go have yourself a chat with Yvette. Just don’t be fooled by those big, innocent blue eyes of hers. She’s a treacherous little kitty cat. And she has even fewer scruples than Sylvia, if such a thing is possible. Never drop your guard around Yvette.”
“Understood. Meanwhile, we have to figure out what to do with you. I take it you don’t want to stay with the new woman in your life or you’d already be doing that.”
“Right. I don’t want her mixed up in this.”
“In that case, why don’t you hang out here for now? I’m bunking at Merilee’s while she’s on location. I just came home to fetch a few things. I’m scheduled to see Addison and Sylvia at noon.”
“Don’t expect too much out of him,” Tommy warned me. “He’s not all there anymore. He’s also a total prick.”
I went into the bathroom to fill my shaving kit, then went in my bedroom and finished packing before I put on an old pink Izod shirt, jeans and flip-flops. I parked my typewriter, Ghurka bag, garment bag and Lulu’s doctor’s bag by the front door. Tommy was busy washing our dishes. “If that flabby, curly-haired ex-cop is now a flabby, curly-haired PI, which wouldn’t surprise me one bit, then he’ll have figured out that you and I are old friends,” I said. “It was smart of you to hide out on the roof. Stay smart. Don’t leave. And don’t use the phone. He may have a tap on it. There’s enough food and liquor here to last you for a couple of days. I’ll be back as soon as I have some news. Can you sit tight?”
“Do I have a choice?” Tommy asked me miserably.
“Do you want me to call your lady friend for you?”
He shook his head. “Like I said, I don’t want her mixed up in this.”
“Are you going to tell me who she is?”
“A young editor at Deep River named Norma.”
“Norma Fives?”
His eyes widened in surprise. “You know her?”
“By reputation. She’s supposed to be a real up-and-comer.”
“She’s twenty-eight and whip smart. Went to Bryn Mawr. I met her at a pub party and we hit it off right away. I sure don’t know what she sees in me. All I know is that she makes me feel like a kid again. Kathleen and me . . . what can I say? The sizzle’s gone.”
“Are you planning to ask her for a divorce?”
Tommy fell silent for a moment. “I don’t know.”
“Your life is a real mess right now, isn’t it?”
“You noticed, huh? I thought I had it made, too. A real sweet deal with Addison. Good salary and health benefits. I’ve traveled all over the world to research his books—Barcelona, Havana, Maui. This last one, Tulsa, wasn’t a super exotic locale, but I dug up a ton of juicy material. Found a history professor at Oklahoma State who had all sorts of great background stories about the founding families. Also amazing stuff about the 1921 race riot. Did you know that a white mob went on a rampage, killed three hundred black people and burned down an entire neighborhood of more than eight hundred homes? And not one person was ever prosecuted? I didn’t. Somehow that story never ended up in the history books. Tulsa is a hell of a good yarn, man. It really is. I’m super proud of it but . . .” He trailed off, shaking his head. “It’s amazing what can happen. One minute everything’s going great. The next minute you walk out the door of a copier shop and your whole life turns to complete shit.”
“Not to worry. We’ll straighten it out.”
He looked at me imploringly. “You really think you can?”
“Absolutely. Sylvia hired me to find Tulsa. I’ll find it.”
Lulu snuffled at me indignantly from the sofa.
“We’ll find it. But like I said, don’t go anywhere and don’t make any calls. If the phone rings, don’t answer it. It won’t be me calling. Understand?”
“I understand. And thanks, Hoagster. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“Relax. Get some sleep. I guarantee you that one week from now we’ll be sitting at the bar of the White Horse drinking beer and having a huge laugh about this whole stupid thing.”
Chapter Two
America’s most famous living author owned a fifteen-room penthouse apartment that consumed the top two floors of a twenty-five-story prewar luxury high-rise on the corner of Riverside Drive and West 83rd Street that was, according to an old-time sportswriter I know, the same building that Babe Ruth lived in until his death in 1948. The Bambino’s widow, Claire, continued to live there until she died in 1976.
I made certain to arrive there precisely one hour early so as to get in some private time with Addison before Sylvia showed up. Since it was still pouring rain, I wore my oyster-gray summer-weight belted trench, Worth and Worth fedora and Gore-Tex street bluchers.
The doorman rang the apartment for me, spoke discreetly to someone up there, and directed me to the penthouse’s express elevator, which whisked Lulu and me nonstop to the twenty-fourth floor before it opened into a small entry hall that had two doors. One was for Addison, Yvette, and their privileged guests. The other was for servicepeople. I shot for the moon and rang the bell for privileged guests.
It was Yvette who answered the door. She was thirty-two but looked younger, possibly because she was so little. Not more than an inch or two over five feet tall in her tiny, pedicured bare feet. Her toenails were painted a shade of grape that was popular that season. She wore a lightweight, gauzy summer sheath with a deep V neck that clung to her so tightly that I could tell that her belly button was an innie. Also that she wasn’t wearing a bra. It took an act of sheer willpower to not stare at Yvette’s nipples poking through the thin material. She was abundantly curvy, bordering on but not quite zaftig. If she weren’t careful she’d blimp into the likes of Lainie Kazan by the time she hit forty. Right now she was still outrageously sexy and she knew it. And wanted to make good and sure that you did, too.
She gazed up, up, up at me, her rosebud mouth half-open as I stood there in my fedora and trench, dripping on the entry hall floor. Yvette had huge eyes that were an unusual shade of royal blue and were her strongest feature—speaking above the neck, that is. She had a round face, a weak chin, and an unremarkable nose. Her honey-blond hair had been artfully highlighted and layered.
“Oh. My. God,” she gasped in a voice that was thirty-two going on seventeen, as in gag-me-with-a-spoon seventeen. She wavered there on her bare feet, her eyelids fluttering.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
She blinked at me with those big blue eyes. “I’m fine, but don’t keep me in suspense. Are you Stewart Hoag?”
“I am,” I replied, tipping my fedora. “My friends call me Hoagy. I’m here to see Mr. James. Are you Mrs. James?”
“Call me Yvette, please.” She offered me her small hand. It was smooth, soft and warm. Her manicured nails were painted that same shade of grape. “Sylvia said to expect you at noon.”
“I’m a bit early,” I acknowledged. “I’ll wait down in the lobby.”
“Like hell you will,” she said. “Sylvia said you were a writer. What she didn’t say was that you’d make me go weak in the knees.”
“Well, she wouldn’t. Not exactly Sylvia’s style, is it? You can feel free to let go of my hand anytime, by the way.”
“Oh, jeez, I’m sorry. You even smell good. What are you wearing?”
“Floris. I get it in London.”
Yvette smelled of fruity perfume, the kind that I associated with the ol
d ladies at Essex Meadows, the assisted living home where my parents were not enjoying their golden years. The scent was entirely wrong for her, but I didn’t feel it was my place to tell her. Besides, maybe Addison got off on it.
She crinkled her nose at me. “I’d swear you also smell like the Bronx Zoo.”
“That would be my short-legged partner.”
Yvette looked down. “Aww, you have a beagle. How cute.”
Lulu let out an indignant moan.
“Lulu’s a basset hound, actually. Her coat can get a bit fragrant when it’s damp.”
Yvette shook her little finger at me. “I used to read all about you. You were married to Merilee Nash. And you’re, like, this immortal novelist.”
“That was the old me. The new me is quite mortal.”
“And you’re here to help Addy find his missing manuscript?”
“I’m certainly going to try.”
“Well, come on in.”
She led me inside, taking short, mincing little steps in that tight, tight dress. She definitely had an ogle-worthy jiggle when she walked. “Addy is in his office. I’ll take you up to him.”
I took off my hat and trench, leaving them on a bench by the door. It hadn’t occurred to her to offer to hang them up for me. A practiced hostess she was not.
The Jameses’ penthouse was formal and grand—but not so much a home as an interior decorator’s idea of what a formal and grand home ought to look like. It had a vast living room with two seating areas that were set before windows that overlooked the Hudson and the New Jersey Palisades beyond. The sofas and armchairs were pure white satin, and it didn’t look as if anyone had ever sat on any of them. There was a smaller parlor with a television set and wet bar that looked as if no one had ever watched TV or had a drink in there. A dining room with a table that would seat at least twenty-four yet probably never had. There were no books, magazines or newspapers on the coffee tables. No paintings or photographs hanging from the walls. No artifacts that Addison had collected in his world travels over the years researching his blockbuster bestsellers. Just bare walls and surfaces. The whole place seemed incredibly unlived in—which may not have been that far from the truth. They did have six or eight other homes scattered hither and yon, not to mention their beach house in East Hampton. It was entirely possible that they were here for only a few weeks out of the year. But I couldn’t help wonder if all of their other homes looked uninhabited, too.
A grand curving staircase went up to the second floor. Yvette led me up there, wiggling and jiggling. Princess Lemon Jell-O indeed. I followed her, detecting no visible panty line. Either she was wearing a thong or no underwear at all. I didn’t think it would be gentlemanly to inquire. Being a gentleman can really suck sometimes.
Lulu grumbled sullenly as we climbed the stairs. She disliked any woman who showed the slightest interest in me, especially one who’d mistaken her for a beagle and passed a remark that had contained the words Bronx and Zoo.
“Addy’s probably still doing his morning exercises in his room,” Yvette informed me over her shoulder. “Want to check out my digs?”
“Love to.”
She led me down an incredibly long parquet-floored hallway. “I have my own private suite in all of our homes. In Maui I have my own cottage and pool so I can swim in the nude. Do you like to swim in the nude?”
“Depends on with whom I’m swimming.”
“You’re a bad boy. I like you,” she said, beaming at me as she stopped to open her door. “Here we are.”
Yvette had a complete apartment of her own. A sitting room with a matching cocoa-brown velvet loveseat and easy chair set before a big Sony TV. A Pullman kitchen. A great big bedroom that had a great big bed buried under an avalanche of pillows, cushions and stuffed animals. Another room—her spa, she called it—that had a treadmill, an exercise bike, a Jacuzzi and a sauna. Again, there were no photographs, no mementos, no personal touches at all. Not unless you count the “music” that was blaring from the sound system in her spa—“Blame It on the Rain” by Milli Vanilli.
“I’m sorry, would you mind turning that off?”
“How come?”
“My ears bleed easily.”
She frowned at me, puzzled, but obliged me as Lulu roamed from room to room, nose to the floor, sniffing and snorting.
“Why’s she doing that?” Yvette wondered, watching her curiously.
“She’s a scent hound. It’s how she gets acclimated.”
“She’s not going to pee-pee on the carpet, is she?”
“Wouldn’t think of it.”
“Can I get you a cold drink?”
“I’m fine, thanks.”
“Well then, sit, sit.”
I sat, sat on the loveseat. Yvette joined me, tucking her bare feet under her, and turned to face me, studying me intently.
“Do you have live-in staff, Yvette? With a huge place like this, you must.”
She shook her honey-blond head. “Addy can’t stand to have strangers around. Two sisters from Haiti come in three times a week to clean. They’re here for maybe four hours, then they take off.”
“Were they here that day?”
“What day?”
“The day that Tommy and Tulsa disappeared.”
Yvette furrowed her brow. “No, Friday isn’t one of their days.”
“Was anyone else here?”
“Like who?”
“A plumber, electrician . . . ?”
“Not a soul.”
“Do you do all of the cooking yourself?”
She let out a girlish shriek of a laugh. “Me? I can barely fry an egg without setting the kitchen on fire. A chef comes in to make us dinner. A different one every night, if you know what I mean.”
“Afraid not.”
“Breakfast and lunch we each go our own way. I nibble on rice cakes, nuts and carrot sticks. Addy has cheese, crackers and about ten gallons of water. Dinner’s prepared for us in the kitchen downstairs by a chef from Daniel, Sistina or Peter Luger, depending on whether Addy’s in the mood for French, Italian or a steak. He likes to eat well, but he doesn’t like to go out, so he has them bring the restaurant to us. It’s kind of amazing what famous chefs will do for you if you’re willing to pay them enough money.”
“And he has it.”
“Sweetie, you have no idea how many books in how many different languages he’s sold over the past forty years. I doubt that anyone does—except for Sylvia, that is. She knows every royalty payment down to the last penny. And she shares that information with no one.” Yvette’s huge blue eyes narrowed shrewdly as she sat there studying me. Tommy was right. There was nothing bimbonic about her. “What else would you like to know?”
“I understand you started out here as his typist.”
“Ten years ago. He got me from Joe Heller, who was in between books and had nothing for me. Joe’s the guy who wrote Catch-22.”
“Yes, I know.”
“I was trying to be an actress in those days. Mostly they had me auditioning for roles in TV commercials as ‘Silly Teenaged Mall Girl No. 3’ because I looked like a high school girl.”
“You still do.”
She swatted at my arm playfully. “Now you’re flirting with me.”
“Am not,” I assured her, my eyes carefully avoiding her nipples.
“I can’t say it was love at first sight, but the more I got to know Addy, the more attached I got to him. He was just so incredibly sweet and considerate. We surprised everyone when we eloped to Atlantic City and got married—especially Sylvia, who thinks I’m nothing more than a conniving little fortune hunter. She’s felt that way ever since I first walked in the door.”
“And you’re originally from . . . ?”
“Larchmont. I was a Theatre Arts major at Long Island University. People had been telling me how cute I was since I was five years old so I thought maybe I could make it as an actress. But I’m practical, too, so I also learned how to type eighty words a minute wi
thout a single typo. I made good money at it. And trust me, typing manuscripts sure beats the hell out of slinging drinks and getting groped by gorillas.”
“What’s your maiden name, Yvette?”
She peered at me guardedly. “Why do you want to know that?”
“Just curious. I like to know things about people.”
“It’s Rittenaur. I shortened it to Ritt as my professional name. And Yvette’s actually my middle name. My first name is Phyllis. Ugh. I mean, all it makes you think of is Phyllis Diller.”
“How did the auditions go? Did you get work?”
“I got cast in one local commercial for a furniture moving company that never ran. I don’t think the owner ever intended to run it. He just wanted to screw me, like he had a prayer. The soaps didn’t want me. Off-Broadway didn’t want me. Let me tell you, Hoagy, there’s a big difference between being the cutest girl in your high school in Larchmont and competing against the cutest girls from every high school in America, not to mention places like Sweden and Brazil. Plus, being honest, I was no Merilee Nash in the acting department. I could be a ditsy airhead, period, so it was a darned good thing I learned how to type. Addy wrote on an old Underwood. Still does. He began using me a few hours a week, and then it became more like twenty or thirty. I hear that a lot of writers are using personal computers now, so they don’t need typists anymore.”
“Does Tommy use one?”
“Nah, he still uses an Underwood, same as Addy.”
“Does he do his writing here?”
She shook her head. “At home. Then he brings his pages over here and he and Addy go over them together. You should hear the two of them yelling. They disagree a lot. Addy has strong opinions. I love a man who has strong opinions. I love Addy. Nobody has ever believed that, you know, what with him being in his late sixties when we met. But he was still all man, if you hear me.”
“Loud and clear.”
“After I’d been typing here for a few weeks, he asked me if I’d like to stay for a glass of sherry. It was a Friday evening. Longest glass of sherry ever. I didn’t go limping home to Park Slope until Sunday night. When I came in on Monday, he’d left a note on my typewriter asking me if I’d like to move into one of the half-dozen guest bedrooms here. So I did, although I ended up in his bed almost every night. Next thing I knew he’d proposed to me and I’d said yes.” She giggled gleefully, recalling it. “God, was Sylvia pissed off. She’s never once shown me an ounce of human kindness. I don’t think she even knows what kindness is.”
The Man in the White Linen Suit Page 4
