Nothing Personal: A Novel of Wall Street

by Offit, Mike

  “Are you kidding me? You’ve got the best legs in Christendom. Much better than hers. A national treasure!” Warren wasn’t passing an idle comment. Sam’s legs were a great natural resource, her upper thighs thin and muscled, almost concave.

  “Flatterer. I’m starved. No way I’m skipping dinner. Can we eat somewhere else?” Sam nodded her head toward the back.

  Warren didn’t reply. He was lost in thought. Strategic thought, he mused. Something had just lit up the inside of his skull like a bonfire.

  “Hellooo? Food? I’m asking for sustenance? Anyone home?” Sam waved her hand in front of his eyes.

  “Wait. Gimme a sec. I’m thinking about something.” Warren put up a finger.

  “Hah! I thought I smelled something burning.” Sam shrugged and contemplated her drink for a second, then fished the last olive out of his glass.

  Warren came back to life with a start. “You know, I suddenly got this idea. If I’m right, maybe the pressure is off. If I’m wrong, all I did was piss off an old girlfriend. Trust me?” He drained what was left of his martini. Sam stared at him for a moment, sifting his tone, the look in his eyes. She broke the eye contact first. “Whatever it is, I’m in. I’ve come this far. To hell with it, you only live once, right?”

  “That’s what they say.”

  “I always thought the lottery was for suckers,” she said, still chewing.

  “Ever win anything?” he asked, more than a little edginess in his voice.

  “Two bucks, once. One of those instant poker games.”

  “This is a bigger ticket. And it costs more than a buck to play.” Warren tried to force a grin.

  “And I think we’ve overextended that metaphor just about to death. Just let me know when it’s over, okay?” Sam plopped her napkin on the bar in the universal signal that it was time to go.

  “Hey, you know what? I think you’re going to be there. I think you’re going to know.”

  “Oh, boy. Something to look forward to,” she said sarcastically. “What I’m thinking is lobster.”

  fifty-two

  Like most social engagements for people in their business, five or six weeks passed, but Frank called Warren, and reminded him about that dinner. Karen wanted to come after all. The Post House is just off Park Avenue on East Sixty-Third Street, an elegant version of the traditional New York steak house, befitting its location in the middle of the most expensive residential real estate in Manhattan. The two couples arrived almost simultaneously and checked their coats. Karen lingered a moment to be certain that her fur got a wood hanger, then they headed into the dining room. Every male head swiveled when she and Sam led the foursome to their table. Karen’s height and blond hair made her an obvious object of admiration, but Sam was dazzling. She had, at Warren’s insistence, tied her hair back with a black velvet bow and worn a short and tight dark green velvet dress they’d picked out at Valentino, with her new earrings. She wouldn’t let Warren pay for it, as usual. She wore almost no makeup and looked elegant, sophisticated, and sexy. The two men couldn’t help but swagger a bit as they followed along.

  The first half of the meal saw the two friends playing catch-up after that entrance. Sam snagged the wine list and after a brief perusal commanded a magnum of Château Palmer, 1966. The captain’s eyebrows went up, not so much at the price tag, but at the sophistication of the choice. It was actually a bargain, an unreplaceable gem from a good vineyard.

  Sam looked at Warren with a sly grin. “Hey, before my ex stole all my dough, he taught me how to spend it on what I drank. Oh,” she added, turning back to the captain, “please open that right away and decant it. And be sure that the glasses are rinsed and dried before you pour it.”

  “Now, I forgot, which one were you again, Ernest or Julio?” Frank cracked with a smile.

  “In this town, more like Joey and Kid Blast,” Sam rejoined.

  Warren never ceased to be amazed by Sam’s library of arcane facts. “Jesus, how do you know about the Gallo brothers?”

  “Desire. That and Blood on the Tracks are probably Dylan’s greatest albums,” Sam replied.

  “‘Born in Red Hook, Brooklyn, in the year of who knows when…,’” Frank sang in a nasal imitation of Bob Dylan.

  “‘King of the streets,’ Joey Gallo,” Warren added. “Great song!”

  “Well, maybe you’ll be King of the Street, anyway.” Frank laughed as he said it. “Until someone comes and blows you away.”

  “Well, Sam already does that,” Warren responded, and took Sam’s hand as he said it.

  “Awwwwwwwww,” Sam said, and leaned over to give him a peck on the cheek. The sommelier arrived with a large bottle of wine and made a ceremony out of preparing the neck of the bottle and operating a simple corkscrew.

  “An excellent choice, madam,” he intoned ceremonially as he handed her the cork.

  “Yeah,” Karen chimed in, “it’s nice to have someone along who knows more than just the highest price.”

  “Hey, given what’s been going on, blowing away you Wall Street guys is no joke anymore,” Sam said, nodding to the server. He began decanting the wine into a crystal carafe while examining the thin red stream in front of a lit candle on his tray.

  Frank looked at Warren and shrugged. Sam and Karen launched into an analysis of the menu, debating lobsters versus steaks versus lamb chops. Sam suggested that women who weren’t sexually satisfied generally ordered steaks. Karen said she felt like the double-cut porterhouse. Sam called the busboy over and asked if she could have a whole-rib roast. He looked at her in utter confusion.

  “Okay, okay, you two, c’mon. We give up.” Warren waved his napkin like a white flag. Then he steered the conversation to the trip that Frank and Karen were planning to Anguilla. Frank could be counted to be on the cutting edge of resorts—if it was about to become a hot spot, he’d just gotten back.

  “Yeah, well, last year we went to this neat place on the Pacific coast of Mexico. It was built by Goldsmith’s daughter—you know, the Englishman who owns about a thousand square miles down there. It was great, but the water was too rough. This year, we’re trying this spot called Malliouhana if it opens on time. Sounds more laid-back.”

  “The beach looks great, the rooms are supposed to be amazing, and we’re just going to go and relax,” Karen added.

  “Sounds awesome. It is interesting, though, how one of the big topics of conversation in this town is getting out of here.” Sam had noticed this about New Yorkers. “I mean, in LA everyone’s always talking about real estate or movie parts or other people’s sex lives. Here it’s all about vacations and summer houses.”

  “Well, generally, that’s because life is so miserable here that the only thing that makes it worthwhile is going away,” Warren explained.

  “And no one except us has a sex life,” Frank chimed in.

  “So why don’t you just live somewhere else?” Sam replied.

  “Because it’s the only place we can do what we do and get paid so much to do it,” Frank said with a grimace.

  “Do you really like living in LA so much?” Karen asked Sam.

  “No. I actually hate it. But I was doing pretty well there, then my boyfriend ran off with my life savings, and I’m stuck with a house I can’t sell in this market, and that’s where my car business is. So, I’ve gotta stick around there, for now.” Sam took her first sip of the wine, which had been breathing for a few minutes. “Wow!” She nodded approval and the sommelier poured everyone a bloodred glass.

  “Where would you rather live?” Frank asked pointedly.

  “Well”—Sam looked at Warren—“I kind of like New York, except for the cold weather. San Diego is nice. I could live just about anywhere, to be honest. I love Europe too. Didn’t you live in Geneva?” Sam lobbed the conversation back to Karen, and it bounced around through the crab cocktails and well into the steaks and the dregs of the wine, which grew into a massive, powerful, and mature claret the equal of any of the great first growths. Sam and
Frank had a too-long debate over what had led to the downfall of the LA Rams as a franchise, and then everyone had agreed to split a single piece of cheesecake with coffee.

  Out in the cold air, they paired off, with the two men smoking good-size Cuban Romeo y Julieta cigars that Frank had brought in from Montreal, and Karen and Sam strolling about twenty paces ahead. The car that Warren had hired for the night followed them as they walked up Madison Avenue.

  “That’s some hell of a girl you found yourself there, pal,” Frank said, exhaling a cloud of fragrant smoke over his shoulder.

  “Yeah. I think so too. You think that Karen will be able to tolerate her?” Warren had noticed her warming up to Sam as the evening progressed.

  “Well, like you said, it was Larisa who was screwing around. I mean, loyalty to your sister is a great thing, but, in this case, I think she’ll get past it.”

  “What do you think she’ll tell Larisa?”

  “I’m sure she’ll tell her you two look like a match. She knows it won’t serve any purpose to try to protect Larisa’s feelings, if she still has any. That ain’t exactly what I’d call a sensitive Susie.” Frank smiled and tried, unsuccessfully, to blow a smoke ring.

  Warren snapped off two perfect halos and flicked the ash off his cigar. “That’s the understatement of the year. It’s funny how I seem to have totally misjudged her. I guess people aren’t who or what you want to believe they are.”

  They walked on in silence.

  “It seems like you two guys may be in it for the long haul,” Warren broke in.

  “It could be. It very well could be. It’s a frightening concept.” Frank rolled the cigar in his fingers. “I never thought I’d even consider a second shot.”

  “Hey, that’s what marriage is all about, right? You’ll never know unless you take a chance.” Warren thought about his parents. They had seemed so perfectly complementary, and yet it didn’t last.

  “Now, let me see. Do I detect a hint of rationalization in that statement? Am I imagining things, ahem, or are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Frank elbowed the smaller man in the side, and he stumbled to regain his balance.

  “Well, we haven’t talked about it or anything, but it’s a distinct possibility. Hey, I’m circling thirty. That’s old enough.”

  “I think that’d be great. Listen, I had some SC buddies check her out. This girl has a sterling rep. One of them almost had a heart attack when I told him my friend was seeing her. Word is she told Warren Beatty to get lost once when she was like eighteen! Hey, we could do one of those double ceremonies. Very sixties.” Frank waved his hands in the air in a gesture evidently meant to be psychedelic.

  “Nah, I’m too young for that. If I get married, I’m going to have it performed by some shaman from a primitive tribe somewhere where there’s lots of ocean and blue sky. With maybe six people there.”

  Up ahead of them, Sam and Karen were having a similar conversation. Karen had confessed that she wanted to marry Frank, and that she would have Warren to thank for the introduction.

  “Warren set you guys up?” Sam was a bit surprised.

  “Yup. He was dating Larisa then, and Frank had been divorced from his first wife for a while. She left him for his boss. It was pretty ugly.”

  Sam hugged herself against a cold blast of wind and idly stared at a display of wild, unwearable clothes in the window of the Gianni Versace boutique. “What happened with Warren and Larisa? He doesn’t talk about it much.”

  “Well, from what she tells me, he dumped her right before he met you. From what Frank tells me, Warren caught her having an affair with someone else. Knowing my sister, he probably did catch her, but she probably wanted to have her cake and eat it too. She always knew how to pick a winner, but also hedge her bets. I personally think she made a big mistake. Warren’s a pretty great guy. Are you two serious? It seems like it to me.”

  “I think so. Do you really think she was cheating on him? I’d hate to think he dumped her for no reason. She seemed to be a little pissed at him when we ran into her the other day.” Sam brushed the hair out of her face. “I mean, the last guy I trusted basically destroyed me emotionally and financially. I don’t want to go through that again.”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me. She always had a couple of guys on the line in high school. In college, she dated half the football team—actually led most of them on. Guys literally used to fight over her. I think she’s actually pissed off that she got caught. Now, she doesn’t have a fallback if the other guy, whoever he is, doesn’t work out.”

  “Your sister sounds like a real sweetheart.” Sam couldn’t help but notice the undercurrent of disapproval in Karen’s voice.

  “Well, let’s just say that she deserves whatever she gets. Years ago, I was dating a great guy. He was on the UN staff, from Rhodesia. Great looking, from a wealthy family, and with his heart in the right place. He spent three years working against apartheid in South Africa, even though he kept getting death threats. It was like living with Gandhi, but he looked like Dirk Bogarde and drove an Aston Martin. Larisa met him when she came to visit me in New York right before I went to Geneva. I was working one weekend, and he takes her out to dinner because I had to help prepare a speech for the Ambassador. She gets him drunk and takes him back to his apartment and sleeps with him. Of course, Mr. Saint has to tell me about it because he feels so guilty.”

  “Gee. Sleeping with your sister’s boyfriend is definitely not too cool.”

  “Yeah. And once I knew about it, what am I supposed to do? He said they got back to the apartment and she started crawling all over him, and after all, he’s a man, and she was this nubile little teenager. She always had those big boobs, too. She got them for both of us. I mean, it isn’t like you can continue a relationship with a man who has slept with your sister. So, that ended it, and she apologized and everything, but I know she still kept seeing him. He was in an ambush in Soweto last year and lost a leg. So he suffered, but not old Larisa. We had a tragedy in our family when we were kids, and Larisa has always thought my parents blamed her. Somehow she managed to turn my brother’s death into being about her.” Karen’s words came out in a torrent, and Sam could hear the pain and bile just behind them.

  “Jeez. I had no idea,” Sam responded. “Warren said that he didn’t think you’d come to dinner because you were angry at him over what happened with Larisa. I guess he was misinformed.”

  “I wasn’t going to come because I was worried that I’d have to sit around and defend my sister. Warren’s a great guy, and Frank thinks Larisa really screwed him over. I’m tired of doing that. She gets what she wants when she wants it and thinks five moves ahead. She thinks that what happened to our brother gives her a pass for any kind of behavior. So I decided that I wanted to meet you. All Frank ever talks about is how pretty you are, and I wanted to see for myself so I could tell Larisa how Warren’s got a gorgeous new girlfriend, and they’re so happy together. I know she’ll call for the details. And I’m going to give ’em to her, in spades. She hates losing.”

  “I don’t think it was a competition, but thanks anyway.” Sam smiled at the compliment, and they walked on quietly for a block. Warren and Frank had stepped up their pace and caught them at the corner of Seventy-second Street, in front of the Ralph Lauren store that had opened in a huge French neo-Renaissance mansion.

  “I’ve had enough. Let’s take the car, okay?” Warren was feeling a little woozy from the wine, beef, and cigars, even in the bracing air.

  “You guys go ahead. We’ll make it on foot from here.” Frank’s apartment was four blocks away, on Seventy-fifth off Park.

  “Okay. Hey, it was great to get out with you two. You set an example for us. Young love and all that. At your age, Frank, infatuation takes the years off.” Warren gave him a playful shove.

  “Well, you’re hardly the one to talk. Sam, it was absolutely our pleasure. You make sure he gets tucked in early so he can sell lots of bonds bright and early tomorrow. The f
ate of the free world hangs in the balance.”

  “In that case,” Sam said, “the free world better have a contingency plan.” She accepted Frank’s hug, and a kiss on the cheek from Karen. “That really is one hell of a coat,” Sam said to Karen as they separated.

  “Thanks. You two be good, now. Oh, and let us know where you’re going to register, would you?” Karen gave Warren a big hug and whispered in his ear, “She’s great. Larisa never should have let you get away.”

  Warren waved at them as they walked off, arm in arm, and when he turned, Sam was holding the door of the car open for him. “All this time, and I’m still holding doors for you,” she said. He half tackled her into the backseat and mumbled the address to the driver, asking him to take the park drive, then burrowed into the nape of her neck.

  “I say Tiffany and Christofle.” Warren gave her a light kiss on the lips.

  “What?” The taxi had entered Central Park on Seventy-second Street and Fifth Avenue, and the light covering of snow that had fallen a few days before made the lampposts into pools of soft light in a sea of white.

  “I said I think that Tiffany for china and Christofle for silver would be timeless, yet sophisticated choices.”

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “If you even want to go through all that. Personally, I’d rather just do the deed and buy our own stuff. I don’t have that many friends, anyway.”

  “Excuse me, but did I miss something here?” The driver had merged to the left and was coming up the slight rise to the Bethesda Fountain.

  “Say, driver, would you do me a favor?” Warren leaned into the front seat. “Just pull over on the right up here for one second. I just want to show my girlfriend the view up here. She’s from out of town.”

  “Yeah, okay, but hurry up. The park’s not safe at night, and I don’t wanna hang around too long.”

  “What’s going on? Why are we stopping in the middle of nowhere?” Sam looked a little apprehensive.

  “There’s this great view right up here, by the balustrade over there. It’s amazing at night, with the ice and the snow.” He opened the door as the car stopped. “Just for a second. Nobody’ll be out in this cold. We’re safe.”