This was payback for leaving my kind first wife, Denise, for the blond-headed scoundrel seated across from me. The Duchess had been my mistress once, an innocent fling that spiraled way out of control. Before I knew it, we were madly in love and couldn't live without each other, couldn't breathewithout each other. Of course, I had rationalized my actions at the time—telling myself that Wall Street was a very tough place for first wives, so it wasn't really my fault. After all, when a man became a true power broker, these things were expected to happen.
These things,however, cut both ways—because if the Master of the Universe took a financial nosedive, then the second wife would quickly move on to more-fertile pastures. In essence, the gold digger, aware that the gold mine had ceased to yield the precious ore, would move on to a more productivemine, where she could continue to extract ore, undisturbed. Indeed, it was one of life's most ruthless equations, and right now I was on the ass end of it.
With a sinking heart, I shifted my gaze back to the Duchess. She was still staring out the window—a beautiful, malevolent ice sculpture. At that moment I felt many things for her, but mostly I felt sad—sad for both of us, and even sadder for our children. Up until now they had lived a charmed life in Old Brookville, secure in the fact that things were just as they should be and that they would always stay that way. How very sad, I thought, how very fucking sad.
We spent the remainder of the limo ride in silence.
CHAPTER 2
THE INNOCENT VICTIMS
Actually, these weren't just any old WASPs but a small subspecies of WASP known as “the blue blood.” Numbering only in the thousands, the blue bloods, with their tall, thin frames and fancy clothes, had natural habitats that included world-class golf courses, stately mansions, hunting and fishing lodges, and secret societies. Most of them were of British stock, and they took great pride in tracing their genealogies back to the time of the Mayflower.Yet, in evolutionary terms, they were no different from the massive dinosaurs that had ruled the Gold Coast 65 million years before them: They were on the verge of extinction—victims of increased death taxes, property taxes, and a steady dilution of the intellectual gene pool, as generations of inbreeding yielded idiot sons and daughters who wreaked financial havoc on the great fortunes their blue-blooded ancestors had taken generations to build. (The magic of Charles Darwin working overtime.)
In any event, this was where the Duchess and I now lived and where I had assumed we would grow old together. Now, however, as the limousine pulled through the limestone pillars at the edge of our six-acre estate, I wondered.
A long circular driveway, bordered by immaculately trimmed box hedges, led to our ten-thousand-square-foot stone mansion finished in French chateau style, with gleaming copper turrets and casement windows. At the end of the driveway, a long cobblestone walkway led to the mansion's twelve-foot-high mahogany front door. As the limo pulled up to it, I decided to take one last shot with the Duchess before we went inside. I got down on my knees and placed my hands on either side of her thighs, which were crossed. As always, her skin felt silky smooth, although I resisted the urge to run my hands down the full length of her bare legs. Instead, I looked up at her with puppy-dog eyes and said:
“Listen, Nae, I know this has been tough on you”—tough on you?—“and I'm really sorry for that, but we've been together for eightyears, sweetie. And we have two amazingkids! We'll get through this.” I paused for a moment and nodded my head for effect. “And even if I dogo to jail, you and the kids will always be taken care of. I promise you.”
“Don't worry about us,” she said coldly. “Just worry about yourself.”
I narrowed my eyes and said, “I don't get it, Nadine. You make it seem like you're totally shocked about all this. When we first met it wasn't like I was being nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. I was being smeared and vilified by every newspaper in the free world!” I cocked my head to the side, at an angle that implied logic, and continued: “I mean, I guess it would be one thing if you married a doctor and then found out, after the fact, that he'd been defrauding Medicaid for the last twenty years. I guess thenyou wouldbe justified! But, now, given the circumstances—”
She cut me right off. “I had no idea what you were doing”— oh, I guess the two million in cash in my sock drawer never made you suspicious!—”none at all. And after they took you away, that Agent Coleman interrogated me for five hours—five fucking hours!”The last three words she screamed, and then she pushed my hands off her thighs. “He told me that Iwould go to jail too, unless I told him everything! You put me at risk; you put me in danger.I'll never forgive you for that.” She looked away, shaking her head in disgust.
Oh, shit!Agent Coleman had traumatized her. Of course, he had been totally full of shit, but, still, she was holding me responsible. Yet perhaps that boded well for our future together. After all, once the Duchess realized that she wasn't at risk, she might have a change of heart. I was about to explain that to her, when she turned back to me and said, “I need to get away for a while. The last few days have been stressful on me, and I need to be alone. I'm going to the beach house for the weekend. I'll be back on Monday.”
I opened my mouth, but no words came out, just a tiny gasp of air. Finally I said, “You're leaving me alone with the kids under house arrest?”
“Yes!” she said proudly, and she opened the rear door and popped out of her seat in a huff. And just like that she was gone-marching toward the mansion's massive front door, with the hem of her tiny yellow sundress rising and falling with each determined step. I stared at the Duchess's fabulous behind for a moment. Then I jumped out of the limousine and followed her into the house.
On the mansion's second floor, three large bedrooms were on the east end of a very long hallway, and a fourth bedroom, the master bedroom, was on the west end. Of the three east bedrooms, our children occupied two, and the third was used as a guest room. A four-foot-wide mahogany staircase swept up in a sumptuous curve from a grand marble entryway below. When I reached the top of the stairs, rather than following the Duchess into the master bedroom, I turned east and headed for the kids’ rooms. I found them both in Chandler's room, sitting on her glorious pink carpet. They were dressed in their pajamas, playing happily. The room was a little pink wonderland, with dozens of stuffed animals arranged just so. The drapes, the window treatments, and the goose-down comforter on Chandler's queen-size bed were all done in “Laura Ashley style,” a palette of mellow pastels and floral prints. It was the perfect little girl's room, for my perfect little girl.
Chandler had just turned five, and she was the spitting image of her mother, a tiny blond model. At this particular moment, she was engaged in her favorite pastime—arranging a hundred fifty Barbie dolls into a perfect circle around her, so she could sit in the center and hold court. Carter, who had just turned three, was lying on his stomach just outside the circle. He was thumbing through a picture book with his right hand, his left elbow resting on the carpet and his tiny chin resting in his palm. His enormous blue eyes blazed away behind eyelashes as lush as butterfly wings. His platinum-blond hair was as fine as corn silk and had tiny curls on the back that shimmered like polished glass.