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  «Fuck...»

  Before I let him run, I chased after him outside, but I was too slow. I was out of practice. When I reached the main room he had already gone.

  «Damn!»

  Liza came out too, laughing.

  «You’re getting old».

  I grabbed her by that cheap dress and stared her in the eye. «Who was that?»

  She ran her tongue over her lips, she’d got what she wanted. «What do you think I know?»

  She was lying.

  I shook her, harder. «I asked who was it».

  «You’re hurting me».

  I was grabbing her too hard. Liza made a face.

  I’d never hit a woman, because there’s no dignity in touching someone who can’t defend themselves. That was the only reason Liza didn’t end up in the hospital that day. Had she been a man, I would have punched her.

  «How much did you sell me for?,» I whispered. «How much am I worth? One high?»

  «Not even that,» she replied, showing her fangs.

  I wanted to reply, but there were people around and my life had changed. I needed no interference, no fights. I had other projects, I wouldn’t let her ruin them. So I let her go, without one more word.

  «You abandoned me. Do you have any idea what I went through when you left?»

  She rubbed at her wrist, her eyes wet with tears.

  «I warned you, I told you to go,» I reminded her.

  «I thought you’d come back for me».

  I thought she was going to make a scene, instead she calmed her breathing down, and touched my arm. «You’re here now».

  I shook my head.

  «You didn’t get it? I’m no longer Christopher Dunn. I’m Nolan Carter now».

  «Are you doing it for her? So you can fuck that bitch?»

  She started screaming.

  «You can change as many names as you like, Wolf. You’re still nothing to people like her. She ripped you to pieces once, she’s going to do it again,» she warned me, but I didn’t want to listen and I went back to the changing room.

  «He’ll come looking for you. He’s seen you, Chris. He knows you’re back,» Liza was shouting.

  I turned both faucets on and stepped under the water.

  Nine

  How does it work when you’re Nolan Carter’s lover?

  «Do you want anything else?»

  «Uhm...»

  I pushed my sunglasses down my nose and looked yet another time at that bangle in the open showcase.

  The shop assistant, who was probably worth eight hundred dollars a month, gave me a strained smile.

  I had not been an easy customer. On a normal occasion, on my own, I was never a success with customer service. I was the type that made you pull down everything from the wall and then likely left without buying anything.

  That was me. Present. I’m owning up.

  But that morning it was different.

  «All right».

  I took my wallet out to pay, and I’d only been there five minutes. After all Madeline Brook, twice employee of the month, had got away with only showing me what was in the window. I hadn’t sent her to the back room even once, and that wasn’t like me.

  But once again, it was a special occasion.

  Nolan had given me leave to splash out, and I had every intention to make him pay.

  I’d started with looking for something comfortable to wear.

  A new Louis Vuitton coat, three thousand five hundred dollars. A Dior dress, four thousand dollars. Practically a bargain. And I wasn’t done yet.

  I gave the credit card to the shop assistant. She took it, but she couldn’t figure out whether she only had to wrap up the Swarovski earrings I’d had her take out of the case, or if I wanted to also add on the Cartier necklace I’d tried on when I’d first come in, or maybe I’d rather have the Montblanc watch.

  She tried asking again. «Do you want something else?»

  «Yes,» I nodded.

  «So… what?»

  «Something else».

  He gave me that idiot smile. That’s to say, she thought I was an idiot.

  «Which one of these do you want?»

  «Everything,» I told her. And while I was at it I pointed at a coral ring. «And one of that. Two of those. That». A steel bangle, a white gold armlet, two turquoise pendants. «I’m late for a meeting, can you make me a nice package?»

  I left the jewelry shop, thinking I’d spent the same sum for one night of sex that I’d spent for the deposit on my apartment.

  It wasn’t to get back at him, it wasn’t revenge, but Nolan had said he didn’t mind.

  Add a zero at the end, I’ll give you double.

  Maybe I was angry.

  Maybe I wanted to see him fold.

  I was still convinced no one could buy me. Plus, from that moment onwards, when Nolan would tire of me and walk away, I’d have something to throw at him. Something that would hurt. Like a pair of black Louboutin stiletto heels. A thousand five hundred dollars. Practically nothing.

  But there were also downsides.

  «Miss Hill… I can see you’re done. Where can I take you?»

  Nolan was having me followed. I was being pursued by his driver, since the moment I’d left his flat. I’d told him it was “to keep an eye on me”. He’d rather say “to make sure I didn’t miss our lunch date”.

  Wasn’t that the same?

  I thought I’d tolerate the presence of his goons better after a martini. So I called Greta and gave her an appointment at a bar in one of the most exclusive parts of town.

  Ten

  When Greta saw me, she could barely recognise me.

  She walked over to the table where I was waiting for her, sipping a coffee. She was astonished by the number of bags I was carrying.

  I could have left them in the car, I know, but why not?

  «Shopping?,» she asked, stunned.

  She thought they were excessive even for me, those shopping bags. The fact there were two Cartier packages alone…

  «I’d not gone into my overdraft yet this month. I thought I was starting to look too normal, so I spent everything».

  «Seems like something you’d do,» she mumbled, and she sat down, taking off a light blue wool coat with three large bone buckles.

  Waiting for her to get ready, I called for a waiter and ordered a Martini Drive, while she chose a club sandwich and a cola. More than anything, all we did was waste our time, wait for our orders while people came and went, looking for somewhere to sit, emerging from the parking lot.

  Someone in Buenos Aires, I thought, was having a bath and sipping at a mate. While I was staring at the clouds, wondering how long it would take for them to break out in a storm.

  «So is it true?,» Greta asked in the end.

  I was mostly drinking. At the Meridian Cafe, you weren’t allowed to smoke. «What is true?»

  «You’re with him now. With Nolan Carter?»

  I couldn’t figure out why she was still curious or there was a hint of disapproval in her voice. She was certainly surprised, she wouldn’t have imagined someone like me with someone like him.

  Neither would I, to tell the truth.

  You’d normally see with a lawyer, or maybe a doctor. I’d gone out with a rugby player once, but mostly I went for spoiled brats with no interest for anything serious. Nolan was nothing like what I’d expect from a Saturday night. Assuming what we had was still what had started that one night.

  I knew me and Nolan were the couple of the century, but I still couldn’t stand the look on Greta’s face, the fact that she thought I was not enough for a billionaire with a pricey car.

  I wasn’t annoyed at her specifically. The situation was pitching us against each other, and I think neither of us really wanted it.

  Greta was the kind of person who’d wear stilettos and sport a hairdo fit for a magazine cover and a fake smile. I liked her because she knew her way around. She wouldn’t step on your toes, you wouldn’t step on hers
, and you could work together. But Nolan had a habit to get the worst out of people. So even Greta, who was like everyone else, forgot what her part was in the whole matter in the end, and looked at me with an air of superiority I didn’t get.

  «Did you just fuck him or is it serious?,» she insisted.

  «Why, do you care?,» I replied.

  «No, obviously,» she admitted, too quickly. I was used to those situations, and I realised I’d accidentally ended up on her hunting grounds.

  So that’s what had happened. Greta had set her eyes on Nolan, I could see it from how she pressed her lips together, from how her painted nails tapped nervously on the tablecloth. So that explained why she was taking it so badly. She would have liked to be there, on that limousine backseat, but it had been me instead.

  «Why not? He’s not bad at all». I sucked an olive off the toothpick. «He’s charming, he’s rich, what aren’t you sold on?»

  «I had a quick chat with him once. Arrogant enough that I don’t want a repeat,» she said, but she didn’t go into any detail. She’d rather let me speak. «What do you think?»

  «I still haven’t made up my mind about him. What did you talk about?» I wasn’t coming clean that easily. It was part of the way I interacted with other people, it was a habit I’d had for years.

  «He’s decided he wants to climb to the top,» said Greta ironically, as if Nolan’s plan was madness. She had the smile of someone who’s not going to be fooled by some start-up. Then I saw her aggression fade. Her eyes were blank, lightless. «He’s just got a lot of money, I can’t see why everyone is making that much of a fuss. It’s not going to last». She was telling herself, and she believed it. And I believed her, because I knew every stone in that town. The cover pictures changed on the magazines, but her name was still there at the bottom of the column. Greta was the one who drew the line between the people who mattered and those who weren’t worth anything.

  «I wanted to write a column about him for Saturday,» I confided.

  «About Nolan Carter? Ah...» She started laughing. She thought I’d said that to make an impression on her. When she realised I was serious, she forgot she was angry at me and went back to being the Greta I’d always known, the one who always put work first. «What do you know about him?,» she grilled me, suddenly serious.

  «I’m working on it». I picked my glass up and sucked the last drop of my martini off the rim.

  «Madison, don’t be a bitch». She wanted more.

  I sighed, then owned up: «I may have something. Give me a couple days».

  Greta furrowed her brow, it wasn’t like me to keep her on edge like that. She couldn’t hold back. «Did you sleep with him?» She was dying to know, to figure out how things were between us. If Nolan was using me, if I was using him.

  I inadvertently rubbed my wrist to that question. It still hurt.

  It was Nolan who had left me that bruise.

  “Don’t move”.

  When he’d pinned me to the bed, holding my hands behind my back, while he touched himself.

  I couldn’t get those images out of my head. I couldn’t get rid of him. His eyes. The pendant between my breasts. My wet thighs, his tongue tormenting me.

  I closed my eyes, shook my head, trying to chase that scene from my thought.

  Greta pulled out her credit card.

  «Excuse me, how much is it?»

  She didn’t want to know anything else, she already had a good idea how I’d end up.

  The waiter came close. «No need. Mr Carter is offering».

  «Oh, well… If Mr Carter is offering,» she replied, putting her MasterCard back in her wallet.

  I saw on her face the certainty that she’d guessed right. I had slept with him. And a warning about the future: be careful, Madison. You don’t fool around with people like him.

  «I’m the one who chooses what goes in the column,» I assured her, before she got some weird idea.

  «Are you really sure?,» Greta replied.

  She took a glancing look at my bags. Now she knew who had paid for them. Nolan Carter was offering. «Explain something to me, Madison. Do you think you have him under control?»

  «He’s the only one he’s allowed to interview him,» I threw in her face.

  She laughed. «And you didn’t wonder why?»

  «Because I’m Madison Hill. I decide who’s worth something in this town». It wasn’t being arrogant, simply stating a fact. You could own Wall Street, but your name only started being worth something when it appeared on my column. I was the one who decided what people would think about you whenever you set foot in a restaurant, in a club, whenever you sat in a theatre stall. Were you glam? Were you a good catch? A golden bachelor or a master scammer? Ask Gossip – Bake Up. That was how it worked. Greta knew what I was talking about, but she couldn’t figure out why I was so calm.

  «You know, Madison, I don’t think so. Nolan picked you because you can’t handle a negotiation».

  «We’re not negotiating».

  «It’s exactly what you’re doing, actually. But you can’t find a middle ground, you can’t keep yourself in check,» she pouted, bitterly, her eyes elsewhere. She felt it was a terrible injustice that things had turned out like that. She had the experience to handle someone like Nolan. I was a loose cannon. Sooner or later, under the right amount of pressure, I would crack. «Doc should not have put you in that position».

  I let her speak, I had nothing to prove.

  Greta hadn’t even touched her sandwich, but she wasn’t hungry. «What are you going to write?,» she asked, before leaving.

  «I don’t know,» I said, sincerely.

  «You’re going to get us all fucked». She was honest too, putting the rivalry aside, the rivalry she only felt because that night Nolan Carter had come looking for me and not for her. «You want a piece of advice, Madison? You won’t get another for me». She preferred being honest. That’s why I liked Greta. She’d help me once, then I’d go back to being the one who’d stolen the guy he’d been waiting for her entire life, the fuck of the century. «Ruin him. You can’t last long against him, ruin him,» she said.

  I had considered that possibility, too.

  Faced with a federal agent, for a moment I’d also thought of destroying Nolan Carter. It would be my good deed for the day and it would earn me my place in Paradise, a column on the first page of the magazine, and why not? A Journalist of the Year prize.

  Why not, that too. But there was an issue.

  I was too taken with it. I barely knew him, but I’d sunk into Nolan’s life, with no way out available.

  I could have only hurt him for two reasons, knowing myself. If he’d hurt me too much, if I’d magically stopped caring about him. At least for now, neither of those had happened.

  «Why would I?» I asked Greta then. One good reason was all it would take for me to ruin Nolan Carter.

  She left a fifteen dollar tip on her napkin.

  «Because it’s what you do best».

  She turned her back and left the bar.

  If I told you I’d never see her again until the end of that story, you’d believe me. You must have figured out Greta was not the type to look back.

  Instead, I was the type who kept pondering her choices.

  After she’d left, I don’t know how long I stayed there waiting for time to pass. I kept twirling the toothpick between my fingers and couldn’t choose to leave.

  «Can I bring you anything else?,» they asked me.

  «No, thank you,» I replied. «I’m late».

  I had a lunch date. I needed to meet up with Nolan and his lawyer, Edison Crow.

  My calculations were three quarters of an hour to get there, if I didn’t bump into traffic. I didn’t place any more orders, I picked up my coat, my bags, and slowly got ready.

  In the buzz of people ordering and chairs brushing against the floor, I realised a woman was screaming. More than anything I felt a rising tension around me, so I lifted my eyes and saw a young b
londe arguing with a couple of waiters. At first I thought she didn’t want to pay the bill, so I kept getting ready. I didn’t want to witness a scene, I wouldn’t even stay and watch, not even if it had been Lady Gaga.

  «Let me get in».

  «Frank, take the lady outside».

  Voices were raised, tones got heated, and I found myself following the scene involuntarily, before I realised that woman was screaming at me.

  «It’s her. It’s her, isn’t it?»

  I don’t know how, she managed to get over the resistance of the staff and stopped by my table. I glared at her, trying to figure out whether I knew her. To tell the truth, I didn’t know who she was. She was wearing a light blue dress, her hair was messy and her mascara was running down her cheeks. I don’t know if she was high or just hysterical, but she had cried. A lot.

  «Did you have fun?,» she was asking me.

  «What’s going on? This is a respectable venue,» someone mumbled from one of the tables, annoyed by the fuss. Paradoxically, I was not reacting.

  A member of the staff came close.

  «Sorry, Miss Hill, but do you know this person?»

  «No,» I admitted, perplexed. I’d really never seen her.

  He approached the woman and tried to escort her out. I thought his reaction was excessive. She barely weighed forty kilos. A strong gust of wind would have blown her away.

  «I said let me go,» she kept struggling. When she managed to get free, she shouted at me: «You’re having fun, aren’t you? You’re a worm, like him. That’s what Nolan is. And you’re just his whore». She was trying to upset me, humiliate me in front of everyone.

  «I don’t know what you’re talking about,» I tried to persuade her, but she seemed so convinced she wasn’t even listening.

  «No». She started crying again, but the look in the eyes was not painful, but violent. She felt a blind hatred, which I reacted to only by listening. «Don’t tell me bullshit. He’s laughing at me, isn’t he? You’re both laughing at me. But you can tell him he’s going to go back into the shit he came out of».

  «I really don’t know what you’re talking about,» I assured her.