The Garden of Betrayal - Lee Vance [63]
“I think I can handle it. I’d prefer it if you lined up a moving company and began investigating short-term space. With a premium on speed, please. I’m as anxious for me to get gone at this point as Walter is.”
The packing kept me busy well past lunch, in part because I’d been overoptimistic about my ability to assemble the origami-like boxes, and in part because everyone I knew was calling in to find out what had happened between me and Walter. I solved the box problem by asking Amy for a tutorial after mangling a few, and the other by simply telling everyone it had been personal. To the handful of clients who pushed harder, I let slip that Walter and I had fallen out over Alex, assuming it would get around the market quickly enough. It was the least damaging version of events I could circulate, and it had the advantage of being true.
Amy buzzed for the umpteenth time shortly after two. I left off wrapping a bunch of old deal mementos and punched the flashing line on my phone.
“Mark Wallace.”
“I was disappointed not to hear from you this morning.”
I recognized the voice immediately. Narimanov.
“It’s been a difficult twenty-four hours.”
“I read about Alex Coleman. You were close?”
“Very.”
“I’m sorry. I was going to suggest we get together to discuss my offer further, but we can put if off if you like.”
I wasn’t much in the mood for business, but my circumstances made it stupid to discourage him.
“Get together when?”
“Three o’clock? My flat at the Time Warner Center?”
I double-checked my watch. I’d still have plenty of time before meeting Claire.
“Three o’clock works fine.”
“Enter on Fifty-eighth Street. The doorman will direct you.”
“I look forward to it.”
21
The Time Warner Center is a slice of Hong Kong transplanted to New York City—a cramped, upscale mall topped by a generic luxury hotel and a host of overpriced, absentee-owned condos in linked towers, with a few million pounds of marble tossed in to make everything classy. Narimanov kept a penthouse, but I had the sense that he didn’t spend much time there. The immaculate, Scandinavian modern living room I was shown to was entirely devoid of photos or other personal items, every throw pillow freshly plumped and perfectly placed. It made me wonder if the maids worked from brochures. I noticed a simple wooden chessboard on a table by the glass wall overlooking Columbus Circle. It was set wrongly, with the pieces randomly arranged behind the pawns. I walked over and began correcting it.
“You play?” Narimanov asked from behind me.
“Some.” I turned to face him. He was wearing the same outfit he’d had on the other day—charcoal slacks and a black turtleneck—and he was carrying a manila envelope. I wondered if it contained an offer letter. “Years ago. When I was in college. I never wanted to spend time memorizing moves, so I never became very proficient.”
“My objection precisely. Have you ever played Fischer Random Chess?”
“Never heard of it.”
“It’s a modern variant of a game called Shuffle Chess, codified in the mid-nineties by your eccentric former champion Bobby Fischer. You roll a die to determine the arrangement of the high-value pieces, eliminating reliance on memorized openings and combinations. There are nine hundred and sixty legal starting positions. We’ll have to play sometime.” He motioned toward the seating area. “It’s good of you to come. Sit, please.”
I sank down onto a white leather sofa and he settled in the matching end chair, tucking the envelope he was carrying between the seat cushion and the chair’s arm. He leaned forward, muscled forearms resting on his knees and thick hands clasped loosely. Broad shoulders and typically Slavic features gave him the look of a Russian movie heavy, but there was a delicacy to his movements that saved his appearance from coarseness.
“Nice place you have here. Great views.”
“My only instruction to my people was not to buy in any building that said Trump on it,” he said wryly. “And this is what they came up with. Trump without Trump.”
I smiled, liking