Chapter 2
“Are you the Martin Cable who bought 51 and Park?” asked, even though she knew the answer. She recognized his tall, handsome figure and classic features from the photos that Sandy had pulled up on her phone.
The man looked apprehensive. He eyed carefully before answering.
noticed that he had sharp, ice blue eyes. He was taller than her, and she wished that she was towering over him as she would have been to someone more of her landlord’s height.
She herself was five eight, which afforded her the satisfaction of towering over quite a few men in her life, including her boss Dr. Norden.
But Martin Cable was at least six foot five, and she found herself gazing up at him instead.
She pressed her hand into her hip, but she itched to reach out and jab her finger into his chest. Answer me, she seethed inwardly.
“I am,” the man finally said. “And you are….?”
“ Reynolds,” she said, watching his face.
There was no recognition there.
“Don’t you know my name?” she asked.
She noticed that he was as good looking in person as he had been in the pictures, perhaps even better looking. He had a solid, athletic body. In fact, she was glad that she was a woman and that the conversation wouldn’t devolve into a fist fight, because she could tell that the man was strong.
He wore a crisp, tailored suit, and was without a doubt the most well dressed person in the room, despite the fact that the space was filled with business men and women on lunch hour.
There was something about him that made him stand out of the crowd. If she hadn’t known that he was a billionaire, she’d have suspected he was a celebrity. He had that look about him.
He shook his head.
“Well you would,” said, “if you’d bothered to see whose apartments you’ll be tearing down. Whose lives you’ll be ruining.”
The man looked stunned, as if she’d slapped him, which she had half a mind of doing.
She felt anger boiling inside of her.
“But you don’t even care, do you!” she shouted, her hand flying off of her hip and waving in the air, all attitude. “You’d rather slink around here like some chicken-ass alley cat, doing backwards deals with landlords than actually think about the people whose lives you’ll be disrupting. All because of what? So you can have your tenth fucking house? What do you need another house for?”
The man stepped backwards.
“I know you got houses,” said, defaulting into street slang as her attitude took over. “So don’t even tell me you need another house!” She paused so that she could inhale, drawing air through her nostrils.
Waving her hand in the air, she continued. “You’re a chicken shit asshole coward. That’s what you are. You don’t even care about people who have one place to call home. We’re nothing to you. You and your damn suit and your damn cappuccino and your damn blonde hair and your damn good looks and your damn luxury yacht and all your damn stupid money.”
The words tumbled out of her mouth, barely making sense.
She realized how far off track she’d gotten, and that the entire Starbucks was gaping at her.
Since she’d been coming to that same Starbucks for years, every afternoon after lunch practically, she knew three quarters of the faces.
They all looked curiously at the man, to see how he would handle the situation.
watched him open his mouth, and then close it again.
“That’s right you got nothin’ to say,” she said.
Then she caught sight of the clock. She’d wasted the end of her lunch break, and the line was now too long to get back into.
“Tsk,” she said, raising her eyebrow at the man. “Now I have to go back to work. Some people have to work. Some people have bills to pay. We can’t all be billionaires, running around and snatching up whatever apartments we want to, you know.”
She turned on her heel.
A scattered applause accompanied her walk to the exit, and she heard the buzzing sound of conversations starting back up as she pushed the doors open.
By the time she walked back into the office, her breath was just starting to normalize, and her heartbeat was returning to normal.
Sandy looked up from her seat at the front desk, where she was reading over a sheet of notes from a file folder. “No drinks?” she asked, her disappointment clear.
“No,” said testily, pulling her bag off of her shoulder and dropping it onto the ground. She dropped into her desk chair dramatically, sighing as she did. “I saw him.”
“Martin Cable?” Sandy asked, turning in her chair so that she faced . “Seriously? We were just talking about him! What are the chances?”
“Probably pretty good, since he’s going to be building a house one block down and there’s only two coffee shops on 51 East. The man obviously doesn’t have to work.”
“Right,” Sandy said, cringing. “Did you say something?”
“Of course I did,” said, pulling herself up so that she was sitting upright as the first afternoon patient walked into the office.
“I had to,” she whispered to Sandy. “I explained to him that he was displacing a lot of very nice people, and that his actions were inconsiderate.”
“Oh, you ‘explained’ that, did you?” Sandy asked, raising an eyebrow. knew that her friend had known her long enough to be able to imagine what the exchange had entailed.
nodded. “I think he got the message loud and clear.”