Park Avenue (Book Six in the Fifth Avenue Series) (47 page)

“Like hell you did.”

“I hired one of Scott’s
men.”

“No, you didn’t.
 
Shall I bring him in?
 
You told me you spoke to him
directly.
 
He’ll answer any of your
questions.”

George glanced behind her
at the door, and then looked at her.
 
“Leana, this isn’t the right time.”

“You’re right,” she
said.
 
“For us, our time is up.
 
But one day, if you have a moment of
clarity that isn’t bound to your insatiable ego and greed, you’ll understand
just how wrong you were to lie to me and how much you’ve failed as a man.”

“Get out.”

“I’m gone,” she
said.
 
“Enjoy Pepper’s charms,
George.
 
Enjoy all she can do for you.”
 
She reached into her pocket, removed her
set of keys to 157 Columbus Circle, and tossed them across the table with such
force that they slid past him and fell to the floor.
 
“Opening night for our hotels is days
away.
 
I hope you have something
massive up your sleeve because I’m going to destroy you.”

He started to come around
the table, his face flushed.
 
Sweat
shined along the brow of his forehead.

“I told you to get out.”

She turned to leave.

George followed her.

She opened the door and
stepped out, but he put his hand on her shoulder and spun her around.

“Let go of me.”

“I did hire someone.”

“Tell that to him.
 
Tell it to Sean.
 
You said you hired one of his men.
 
So, here’s Sean, who says that you
didn’t.”
 
She flicked his hand off
her shoulder.
 
“Go on.
 
There he is.
 
Try to lie your way out of it now.”

George looked at him but
said nothing.
 
Sean Scott was
staring straight ahead.

“Did my father hire one
of your men?” Leana said to Sean.

“He didn’t.”

She glared at
George.
 
“What do you have to say to
that?”

He kept his eyes on
Sean.
 
“For some reason, he’s
lying.”

“That’s all you’ve got?”

“For now.
 
For whatever reason, he’s lying.
 
But I’ll find out why.”
 
His eyes never once left Sean.
 
“You know I will.”

Sean started to walk
away.

“Have a great opening
night,” Leana said.
 
She looked at
Sam.
 
“Let’s go.
 
I’m out of here.”

*
 
*
 
*

At midnight that night,
when Leana was in bed with Mario and on the verge of sleep, her cell buzzed,
indicating that someone had left her an email.
 
Her construction team was working around
the clock at The Park.
 
She sat up
in bed, reached for the phone on her bedside table, and looked at the
message.
 
It was from her father.

“What’s that?” Mario
asked.

“An email from my
father.”

He pulled himself up in
bed.
 
“What does it say?”

“It says, ‘I’m sending
this to you now because it’s late and I know you’re not with Sean Scott.
 
I need you to listen to me now.
 
You’re in danger.
 
Scott and his men aren’t who they appear
to be.
 
He’s lying to you.
 
Through him, I hired one of his
men.
 
He knows I did, but he won’t
take my calls now, so I can’t challenge him on it.
 
I just spoke to Fondaras, who claims he
knows nothing about this.
 
He said
he will talk to Scott tomorrow, but I don’t trust him, which you already
know—I’ve warned you against him from the start.
 
I don’t know why Scott is doing
this.
 
Perhaps it’s to make me look
like a liar in your eyes, but even that makes no sense to me—yet.
 
You need to listen to me.
 
Something is very wrong here.
 
For some reason, he’s lying to you.
 
I’ve already hired someone to
investigate Scott and his men.
 
I’ll
be in touch, whether you want me to be or not.
 
Be careful.
 
Tell Mario everything.
 
Maybe he and his father also can look
into this.
 
Don’t let our personal
history get in the way of this.
 
I’m
trying to help you.
 
Something isn’t
right, Leana, because I did hire one of Scott’s men.
 
Or, at least I thought I did.
 
You need to trust me on this.’”

She shut off the phone
and lowered it into her lap.
 
“What
am I to make of that?”

“Why would Sean Scott
have any ill intent toward you?”

“Exactly.
 
Anastassios suggested him and his team
for me.
 
They’ve been great.
 
I don’t get it.”

“Do you think your father
is telling the truth?”

“He confronted Sean.
 
He called him a liar to his face.
 
After that note, I have to at least
question this.
 
My father doesn’t
reach out like that.
 
He wouldn’t
send me some secret message at midnight for no reason.”

“Other than to get you
back on the project?”

She shrugged.
 
“I don’t know if that’s it.
 
This is different.
 
He invoked you and your father to
help.
 
You’ve got to admit that’s
unusual.”

“Agreed.”

“So, what am I to do
now?”

“You need to stay here
tomorrow.”

“You know I can’t.”

“You’re going to have to
for one day.
 
Let me and my brothers
look into this.
 
Have Marty Spellman
look into it.
 
Stay in touch with
Zack via your cell, and work on the hotel from here.”

“Mario—”

“It’s just one day,
Leana.
 
Give Marty and me a
day.
 
You at least owe your husband
that.
 
Now, let me see the phone.
 
I have calls to make.”

CHAPTER
SIXTY-SEVEN

Across town, in an
industrial-looking building on West Fiftieth Street and Twelfth Avenue in
Hell’s Kitchen, two men of great power sat opposite each other.
 
A desk was between them, smoke and
tension were in the air, utter hatred possessed one of the men to his core, and
bodyguards stood along the periphery, guns in hand.

It was past midnight, but
past midnight was always when he was summoned to meet this son of a bitch.
 
Past midnight, he was reminded, was a
time when few would call him, few would see him; and so past midnight it was,
so no one would know that their paths had crossed.

“You’ll never be found
out this way,” he was told.
 
“You’ll
see.
 
It’s genius.”

Their meetings began five
weeks ago, and in those five weeks, he had betrayed her more than he ever had
betrayed anyone in his life.
 
He was
being used as the catalyst that would end her life.
 
But he was powerless to stop it if he
wanted to save his own life, as well as the lives of his sons and daughters.

“If you don’t fall in
line, if you don’t do as we say, we will kill your daughters first, then your
sons, and then we will kill you.
 
But it won’t be that simple.
 
First, you’ll be shown videos of their deaths; you’ll hear them pleading
for their lives; you’ll hear them questioning how you could have let this
happen to them over the life of another woman.
 
And then you’ll meet your own death,
which will be torturous.”

The day after he told the
man to go to hell, that no one challenged him, his youngest daughter was
abducted and beaten to such a degree that she was still in the hospital,
recuperating.
 
He managed to keep
her beating out of the press because he was ordered to do so and because he had
the power to do so.

So, now here he was,
ready to listen to the next steps that would result in the end of the life of a
woman he also considered something of a daughter—Leana Redman.

“The opening night of her
hotel,” the man sitting opposite him said.
 
“You and your men are ready to act?”

“We’re ready.”

“What are your plans?”

“I’ve told you my plans.”

“Nothing’s changed?”

“Why would they?”

“Because you’re intimate
with her.
 
You have an inside track
that the rest of us don’t have, which is why we approached you in the first
place.
 
We know she’ll tell you if
she changes her plans.
 
And if she
does, then your plans will change.
 
They’ll have to.”

“They haven’t.”

“Well, that’s good,
Anastassios,” Antonio De Cicco said.
 
“Or should I call you Deadman?
 
Or is it Deadman1?
 
I can
never remember.”

Anastassios didn’t
answer.

“You don’t see it, but
she is a murdering cunt, just like I said she was on her fuckin’ hotel.
 
She is responsible for the death of my
Lucia.
 
She’s responsible for taking
my grandchildren’s mother away from them.
 
And now Mario plans to marry her.
 
At my estate.
 
But he won’t,
will he?
 
You’re going to take care
of that for us, aren’t you?
 
You and
the team she hired to protect her.
 
The team you suggested for her.
 
Isn’t that right?”

“That’s right,”
Anastassios said.
 
“Just keep your
hands off my family.
 
Leave them the
hell alone.”

“I have no interest in
your family, Anastassios.
 
That is,
of course, unless you give me a reason to take an interest, which you won’t,
will you?
 
No, I didn’t think so.
 
That’s why you continue to come
back.
 
That’s why you’re here now,
hoping and praying I don’t fuck up another one of your kids.
 
That’s why you’re going to set it up so
that murdering cunt dies.”

CHAPTER
SIXTY-EIGHT

Pepper Redman arrived
home late, exhilarated and surprisingly energetic given the day she’d had.
 
It was nearly twelve-thirty in the
morning and she had just left the Columbus Circle project, of which she now was
back in charge.

Miraculously, her cousin
had quit, and her uncle had turned the job back over to her control, just as he
should have.

“Leana won’t be part of
this again?” she asked.

“It’s doubtful.”

“I need a guarantee,
Uncle George.
 
I can’t be played as
if I’m worth something one day, then worth nothing the next.
 
It isn’t fair.
 
You know how hard I’ve worked for
you.
 
Either you want me to finish
this job, or you don’t.”

“Finish the job, Pepper,
but lose the attitude.
 
You’ve cost
me key people because you’re too aggressive.
 
You pissed them off.
 
You need to manage this with a firm
hand, not with a bite.
 
Do you
understand me?”

“I won’t let you down.”

“I hope that’s true,
because if you can sew this up for me, there will be other buildings of similar
caliber for you to manage.
 
You’ll
leave your mark, but you need to do a better job of handling your staff and
crew.
 
That’s your weakest quality.
 
Do something about it and fix it.”

And that’s all Pepper
needed to hear.
 
You’ll leave
your mark.
 
She would.
 
And she’d be a better manager.
 
She’d do whatever she needed to do to
make her dreams of leaving her stamp on this city a reality.
 
That way, it would be easier for her to
take over Redman International when her uncle was ready to step down.