Eye of the Beholder

He’s a walking cliche. It’s almost sad.

Almost.

Downstairs, the staff is wildly enthusiastic at his appearance. I get a lot of empty, anticlimactic nods hello after they realize I’m just some lawyer, not a movie star or artist. I do remember a painting I did, in third grade, of a house. I thought it was pretty good. Sister Virginia took one look at it and told me I should be a lawyer.

A hostess takes my briefcase before I remember that my case notes are inside. I have a file with a rundown on every single piece of litigation that my firm is doing for BentleyCo or its subsidiaries. With Harland, you come prepared. Updating him is not unlike the Socratic method in law school, where you scrambled for answers while the professor peppered you with questions that had no accurate answers. This guy oversees the worldwide operations of dozens of companies and he still keeps tuned to every detail of every piece of litigation.

We get a corner table that has been reserved. There is a step up to the table, which appropriately places us above the other diners. A waiter gallops up to the table with scrolls that are apparently menus. But I already know Harland is going to order something off the menu.

The best word to describe Harland is severe. There is no middle ground with the guy. A viselike handshake. Hair tightly cropped, almost to a crew cut. His eyes are small and fierce and liquid, as if he is constantly awaiting the opportunity to prove himself. His jaw seems permanently clenched. His shirts are heavily starched. His clothes are the nicest I’ve ever seen, and I try to wear some decent threads myself. The guy never served, but he conducts every aspect of his life in military fashion. He wakes at five A.M. every morning, swims half a mile in his pool-the outdoor one in the summer-then eats an efficient breakfast and makes it into the office by a quarter to seven. If I had a dime for every time I had voice mails from Harland when I walked into my office, voice mails from seven that morning, I’d be rich.

Richer.

“Thanks for meeting me, Paul.”

“Always a pleasure, Harland. Always.”

“Henry,” he says to the waiter who appears again out of nowhere. “Perrier with lime for me. Paul?”

I’m not sure how Harland already knows the name of a waiter in a restaurant that’s only been open a few weeks. I guess it’s that kind of small detail stuff that made him a billionaire. Either that, or the twenty million in starter money he got from the divorce.

I have a taste for my usual. Harland pauses, as if he disapproves. He doesn’t drink. Doesn’t smoke. The only vice of which I’m aware-and many others are aware, no doubt-is his mouth. This guy speaks with the smooth ease of the ultrawealthy, but if something rubs him wrong he can cuss like a truck driver.

So I always try not to rub him wrong. But I order the martini, anyway, dirty and straight up, with blue cheese olives.

Okay, there’s the mouth and the women. Every time I see him on the society page or at a social function, it’s a different one. Blond, brunet, redhead, buxom, petite, leggy-the man doesn’t pin himself down to a single trait, unless you count young and drop-dead gorgeous as traits.

A woman who looks like she came off a runway, her hair tossed and pearls around her neck, says hello to Harland. Kisses on each cheek, a quick wiggle of the fingers in my direction.

Harland sits back a moment, basking in the glow. This guy’s a rock star. Still with the hint of a smile across his lips, he turns to me.

“Do you know someone named Evelyn Pendry?” he asks.

HE FEELS SAFE in the dark, warm and secure, the great equalizer, you can’t see me, even with the light coming in through the space between the two doors, still dark, dark closet, then the click of the dead bolt-

Leo frees the knife from his sock and gets out of his crouch.

Thump on the floor, by the door. Dead bolt locks again. Footsteps moving quickly on the carpet. The television turns on, the scripted voices fading into the room. The news.

“First in the news, tonight,” says Evelyn Pendry, imitating her mother’s voice and crisp intonation on the newscast playing in the background. She walks into the bedroom, pulling at her earrings, repeating her mother’s words. She unbuttons her blouse, kicks off her heels, wiggles out of her skirt.

The scent of berries wafts into the room. Leo inhales, it’s been so long since he smelled someone like that-

“Senator Almundo,” she says, repeating Mom’s words, “denied the allegations.”

She stands in front of the mirror in her cream satin underwear, cocking her head decisively and punching her lines. “Senator Almundo… denied the allegations.”

Leo stares through the crack between the doors of the bedroom closet as Evelyn repeats the phrase again, working on her punctuation.

Her figure is firm and shapely, but he’s not thinking that way, no, he wonders how she’ll react, she seems athletic, young and athletic, not Old Man Freddy sleeping in his bed, not like the girl with Riley in the alley. No, this one, this one will put up a fight.

He grips the knife in his hand, swallows hard.

He takes a breath and it happens, the calm sweeping over him.

She is early, unexpected. He will wait until nightfall, when she’s in bed.

He closes his eyes and holds his breath.

When he opens them again, Evelyn Pendry is staring at the closet.

HARLAND LACES his hands together. “So she was talking about a background story.”

“Well, that’s how she framed it,” I explain. “She wanted to do a piece on the Public Trust case and Senator Almundo and me. Then she started asking me questions about my background. And she asked if I kept in touch with Nat and your niece, Gwendolyn.”

“Gwendolyn. Yes, Gwendolyn.” It seems Evelyn Pendry asked Harland about those two women as well. He angles his head. “I haven’t heard from Gwendolyn in years. And if it’s many more before I do, I won’t complain. What a vile girl.”

“You two didn’t hit it off,” I gather.

Harland looks hard at me, wets his lips, and answers evenly. “This was Cassie’s only cousin. The closest thing she had to a sibling. And she didn‘t-” His face changes, a break in the anger, a moment of emotion before hardening again. “She didn’t even come back for Cassie’s funeral. This girl couldn’t take one day away from her gallivanting across the globe to pay her respects to Cassandra. That I will never forgive.”

Harland married Natalia Lake, heiress to the Lake fortune, when she was nineteen, and-coincidentally, I’m sure-had just inherited almost a billion dollars from her father, Conrad Lake. They divorced after about twenty years of marriage, not long after their only daughter Cassie was murdered. Harland took twenty million and went his own way, investing in hotels first-Bentley Suites-and then building a number of businesses that bear his name, including Bentley Manufacturing, Bentley Bearings, Bentley International, and Bentley Financial.

Word was, Harland’s fondness for young women did not begin after his divorce but long before. The marriage had turned into a cold one, held together by the one thing they had in