Voilà! There she was again, the French supermodel Marbella, on the cover with yet another glass of champagne in her hand and a mischievous smile.
“JUST KIDDING!” read the headline.
Fifty cents later I was standing off to the side, my head buried among the pages.
Apparently Marbella had given an interview to a French television station claiming – au contraire – that she’d never actually slept with Thomas Ferramore. It had all been a bad joke, she insisted, and she deeply regretted any problems it may have caused the billionaire or his “lovely fiancée” in America.
Yeah, right. Color me sold, sweetheart.
But there was more.
And on the believability scale, it was actually a bit more convincing, or at least creative.
The CEO of ParisJet, the company in France that Ferramore was negotiating to buy, had told the French business magazine Les Echos that Ferramore had been in talks with him day and night for his entire trip.
“Trust me, Mr. Ferramore had no time for any funny business or hanky-panky business,” read the money quote.
I closed the Post and tucked it beneath my arm, walking toward the Lexington Avenue exit to hail a taxi. I could feel the whoosh of commuters rushing by me for their trains and the vibration of their footsteps against the wide marble floor.
But what I really felt was numb, confused, and more than a little lost.
For sure, Courtney hadn’t been scooped by the Post. She had to be up to speed on this latest twist and turn in her marital saga. Ferramore probably even made sure of it. Why wouldn’t he? It was alibi city.
But was she buying it?
The verdict rang in my pocket no more than a minute later. Courtney was finally calling me back.
“I saw the story. Do you know what you’re going to do now?” I asked her.
“I do,” she answered.
Chapter 54
IT WASN’T THE words themselves but the way Courtney said them. As if she were already standing at the altar with Thomas Ferramore.
“I do.”
I immediately fell silent on the phone. There was no need for Courtney to officially break the news. It was broken. Just like my heart.
“I need you to understand, Nick,” she said. “I’m marrying Tom, but I need you to be there for me.”
“I was there for you,” I said.
“I know you were. Promise me you won’t stop now. Do you promise?”
What could I say? As much as I loved her, she had always been my friend first, before anything else.
“Please,” she said, pressing me. “Do you promise? I need to hear the actual words, Nick.”
I took a deep breath and swallowed it along with my pride.
“I do,” I said.
Of course, little did I know how fast I’d have to make good on that promise.
A few hours later, with the sun setting over Manhattan, I arrived downtown at the North Cove Marina to climb aboard Sweet Revenge, Thomas Ferramore’s 180-foot Trinity megayacht. I’ve seen much smaller houses. Actually, I grew up in one.
In a word? Wow.
At the bow stood the bar, and at the stern was the live jazz band, a really good combo. In between was a veritable who’s who of publishing, fashion, and what remained of the decimated ranks of the banking and Wall Street elite.
You get one guess as to where I headed first, and it wasn’t to shake Thomas Ferramore’s hand.
“I’ll have a Laphroaig Fifteen Year Old,” I said to the rent-a-bartender, who barely looked old enough to drive, let alone serve drinks.
The young man looked at me as if I’d just spoken Swahili to him. “A what?” he asked.
“A Laphroaig Fifteen Year Old,” came a voice over my shoulder.
It was Courtney, and in her hand was an entire bottle of my favorite Scotch whisky.
“Here,” she said, handing the bottle to the bartender. “Please keep this behind the bar for Mr. Daniels, and Mr. Daniels only.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, quickly pouring me a double. “Laphroaig Fifteen Year Old.”
Courtney took my arm as we moved away from the bar. “Thanks so much for coming,” she said. “It means the world to me. You’re the best.”
Apparently not, but I took a big swig of excellent whisky and winked at her. “What are friends for?” I said.
She gave me a huge smile and leaned in to tell me something, when the music suddenly stopped. It was replaced by the sound of a knife tapping on crystal. Oh boy, Thomas Ferramore wanted to make a toast.
Once again he had come between Courtney and me. I guessed I’d better get used to it.
“C’mon up here, sweetheart!” he bellowed, standing up straight and proud on the captain’s deck. He was wearing a faux white naval jacket replete with shoulder boards and a sleeve insignia. Two blond women flanked him, both very pretty, and I figured they were his PR team. Was this guy for real? I couldn’t understand what Courtney saw in him. Not even when I tried extra hard.
As she made her way to join him, Ferramore thanked everyone for coming on such short notice “to this wonderful celebration of love.” That brought a rousing cheer from the entire crowd. Minus me, of course. I had one hand in my pocket and I was wiggling my middle finger at him.
Ferramore took no offense and continued: “Courtney and I wanted to make it very clear this evening that no rumor, no unfounded gossip, no nonsense whatsoever, will ever get the better of us. We can ride out any storm that comes our way!”
Ferramore turned to face Courtney, pulling her tightly into his arms. As the two of them kissed, he thrust his hand high in triumph. An even louder cheer erupted from the crowd of his friends, or whoever these hordes of overdressed people were.
Right on cue the first firework exploded in the night air, a beautiful collage of rainbow colors mixing with a sea of stars. It was an amazing spectacle, actually.
But the real spectacle that night was yet to come, and of course, I would be part of it.
I’D SPENT THE afternoon with Hoodie.
Now here I was with Houdini.
Thomas Ferramore had just pulled off the impossible, a trick for the ages. He had escaped the seemingly inescapable bind he’d been in, and he’d made it look easy.
Deep down, Courtney may have still had some suspicions, but there on his yacht, for all of Manhattan ’s glitterati to see, Ferramore still had his prize. That’s all that mattered to him.
And me.
I should’ve stolen a page from Courtney’s playbook and put everything into a box.
Instead, I put it all into a glass… and drank it.
After about an hour at the party, and after the youthful rent-a-bartender decided that my drinking two-thirds of a bottle of whisky was clearly one-third too many, I decided I would tell Thomas Ferramore exactly what I thought of his marrying Courtney.
Only I couldn’t find him. So I did the next worst thing.
I told Courtney.
Cornering her along the starboard railing, I slurred the truth to her in a voice somewhat louder than it should have been. “You can’t marry him! You’re making a mistake! Don’t you see what a mistake this is? You’re smart – so act smart, Courtney.”
Her eyes filled with tears as everyone within earshot turned to gawk at the scene I was making. Courtney was so upset, she could barely get the words out.
“All I see is someone drunk who just broke his promise to me,” she said.
She walked away then, leaving me alone – unless, of course, you count all the lookie-loos still watching. That’s when I really gave them their money’s worth. All that whisky in my otherwise empty stomach churned and sloshed its way up past my heartache and back out through its original port of entry. Right there over the starboard railing, with an ear-wrenching heave-ho, I power-fed the fishes.