In the seven years Newman worked with Vance-Ehrhardt, he learned his lessons well. And his own specialties began to emerge.
Early on, Newman developed the uncanny ability to sense a grain deal in the works. A run on shipping tonnages here; there the emergence of an African leader who understood that his people had to be fed; an adverse weather report in one section of the world, with bumper crops in another — all became signs to Newman that a deal was in the making.
This ability, combined with the backing of the Vance-Ehrhardt conglomerate, allowed him to undercut competitive grain dealers even before they knew what hit them. Corn to Johannesburg at two-ten a bushel? He could turn it into two-fifty. Canadian wheat languishing in the fields? He bought at fifty cents a bushel discount, held for three months, and resold it at a ninety-cent profit when everyone else was screaming for a quarter higher.
Thus he became known as the Marauder.
Then, eight short years ago, Newman had branched off on his own, taking with him not only the expertise Vance-Ehrhardt had taught him, but several of the conglomerate’s most lucrative contracts.
For that Jorge Vance-Ehrhardt had never forgiven him. The term Marauder was not used as an endearment in that household, rather as an obscenity.
It didn’t matter, though, he kept telling himself. Today was the wedding, and by this evening he and Lydia would be gone. After a brief honeymoon he would be back at work.
He turned off the shower, dried himself, and went back into this bedroom, tying the belt of his robe.
Lydia was standing there, her back to the hall door. She was clad in a black bikini, a light robe over her shoulders, sandals on her feet. She jumped, a surprised look on her face that turned to a seductive grin.
“What are you doing here?” he said mildly.
“I was getting set to join you in the shower,” she said. Her voice was soft and very pleasant, with the slightest trace of a German accent. She was a tall, willowy woman, with small breasts, a flat stomach, and a small, almost boyish derriere. Her skin was deeply tanned, which accented the long blond hair that cascaded around her shoulders.
“Your mother will have a fit,” Newman said, not moving from the bathroom doorway. He was conscious of his heart beating in his chest. Lydia was a lovely woman.
“Screw it,” she grinned. She undid her bikini top, tossed it and the robe aside, stepped out of her sandals, and slipped off her bikini bottom. Her pubic hair was nothing more than a light tuft of blonde. She came across the room to Newman, put her arms around his neck, and pressed her body against his.
“Hmmm,” she sighed luxuriously. “I’ve missed you, Kenneth.”
Newman resisted for just a moment, but then he pulled her even closer, and they kissed deeply, her breasts crushed against his chest, her long legs soft against his, and he could feel himself responding despite his determination to do absolutely nothing here that could be criticized. But he loved her. Despite her faults, which he knew and understood all too well, he loved her.
He had watched her develop and mature during the years he had worked for her father. At first he had called her the snot-nosed kid. But then, one day, he had suddenly seen her in a new light. She was not a kid, snot-nosed or otherwise, but a beautiful woman, though headstrong, petulant, and spoiled. A woman he had fallen deeply and irrevocably in love with. Nothing had happened to change that in the two months since he and Lydia had announced their engagement. Not her family’s animosity, not her shenanigans (as her father called her defiant acts), and certainly not any second thoughts on his part. If anything, he had fallen even more deeply in love with her.
If he was a marauder, then she was a pirate. Uncompromisingly selfish, but lovely.
They parted, and he held her at arm’s length as they looked into each other’s eyes.
“Not now,” he said firmly.
“Don’t be a boor, Kenneth,” she said.
He laughed, pulled her closer so that he could kiss her tiny, upturned nose, then spun her around by the shoulders, and slapped her on the bottom.
“Your mother and aunts are probably having fits right now trying to find you. Don’t disappoint them. Just this one time.”
She wheeled back to him, her hands on her slim hips. “You son of a bitch,” she shouted.
Newman laughed again. “Hell of a thing to call your groom on your wedding day.”
For just a moment it seemed as if she wouldn’t back down, but suddenly she grinned. “It’s one of the many reasons I love you, you know. You’re such a bastard, I can’t get around you.”
“And you’re a spoiled-rotten little bitch. A hell of a relationship we’ve got ourselves here.”
She laughed as she gathered up her bikini and threw on her robe, but then she turned serious. “You’ll rue the day you met me, Kenneth. You do know that, don’t you?”
He nodded. “It’s one of the reasons I love you. I like living dangerously.”
“I will hurt you.”
“You already have.”
“Bastard,” she said. Someone knocked on the door. She threw it open as her startled father was raising his hand to knock again.
She reached up and pecked him on the cheek. “He’s a son of a bitch, Father,” she snapped, turning around to smile at Newman. “But I love him.” And she brushed past her father and was gone.
Vance-Ehrhardt looked after her for a long moment, shook his head, then turned back to Newman. “May I come in?”
“Of course,” Newman said.
Vance-Ehrhardt stepped into the room, softly closed the door, and came across to where Newman was standing. He seemed ill at ease, almost embarrassed.
“I came to offer you money to quit this nonsense.”
“It would have to be quite a sum to tempt me, Jorge,” Newman said angrily. He had always respected the older man’s wisdom when it came to business. But his judgment of the people closest to him had always been wanting.
“Five million.”
“Dollars?”
“Of course,” Vance-Ehrhardt said. He was a short, stocky man with thinning white hair, a double chin, jowls, and deep-set, hooded eyes. No one knew his real age, but Newman was sure he was in his late sixties at least.
“You value your daughter highly,” Newman said.
“Don’t play games with me, Kenneth,” the older man said, a bit of color coming to his cheeks. “I don’t want you as a son-in-law. I don’t want you married to Lydia. I don’t want you a part of this family.”
“You’re forgetting, Jorge, that Lydia will take my name. She becomes a part of my family.”
“You have no family!”
“Does that mean you will deny your own grandchildren?”
Vance-Ehrhardt raised his right hand as if he would strike Newman, but then he lowered it. “Are you saying my daughter is pregnant?”
“No, unfortunately not. But I’ll do everything within my power to make sure she is within the next few months, with or without your blessings.”
A range of emotions played across the older man’s face, which had turned a mottled red. “Why have you done this to me, Kenneth?” he asked at length. “Why have you singled out my family?”
“I’ve not singled out your family, Jorge,” Newman said with feeling. He truly liked the old man. “In the beginning we were friends. You taught me nearly everything I know.” He turned away and looked out the open doors toward the jungle, the airstrip beyond. “I had always thought you would be proud of my achievements.”
“Proud?” Vance-Ehrhardt sputtered.
Newman turned on him. “Yes, goddamn it, proud. I was like a son to you.”
“A son who turned on his father.”