Иностранец. Становление. Игорь Шелег

plants Seven was used to seeing in Jamaica. A neatly manicured dozen or so acres, the landscape was occasionally broken by a hatted gardener stooped over a bed of flowers or stretch of grass. The smell of fresh-cut grass drifted into the car despite the closed windows and arctic AC.

      The chill of the car made Seven suddenly wish for a cup of a hot chocolate. Steaming from the stove, not a packet. Freshly shaved from a ball of cocoa, swirled with milk and a dash of nutmeg. Just like his father made for him whenever he was home in Jamaica. Yeah, that was what he wanted.

      Seven emerged from his momentary fantasy of hot chocolate to the sound of the girls giggling in the backseat. Marcus navigated the car through the mansion’s wide double gates and out to the long bridge heading off Star Island and to the A1A for downtown.

      “The firm is downtown,” he said to Seven. “I’m not sure if Bailey can do anything for you today, but I let her know you’ll be there soon.”

      “Her?”

      “Yeah. Bailey. She’s my money guy.”

      Masiel tapped Marcus’s shoulder from the backseat. “Can we go shopping on Collins Avenue?”

      Marcus glanced back at her in the rearview mirror. “What, you got Collins Avenue money, girl?”

      A chorus of giggles sounded from behind Seven.

      “Honey, we thought you’d treat us.” Felice pouted, cocking a thigh bared in her short skirt. “We’re always treating you,” she said.

      Seven didn’t have to imagine what the girls were always treating Marcus to. In the rearview mirror, Masiel gave him a teasing, wet-lipped smile as she trailed a red fingernail along her low neckline. He wasn’t impressed.

      “You can drop me off at your money guy’s office and take off,” Seven said. “I got this.”

      “See, he got this,” blond-haired Kenya mocked as she offered her cleavage for Marcus’s consideration. “We have needs, Daddy.” Her declaration set off another peal of laughter from the other girls.

      In his profession, the rich and bored often clung to artists as a way to relieve their boredom—a lot like Marcus was doing now. Seven had seen enough of this type of leeching to last a lifetime. These girls bartered their bodies and their time for jewels or money or trips outside their small towns, riding that tiger as long as their looks lasted while hoping for one of these men to sweep them off their feet and offer marriage. He glanced at the trio in the backseat. He didn’t see Marcus marrying any of them, but then again, he had underestimated women enough to know he could be wrong.

      “Here it is.”

      The car pulled up in front of a high-rise glittering with blue glass and steel. “You’re going to the top floor. Braithwaite and Fernandez Wealth Management. Ask for Bailey Hughes.”

      Seven nodded his thanks, patted his back pocket to make sure he had his wallet and got out of the car. As he slammed the door shut, one of the girls clambered over the other two to claim a position in the front seat beside Marcus. The younger man saluted Seven with a tap of fingers against his brow and peeled off down the street.

      Inside the building, the AC threatened to turn him into an icicle in his thin white shirt and jeans. He pressed the elevator for the twenty-second floor, and when the car arrived laden with a half dozen business types who gave him cool, dismissive gazes, he got on and rose in swift quiet toward the building’s summit.

      * * *

      The top floor was rarefied air indeed. Seven stepped off the elevator into the marble-paved lobby of Braithwaite and Fernandez Wealth Management and the cold smell of new money. A thick mahogany desk sat directly in front of the elevator. Behind the desk, a freckled redhead with wheat-colored skin watched as he walked through the steel doors of the elevator. The heels of his loafers rang out against the marble.

      Seven shivered slightly in the chilled air, feeling goose bumps rise over his arms. The lobby was cold and massive. It stretched out in both directions with an impressive view of the Miami skyline to the left and an ocean of cream marble in a long corridor that branched off into several hidden hallways. Purple orchids stood in tall black planters at each corner of the large lobby, a complement to the long row of black leather armchairs lining the back wall on both sides of the elevator.

      “Good afternoon,” the redhead greeted him with a surprising island accent. Bahamian, if he wasn’t mistaken.

      “Good afternoon. I’m here to see Bailey Hughes. I was referred by Marcus Stanfield.”

      “Of course. Have a seat.” She gestured to the thick armchairs as she lifted the phone to her ear. “Your walk-in is here,” she said into the receiver. After a moment, the woman nodded. “Of course,” she said then hung up the phone.

      “Ms. Hughes will be with you in a moment. Would you like a beverage while you wait?”

      Seven looked around the reception area at the miles of marble, at the original Rothko on the cream walls. A place of obvious wealth and influence. They’d have what he wanted. “A cup of hot chocolate if you have it,” he said.

      “Of course,” the young woman said. She moved from behind her desk with a click of her impressively high heels against the marble and disappeared down the hallway.

      Seven shoved his hands in his pockets and strolled to the wide windows. Miami lay spread out before him, bright and glittering with its ribbons of roads, high-rise buildings and the gilded waters of Biscayne Bay. It was no Jamaica, but he looked forward to making a home here.

      The sound of shoes on the marble drew his attention from the view. Two men, both middle-aged, with gray hair at their temples, one Latin and the other white, emerged from a long hallway, talking quietly. They looked up at him as they passed, nodding in quiet acknowledgment, although the white one, taller and in a more expensive suit, gave a narrow-eyed glance at Seven’s jeans and T-shirt. Seven, used to the contempt of corporate types, at least until they realized how much money he made, let the man’s cool-eyed stare roll off his back like bathwater.

      He returned his attention to the view outside the window.

      “Here you are.” The pale islander returned, holding a steaming mug in both hands. She smiled, then gestured toward the long hallway the men had come from. Seven gazed longingly at the cup in her hands. “Ms. Hughes will see you now. Follow me.”

      She went ahead of him, long legs beautiful and eye-catching under the black skirt. At the third frosted-glass door, she stopped and knocked briefly.

      “Come.” A voice came faintly from behind the slightly open door.

      The young woman opened the door for him and waved him inside, simultaneously handing him the hot cocoa and gesturing toward one of the leather seats in front of the desk. Her duty fulfilled, she left.

      Only a brief view of the office registered: ceiling-high windows, a wide glass desk, a figure rising from behind the desk with a hand outstretched. The woman behind the desk wore gray slacks and a white blouse with a heavy white bow at her throat. Her hair, straightened and parted down the middle, was tucked behind her ears. The usual banker type. Boring and barely attractive. But something about her pricked Seven’s memory.

      “I’m Bailey Hughes. It’s a pleasure to meet you,” the woman said.

      Seven’s hand rose automatically to meet hers even as his mind registered the familiar lines of her face, her sharp blade of a body, which had drawn his attention before.

      “Have we met?” he asked, shaking her hand.

      Her mouthed twisted briefly in a smile. “No, we haven’t. At least not formally.” She drew her hand back. “And I still don’t know your name.” She looked up at him, challenge in the arch of her eyebrow.

      He grinned. “Seven Carmichael.”

      “As I said before, a pleasure.”

      “Likewise,” Seven said.

      He