Bulls Island Read online

  Bulls Island

  Dorothea Benton Frank

  For Peter

  Toward the Sea

  The wind is an empty place. You enter

  expecting something softened by the sea.

  A piece of cedar shaped into a body

  you once loved. Perhaps the hand that held you

  from a distance or the face that simply

  held you here. Still moving in and out of time

  during the hour when night meets day,

  you try to find your bearings.

  You pick up objects. You want to remember.

  Jagged edged rocks in the palm of your hand.

  You hold them up in the moonlight.

  They are earthbound, filling with sky.

  You walk on further, pause to scoop tiny iridescent

  shells, the colors of cream and roses.

  Little by little the air brightens into hours,

  which are either empty or full of all the things

  you love and remember, depending

  on which direction the wind is coming from.

  —Marjory Heath Wentworth,

  South Carolina Poet Laureate

  Contents

  Epigraph

  Chapter One

  Meet Betts

  Chapter Two

  Meet J.D. and His Tribe of Malcontents

  Chapter Three

  Back to Betts

  Chapter Four

  J.D. Remembers

  Chapter Five

  Betts and Her Bundle of Joy

  Chapter Six

  J.D.’s Gone Fishing

  Chapter Seven

  Dad, Joanie, and Vinny

  Chapter Eight

  Empty Nest

  Chapter Nine

  Betts Is Back

  Chapter Ten

  Remember Me?

  Chapter Eleven

  Dirt on Everyone

  Chapter Twelve

  Catching Bull

  Chapter Thirteen

  Home

  Chapter Fourteen

  J.D. Speaks His Mind

  Chapter Fifteen

  Betts in New York

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Envelope, Please

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Best-Laid Plans

  Chapter Eighteen

  Shock Waves

  Epilogue

  2008

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Other Books by Dorothea Benton Frank

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  Meet Betts

  Trouble. In the charcoal shadows that delivered dawn to day in my Manhattan apartment, trouble lurked like a horrible thief. It would snatch my guilty life out of my pocket. I could sense but not pinpoint the exact location. It did not matter. Trouble would get me anyway. Trouble so practiced and seasoned that I would never know its clammy hand, each fingertip as light as feathers had been there mocking me the whole way to ruination. Except for one telling detail. Before I threw back my bedcovers, before I even glanced at my alarm clock, my left eyelid had begun to twitch in earnest. Always a redoubtable warning of approaching and certain disaster. My heart pounded. Was it a dream?

  Moments later, real life began again. My cell phone rang and vibrated against the blond wood of my bedside table. It was my secretary, Sandi, calling to say Ben Bruton wanted to see me that morning. Wonderful. I was to begin my day with an audience with the Great and Terrible Oz. Not to mention I had a scheduled meeting later that morning with a gaggle of fast-talking suits from Tokyo.

  Swell. No one at my level was called to see Bruton unless he wanted you dead and out of his life—or your status was to improve vastly. I had no reason to fear for my position and no reason to believe I was in line for anything except to continue what I had been doing for the past four years—evaluating and restructuring the distressed properties in our portfolio. Sounds boring? Anything but. Trust me.

  I was late, which was unusual. Normally, I’m up at six. My nerves got in between me and everything I had to do. As I dressed, I pushed my toe through an expensive pair of Wolford panty hose, jabbed my eyeliner into the white of my eye, spilled tea on my shirt, on and on it went until I finally got out the door.

  I rushed the nine and one-half blocks from Park and Sixty-first to work dodging traffic, juggling my Tazo chai, my handbag, the Wall Street Journal, and my briefcase. Click, click, click. The heels of my Prada pumps clicked and echoed in my ears as I hurried across the rose-colored, gold-speckled granite floor of the lobby. In my peripheral vision, I spotted Dennis Baker swinging into action, moving toward me like a PI, knowing he had caught my eye.

  Why was he always following me? He made my skin crawl. I slipped into an empty elevator, his arm caught the closing door, and I was trapped.

  “You look great today. New dress?” he said, exuding enough testosterone to impregnate every female in the five boroughs of New York City.

  Except me.

  “Thank you.” I avoided eye contact and his question.

  He leaned against the opposite wall, put his hands in his pockets, and struggled to look adorable. “So, let me ask you something, McGee.”

  “What?”

  “Why aren’t you committed to someone who could, you know, see about all your needs? Too risky to get involved?”

  “It’s not about money, Dennis,” I said, looking directly at him without a shred of warmth. “It’s about my survival. And since when is my life your business?”

  Disbelieving, Dennis Baker’s obnoxious eyes surveyed me as though he could not imagine what I struggled to overcome. In his opinion I had no problems because money was the great cure-all. As if I was rolling in it. Would that it were so.

  “I’ve been watching you. And…just curious, I guess.” Next, with what I’m sure he deemed considerable insight, he said, “Well then, it must be about power. Why you work so hard and why you’re such a loner? A relationship might distract your focus and therefore dilute your power. Am I right?”

  “Nooooo,” I said, assuring him that I had no interest in chatting with him for the minute it took us to rise from the thirty-eighth-floor lobby to the seventieth floor. Any and all conversation with him was exasperating. I stood rooted to my side of the elevator and stared up at the rapidly changing red digital trailer of weather and news.

  I said to myself, no, it wasn’t about power. It actually was all about survival. Was it easy for a woman to make it in this business? No. You had to be twice as right, twice as qualified, and twice as anything else the assignment required.

  Relieved when the doors opened, I left him to slither back to his cubicle on the sixty-eighth floor.

  “Have a great day,” he said.

  “See ya.” I said. Loser.

  Dennis was like a swarm of gnats at dusk, annoying and confident that he would eventually get to you. He was fortunate that I had not reported him to human resources for sexual harassment and that I spoke to him at all.

  Dennis Baker was one of a dozen male and female secretaries with a degree in chiropractic medicine, culinary arts, or medieval literature who hunted the halls like a hungry animal, searching for prey, married or single, with a mid-seven-figure income that could give them a life of ease. Married with children didn’t bother them one iota. And they seemed unaware of a greater truth, which was this: Why would anyone of actual significance be interested in anyone so pathetically amoral? Even the occasional drunk partner or lonely associate knew the difference between a sporting screw and a relationship that could cost them a marriage and, not to be overlooked, a painful division of assets. Dennis Baker was a stellar bartender and amateur
sommelier, hence his longevity at the firm.

  But back to the more important issue. I had been summoned to Ben Bruton’s office, or rather I should say the real estate he occupied in the penthouse of the five floors we owned on Fifty-second and Fifth. When his gatekeeper, Darlene, spotted me, she smiled and pressed the button to his inner sanctum, whispering the news of my arrival as though we were gathered in an ICU with a priest. I sat in the waiting area and then got up to pace. What did Bruton want? I was nervous.

  Bruton wasn’t the chairman of our private equity firm, but he was well positioned on the launchpad. Our chairman, Doug Traum, who had been on the aura of his own retirement for at least the last decade but was still in the game “for the thrills,” was currently aboard the firm’s two-hundred-foot yacht, cruising the coast of Croatia, wooing some unfathomable amount of oil money into one of our funds. There, the perfectly toned arms of well-trained shipmates/nymphets were pouring vintage Cristal into Baccarat flutes as the Croatian investor, stupefied by Traum’s style of extravagance, wasted on sun and salt, mesmerized by bountiful female blessings and long tanned legs, was wondering how much could be had for a price. Or was it free? Part of the deal?

  I could see him in my mind. Traum was smug, rolling an unlit Cohiba from side to side in his mouth—doctor’s orders, no more fumée—and another deal was struck. No, the chairman was not in the city. Chairman Traum was otherwise engaged, honing his finest skill by topping off our already bulging coffers. Traum, the antithesis of Bruton, was a great beast of a man with a roaring laugh, a mind-boggling compute speed, and a definite preference for the outdoors.

  President Bruton was perfectly comfortable at the stateside helm in his steel-and-glass testimony of success. Bruton was another breed. Heartless and bloodless. But a genius with movie-star looks. Everyone acknowledged that he oozed nuclear power. Even the most self-assured predator in the office dared not sniff around him. He would have annihilated them. Bruton was seriously married to a former supermodel with whom he had two small children and had never once stepped out on his wife. If he had, she would have annihilated him, to give you a sense of the family portrait. Tough bunch.

  “Mr. Bruton will see you now,” Darlene said.

  I swallowed hard and opened the door to his office as she buzzed me in. He kept it locked…why? For fear that the boy from La Grenouille who was delivering his poached salmon and haricots verts and a bottle of Badoit on the side might be an Uzi-toting terrorist? Please. My eye twitched again.

  There he was. Bruton stood with his back to me as he looked out through the wall of floor-to-ceiling windows, high above Rock Center, like a lord surveying his lands. Although not yet forty, he was one of the most influential men in the world of finance. He knew it but he did not take his reputation for granted. Every detail of every deal was scrutinized and given the nod by him. Bruton controlled the firm’s oxygen supply, and to be in his presence was exhilarating as well as terrifying.

  “You wanted to see me, sir?”

  He swung around to face me and actually smiled, something I had rarely seen him do. “Yes, Betts…do you mind if I call you ‘Betts’?”

  “Not at all.”

  I was dubbed “Betts”—short for Elizabeth—when I was six years old because I never backed away from a dare. To date, I’d always won. At that precise moment my eye twitched hard and my self-assurance wavered. Something told me, something that made me shiver with dread, that my confidence and nonchalance were packed and leaving for an extended vacation in another solar system.

  “Please, sit down.” He walked around his desk and indicated with his left hand for me to sit in one of the two green leather chairs in front of him. “Coffee? A cold drink?”

  “No, I’m fine. Thank you.”

  “Okay, well then…I asked you here, Betts, because I have been following your progress for some time. I have to tell you, companies that my partners would have dumped, you’ve revived. And turned a profit.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Betts? For the sake of my vanity, do not call me ‘sir.’ We’re almost the same age.”

  “Okay.” Pause. “Mr. Bruton.”

  “Ben. Please.”

  “Ben.”

  “Right, then…where were we? Ah, yes. That fixtures company? Brilliant. The taxi company? Great work. Dealing with the TLC isn’t for pansies.”

  “No.” Foolishly, I began to relax a little. “The Taxi and Limousine Commission isn’t for the faint of heart.”

  He leaned back in his chair, staring with a quizzical expression, trying to comprehend how someone of my gender, age, and size could take on one of the most difficult agencies in the city of New York and emerge virtually unscathed, and yes, victorious. I got the giggles then and he nearly giggled, too. He caught himself, so I stopped and asked him a question.

  “Um, Ben? Having trouble wrapping your mind around how a southern girl like me deals with those big tough guys?”

  “Well, now that you bring it up, perhaps I was…”

  “Thought so. I do my homework. And, a southern female can be disarming, and once the enemy is disarmed…you see where I’m going here?”

  “Yes, I do. That’s why I handpicked you over all the other candidates for what I’m sure is the project you’ll hang your career on.”

  “Oh?”

  “You’re originally from Charleston, South Carolina, aren’t you?”

  “Uh, yes. Yes, I am.” My eye twitched then so badly that I had to hold it still with my hand. How did he know that? I’d told everyone I was from Atlanta.

  “You okay?”

  “Yes. Fine.” No, I was not fine. I was mortified.

  “Okay. Know the area well?”

  “As well as anyone who’s from there, I guess. What’s this about?”

  “Well, it seems that the state of South Carolina or some governing body cut a deal with a huge local land developer. They’re to put up the most expensive gated community ever built on a place called Bulls Island. Ever hear of it?”

  I sat up straight in the chair and my mouth got dry.

  “Impossible. That land belongs to the Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge.”

  “Not anymore.”

  This could not be true. “No, seriously. It’s got a Class 1 rank and is protected against…shoot, you can’t even spend the night there, not that anyone would want to…”

  “Interesting comment. Since we’re about to invest a fortune there, triple what we’ve ever laid down on any other real-estate deal, one should ask, why wouldn’t one want to spend the night there?”

  “Gatorzilla, for starters.”

  “Gatorzilla.” Bruton cleared his throat. “This does not sound like a value-added feature.”

  “Biggest American alligator on record. Over seventeen feet and growing.”

  “We should assume he has friends and family?” Bruton smirked as though he wanted to meet them face-to-face. They could floss together.

  “Legions. Did I mention the bugs?” I could feel perspiration rolling from the nape of my neck, traveling down to my waist.

  “I’m sure. But that can be handled.”

  “Right. Technology can wipe out anything.”

  “Well, the ink’s dry on the deal and we want you to head it up. Can’t send a Yankee down there, can we? We need a bona fide belle. Is that the term? You’ll be working with Langley Development and…”

  Twitch! That was it! I didn’t hear another word he said after Langley. I was going to faint. No! I would not faint then. I would vomit. Later. Langley! It was just in the odds. No! I couldn’t take on a long-term assignment in Charleston. It was impossible. Not happening. Being in Charleston meant I would have to confront my entire family and, God help me, J. D. Langley. J. D. Langley. His mother, Louisa. The whole lot of them. They despised me. J.D. most of all.

  No. I could not and would not under any circumstances go back. Entangle my life with theirs again? No! Every strand of self-defense in my DNA was screaming Don’t
do it!

  But this was exactly the kind of business opportunity I had been lusting after since I walked in the front door of ARC Partners. I knew what it meant. If the project went well, I would get a huge bonus, shares of stock, a better office, and probably some elevation in title—senior vice president. Maybe partner. It would change my world in every way.

  I realized that Bruton had stopped talking and was waiting for me to come out of my fog and return to the conversation. His eyebrows were knitted in annoyance. Small wonder. He could not have known that his proposal caused a virtual landslide of chest-heaving emotion as I relived every terror I had ever known in fast frames.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Have you heard anything I’ve said? You seem very far away.”

  “No, I heard you…Well, actually, I did miss some of what you said. It’s just that I have issues with Charleston—I mean, not with Charleston, but I haven’t been there in almost twenty years…”

  “Does this mean that you’re not interested?”

  “No!” I almost leapt from my seat. “Of course I’m interested…it’s just that I have to figure this out. I mean, I never thought I would go there again and I have to think about it a little to see how I can make this work. It’s slightly complicated, that’s all.”

  “Betts, we don’t have the luxury of time here. If I need to research the ranks again for another candidate, I need to know. Now.”

  “Of course, and I appreciate the opportunity, Mr. Bruton. Ben. I do. I accept. I’m thrilled! Seriously!”

  He leaned back in his chair and looked at me for what seemed a long time. I could see he was trying to get a read on why anyone would hesitate to grab the priceless gem he was offering me.

  “Okay,” he said at last. “Good.”

  His tone said it was less than good. There was a crack in my wall and he could see it. There was nothing Ben Bruton and all the leadership of ARC Partners hated more than weakness of any kind. Bruton now believed there was a chance he might have made a mistake in choosing me. The chance of a misstep was enough to make him skittish about me, my commitment to the firm, to my career. What had I done? I stood and extended my hand. He shook it without conviction.