AMANDA watched with a mixture of horror and amazement as the life class of the world-famous Art Students League disintegrated into chaos. David Parkerson’s screaming face was a mask of fear as he flailed ineffectively at his students, trying to restore order.
Half the participants had succumbed to the bloodlust of the mob, a vicious game of who would wrest power from whom. Others were indignant and furious at weeks of being treated so cavalierly and were determined to voice their repressed anger. Nathan, though in the midst of the shouting battle, was oddly silent, his ferret eyes fastening on one anger distorted face and then another, almost frighteningly concentrated on some inner directive. He worried Amanda most.
Parkerson stumbled backward through shoving students, in retreat from a gesticulating, chastising Christine and Mr. Wilde who was waving his arms and bellowing for calm as he swam through the sea of angry bodies toward the beleaguered instructor. At the forefront was a red-faced Professor Angeli, screaming invectives.
The vituperation pouring from her beloved, old friend shocked Amanda. His anger far exceeded the situation. Deep, hidden frustration boiled forth unchecked in his shouted hostile reprimands.
A yell of rage mixed with pain burst from the instructor as he backed into a large cabinet filled with plaster casts. There was a moment’s horrible pause before a piercing scream of shock stilled the roiling students. A large fragment of a Greek torso toppled from a high shelf and struck the teacher to the floor, shattering around his crumpled body.
“Parkerson!”
“Oh my God!”
“He’s out cold!”
“He’s bleeding!”
“He’s not moving!”
“Get help!”
“Does anyone know first aid?!”
Professor Angeli staggered backward in horror, his trembling hands to his gaping mouth and fevered brow, a picture of pure melodramatic terror. “What have I done?” With a heart-rending cry he dashed from the room.
Amanda shoved shocked bodies aside to get to the fallen instructor. It looked serious. Blood poured from his head and he was growing pale. She thrust the large chunks of broken plaster aside to inspect the wound without moving Parkerson’s body.
“Call 911 now,” she instructed loudly to the mob of milling students. “Nathan, get this stuff out of the way! Christine, grab that clean drapery from the posing platform. Bring it here, quickly.”
She lightly touched Parkerson’s forehead. “We need to cover David, he may go into shock. Mr. Wilde, go after the professor. He’s hysterical. He might hurt himself. He’ll listen to you.”
She brushed a bit of plaster from the instructor’s head. The wound seemed clean. Folding an end of the drapery Christine handed her, she placed the pad against the bleeding slash and pressed firmly as several members of the class covered Parkerson with drapes and coats.
A horrified member of the League’s office staff appeared with a first aid kit. Within minutes, paramedics arrived to attend to Parkerson’s wound properly and bundle the still unconscious man onto a stretcher.
Amanda leaned against the doorway to the classroom.
Where is Marc?
The paramedics wheeled the gurney down the hall and out the front door as Amanda grabbed the coat and portfolio that Christine pushed into her hands.
She turned to follow the group and caught sight of a scowling Nathan staring after the stricken instructor as the attending group disappeared down the front entrance.
“C’mon, Nathan. We’re all going to the hospital.”
“No, I don’t like blood.”
Christine reappeared, looking for the young artist.
“Christine, you and Nathan check in the office about insurance. We don’t need that to hang us up at the hospital. I’ll call you from emergency.”
“Right. C’mon, hot shot. Let’s go make ourselves useful.”
Nathan pulled away from Christine’s grip. “I’m sorry the old guy got hurt, but he brought it on himself. Pompous bastard.”
“Step one: denial.” Christine shoved the glowering young man toward the office. “Don’t worry, stud bunny, you’ve got four more steps to go through before you accept the fact you were as guilty as the rest of us hot-headedartistes in getting the man hurt. Get word to us as quickly as you can,” she called after a departing Amanda.
Amanda flung a hand over her head in acknowledgment and dashed out the door.
The next hour was chaotic. Fortunately Roosevelt Hospital was only a few blocks away and David was quickly attended to, but it seemed forever before any information on his condition filtered down to the waiting group of students.
Amanda filled out forms with what information could be gleaned from David’s wallet, answered questions characterizing the incident as an unfortunate accident, and called the League to see what information Christine and Nathan had learned about the school’s liability.
“It’s going to be a while, Christine,” she finished the conversation. “Why don’t you and Nathan go on home? Most of the others have left the hospital already. I’ll give you a call when I find out something definite. They’re running tests now, but the E.R. physician’s first impression is it seems to be a minor concussion.”
“We’ll be at my place,” Christine answered. “The kid’s a wreck. Who would have thought the hard-hearted little beast had so much compassion in him- or guilt, hard to say which.”
“I’m so worried about Antonio. There’s no answer on his phone.”
“You know where he lives! Well, well, well. Does Mr. Horn Rims know you’re in tight with a naked, Italian model, too? A damn good-looking, incredibly hot, naked, Italian model if memory serves, who could probably give your horn rimmed stud a run for his money.”
Amanda flushed. “Of course he does. I mean, of course I’m not…” She was rattled.
I hate all this confusing hiding of identities. I hate all this duplicity. Why can’t we just be honest with each other.
It was a childish plaint, an “I-want-my-Mama” resurrected from ancient childhood. And a waste of wishful energy.
When her Mom had died, little Amanda had learned very quickly that I-want-my-Daddy brought little comfort. An alleviation of the problem, perhaps, but little sympathy or empathetic understanding. The man did not hug much.
She knew he cared. But he never learned to show it.
Still doesn’t. He’s a very good man, and he means well, but a “well-meaning parent” is cold comfort when what a little girl needs is to be cuddled.
And the younger brothers were as bereft as she. So Amanda became Mama. To her brothers and to her father.
And sometimes the job got really tough.
Christine’s voice through the receiver cut through her thoughts. “C’mon, tough lady, you sound like you could use some rest yourself. Parkerson’s in good hands. Why don’t you turn it over to the professionals?”
Amanda cut her off. “Christine, I have to go. Mr. Wilde’s shown up with Professor Angeli. Oh, the poor man. I’ll talk to you later.”
The professor was a shambles. Filled with regret and remorse. Self-flagellating to the point that Mr. Wilde threatened a sharp slap to the old artist’s quivering chops.
“Pull yourself together, man. No one’s blaming you any more than we’re all to blame for behaving so beastly. Rather exciting, in a way, to see everyone so excited about something.” A brief moment of shame passed over Wilde’s face remembering the exhilarating rush. “Obviously, the extraordinary artistry of young Antonio was the final catalyst that permitted so much animosity to be unleashed. Rather a sad state of affairs really.”
He leaned closer to Amanda. “I’m afraid I poured too many whiskeys into the professor after I caught up with him wailing and gnashing his teeth in the middle of Columbus Circle. I dragged him by what little hair he has left to the nearest bar. Don’t worry, I’ll see him home. You should pack it in, too, my dear. You’re looking a bit peaked. You’ve done a splendid job of handling things. We’re all in your debt.”
Peaked? More like totally wiped.
Amanda got the latest report from the attending doctor and staggered for a cab. David was probably going to be okay, but that relief only allowed a wave of dreadful premonition to break through her steely control. Thank God the cab ride was harrowing. It kept her alert.
There was no answer to the buzzer at David’s apartment house. She ran her hand up and down the row of buttons and presently someone let her in as an angry voice yelled at her from a high window. David’s front door was closed but on close inspection she could see the lock had been jimmied. It looked familiar. The same as the break-in at her and Cissy’s apartment.
She felt a rush of anger at the large man who was invading all their lives. In a rage she slammed her sneakered foot against the door as Marc had done, bursting it open. Only at the last second did she realize she had no gun with which to make the same dramatic entrance.
She leaped to the side of the doorway, plastering her back against the hallway wall, fully expecting a hail of bullets as a response to her un-thought-out emotional reaction.
Nothing. Was that a groan? She flung herself into the room. “Marc! Marc!”
He wasn’t in the living room or behind the kitchen counter. The place was a mess with a shattered lamp, overturned end table, utensils, pots and pans, smashed dishes scattered around the work island in the kitchen area. There had been a terrible struggle. She caught sight of a splatter of blood beside a large frying pan and let out another scream.
“Marc! Are you here?”
Suddenly she realized there seemed to be splatters of blood everywhere.
A groan from the bedroom. She dashed inside. Marc’s arms and feet were bound to the headboard and footboard of the bed with ripped up sheets. Masking tape circled his head, covering his mouth.
She leapt onto the bed and began to rip the tape from his face. His eyes groggily followed her. He smelled of liquor. What had the wretched man done to him? Fury swelled. She swore silently the beast would pay.
“Well, hi, babe.” His clear blue eyes blinked heavily. “Gee, I’m glada see you. I was jus’ havin’ the greatest dream.” He leered lasciviously as Amanda clawed at his bindings. She dashed into the kitchen and found a knife.
Marc was looking forlorn. “I’m really sloshed. Bastard poured enough Scotch down me to sink a bammleship. Sure sunk me.” He nodded sagely as Amanda sawed at the knotted sheets, blinking through her tears, desperately trying not to carve up his strong ankles.
“Y’wanna know what I was dreaming about?” He sat up in bed grinning foolishly as she freed his limbs. “Us!”
He reached for her and she flung herself at him, knocking him back down onto the bed. She covered his mouth with kisses as the sobs hiccupped out of her. She kissed his eyes, his chin, and drew back in shock at the horrible bruise risen on the side of his head.
But it didn’t seem to bother him and it wasn’t going to stop her. She dragged him upright, blubbering, testing his limbs. He grabbed her tight. His limbs worked fine. She grabbed him back, covering his body with hers as she clutched him desperately.
He lay blissfully back on the bed as she drenched his chest with choking sobs of relief.
“Oh, man, that dream was nothing.”
AMANDA jerked upright. She had fallen asleep.
Marc snoozed contentedly under her, his arms locked safely around her, a benevolent smile of possession on his handsome face.
It could only have been a few minutes. She was just so exhausted- and so relieved. She should let Marc sleep. God knows what he had been through. But he needed to know what had happened. It was his investigation and she should tell him what had happened to David. There may have been something she had missed in the bedlam at school. She needed to get him awake.
She pulled his arms off her and shook him. He frowned mightily and then when he saw it was her, grinned broadly.
“What about a cold shower? An awful lot has happened, Marc. I need to know you’re listening.”
“I will if you will.” He struggled out of the bed and tottered upright, clinging to her. Amanda had been in bed with him. This was too good an opportunity to miss. “Come with me into the shower. We can talk as much as you like.” He began to undress.
He was less drunk. Another sigh of relief. But she knew if they got into the shower together, talking was not what they would do; certainly not what she wanted to do. But as he pulled off his shirt and his broad bare chest was exposed, she panicked. He began to unzip his pants. She leapt off the bed to leave the room.
“Wait a minute, Ace,” he pleaded, stumbling after her, his trousers half off. “You said take a shower. C’mon, please…”
“David was hurt very badly at the League tonight. I think it was an accident. But so much as been happening lately, I need desperately to talk to you about it.”
He stood frozen in the middle of the room, holding his trousers, dressed only in his white cotton briefs, assimilating what she had said. Comprehension almost visibly raced through his body, slicing through the drunken stupor. She wanted to throw herself at this incredibly handsome, powerful man and turn her life over to him this instant. He would protect her from all harm. He would make everything well. He would certainly make her well.
Marc blinked hard, his mind furiously working on willing the drunkenness away. He concentrated on Amanda’s face, waiting for a fuller explanation.
“David is going to be fine. There was a riot.” She gave a giddy laugh, her nerves taut, overwhelmed at the amazing memory. “Because Antonio didn’t show up. See what you did?” She gulped for air. “Someone knocked into that large cabinet with the plaster casts and one fell on David. He was knocked out. It was pretty bloody.” She shivered.
He turned and headed for the bathroom. “Follow me and keep talking.”
He pulled off his shorts and stepped into the shower. Amanda stopped dead at the sight of his naked body disappearing behind the mottled glass.
“David is going to be fine? More information, Ace.” His voice was firm over the noise of the water.
Thank God, he seemed to be sobering by the minute. Just what she needed.
“He’s in Roosevelt. The CAT scan came back clean. It’s a minor concussion with superficial cuts. He should be okay in a day or two. They gave him medication for the bleeding and the pain and hooked him up to all sorts of monitors. If he develops no complications, they’ll release him in a day or two.” She stayed outside the room, yelling through the open door.
Suddenly the water stopped. He stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel to wrap around his middle. “We’ve gotta get there right away. Is he alone?”
She blinked at the sight of his naked body. “Wh… what do you mean, alone? We all left. There was nothing else we could do. He was moved upstairs.”
Marc was hurriedly pulling on clothes. “This big guy that’s been hounding us is getting panicky, Ace. I wondered why he didn’t finish me off. Maybe it’s because he’s got someone else who it’s more important to finish off first.”
Amanda felt the breath knocked out of her. “F… finish off…?”
He grabbed the phone. “Do you know Roosevelt’s number?”
“No… it’s…”
He punched the operator. “This is an emergency. I need to be connected to the emergency room of Roosevelt Hospital on 59th Street. Damn, they connected me to 911.”
“Marc, what’s going on? Tell me what we need to do.”
He was explaining to the emergency operator there was the possibility of a murder attempt on a man’s life in the emergency room of Roosevelt Hospital.
Amanda’s jaw dropped.Murder?
“Marc, he’s not in emergency anymore…”
Marc was furious at not being able to make himself clear. The operator thought it was a hoax. There would be people everywhere in the E.R. She demanded more information. Marc slammed the receiver down in frustration and ran for the door, still standing wide open.
“We’ve got to get to David. With him out of the way, the lead suspect would be gone.” He dashed outside.
Amanda’s jaw dropped. David was the lead suspect? She grabbed her purse and dug for her address book. She punched in the numbers quickly. “Christine, don’t ask any questions. This is an emergency. Get to the hospital and get into David’s room and stay by him until we get there. Yes. It is a very big deal. I don’t care how you do it.” She hung up and ran outside where Marc was still frantically searching for a cab, cursing mightily that cabs were never around when you needed them.
“Marc, it’s the middle of the night. Tell me what’s going on. What do you mean, David’s the lead suspect?”
A cab appeared and they threw themselves inside. Marc urged the driver to run whatever red lights he could safely run. “If a cop stops us, even better.” The large bill he waved made his point.
He turned to Amanda. “It seemed logical to the auction house. The drawings had been traced to David’s class. He’s the instructor. Ostensibly the most talented. They hired me, his brother, to prove that he wasn’t the forger figuring if anybody had a motivation to prove him innocent it would be me. If I can’t do it, David gets sent up by default.”
They were zooming up Ninth Avenue, screeching through red lights, racing past other late-night traffic.
“At the very least, his reputation would be ruined. Again,” he added grimly. “At the worst, he’d be put away for awhile. That would kill him.”
Amanda stared out the window, desperately trying to put all the pieces together. The jumbled New York landscape racing by making no impression. The cab hurtled past refurbished 42nd Street. 43rd. 44th.
None of this is making any sense.
“Do you think he is the forger? Is he capable of such a thing?” She couldn’t allow herself to even consider the possibility that he and David might be working together. She clutched Marc’s hand even tighter as if to squeeze that remote possibility from her mind.
“Talent-wise? The man’s a genius, when he lets himself forget how the world has never discovered that fact. He’s got a huge ego. He had to make something of himself; he had to show Dad. He’s still trying to do that. My brother wants to dance on my father’s grave. And I say more power to him. I just happen to have gotten another life. Better things to do with my time.”
He pulled her close. It wasn’t a romantic hansom cab clip-clopping through the spring rain, she thought, but it would do.
They were into the fifties now.
“You said his reputation would be ruined again.”
“Yeah, I’ll tell you about it sometime.”
They pulled up in front of the emergency entrance to the hospital. Marc shoved large bills at the driver and he and Amanda dashed into the waiting room. The emergency room doctor she had dealt with before was still on duty. The doctor made a quick phone call and gave them David’s room number.
Christine sat glowering by David’s bed in the dimly lit room. Her face washed clean of most of its make-up and her hair beaten down by the day’s turmoil, she seemed soft and almost shockingly vulnerable, even through her annoyance. Nathan perched on the window sill nearby sketching on a small pad by the light of the small table lamp.
Marc stood frowning, framed in the doorway, the harsh, fluorescent hall lights behind him, his face in shadow.
“I called Christine,” Amanda explained. “She lives on Central Park South, minutes away. Nathan was a bonus.”
“Which I was rudely interrupted right in the middle of collecting,” Christine added airily, swooping over to shake Marc’s hand. She winked at Amanda. “Not bad. With or without the horn rims.” She looked more closely at Marc, squinting against the light. “You look familiar. Have we met? Nooo,” she decided. “I would have remembered you.”
“That’s my Ma,” Nathan said, as he chuckled smugly from across the room. He gave Marc a cursory glance and went back to sketching. “Thanks, boss lady,” he tossed over to Amanda. “You saved me from another night of sin. Guess this means I have to be at work on time tomorrow, huh?”
He slid off the window sill, preparing to leave.
“Everything under control now?” Christine looked from Amanda to Marc. “Can we get out of here? According to Nurse Grumpy, Parkerson’ll be good as new in no time.”
“No time meaning three or four days.” Nathan looked more closely at Marc.
Marc ducked his head and turned to Amanda, his face firm.
“You didn’t tell me what you had done…what you were going to do,” he said quietly, his voice hard.
“You didn’t give me much time to discuss anything.” Amanda felt the heat rise in her cheeks. She didn’t like being reprimanded in front of her older friend and her younger employee even if they weren’t paying that much attention as they prepared to leave.
“Nor did you tell me in the cab.”
“You were busy explaining some important information. I didn’t want to interrupt.” She turned to Christine who had collected Nathan and was standing in the doorway. “Did you notice anything special when you got here?”
Nathan grunted and shrugged. “We thought Wilde was still hanging around, but it turned out to be some other guy.”
Amanda blanched. Marc stayed in the doorway with the strong light behind his back. “Thank you both,” he said. “I’m sorry we interrupted your evening. What you did was very important. Thank you again.”
He shook their hands and ushered them out the door, keeping his head down as he turned his attention toward the sleeping patient.
Nathan gave one last attentive glance at the large, muscular figure, the wide shoulders, the narrow hips, before nodding goodnight to Amanda and following Christine out the door.
Marc picked up the phone, punched several numbers and spoke quietly into the mouthpiece. He hung up.
“I called a private security firm. They’re sending someone over right away. We’ll wait until they come. Okay?” He didn’t speak as harshly as he had a few moments ago.
Amanda sat down in one of the hospital chairs, her head in her hands.
“I had completely forgotten you were you. I mean, not Antonio… Oh Marc, what if they recognized you?”
“Don’t worry about it. I think they had other things on their mind.”
“And I was feeling so proud that I had thought to call…” Her voice trailed off.
“We seem to have a little rivalry going on here. You want to take my job away from me.” His playful tone was back. She stood, feeling abject, grateful for his understanding, confused at her own actions and hoping he would come to her.
He did. His strong arms enfolded her. Their kiss was deep and fervent. Safe in each other’s arms. Amanda’s pulse heightened. Marc’s chest rose and fell quickly as she nestled against it. She never wanted to let this protective presence go.
Marc turned toward his sleeping brother. David’s head was bound and tubes fed him medication. Even in sleep, David Parkerson’s face was strained. Marc studied it for quite a long time.
“He doesn’t seem to have such a big ego, now.” Amanda hoped her callous observation might lighten the mood.
“Do you know the painter Giorgione?”
She thought for a moment. “Sixteenth century, Italian?”
“Very good, Ace. Giorgio da Castelfranco, known as Giorgione. Not only was he a great painter, he was quite a swinger: poet, lover, musician. Shook the art establishment by its short ones. Died young; caught the plague from a lady friend. Probably was a great-looking corpse. He was my brother’s MFA thesis. Boy, did David empathize.”
“David? Empathize with a swinger?”
“He was quite a hellion in his younger days. Did everything he could to get Dad to pay attention to him. Dad hated the art crap stuff that David loved. He wanted David to be a salesman, a businessman, anything that would bring in the bucks.” He sighed, continuing to stare at the sleeping man.
“David turned his thesis into a book about Giorgione. Nobody had studied him as thoroughly as my nosy, self-absorbed brother, not in 200 years. I was damned impressed. The book was gonna be published by Abrams. Dad was not impressed. Writers were almost as bad as art critics.”
Amanda looked up at the grim face, flickering with ghostly memories.
“What happened?”
“One of Giorgione’s drawings came on the market. There are only about half a dozen of his paintings that can honestly be attributed to him. Most of the time experts can’t tell the difference between him and Titian, for God’s sake.
“They came to my brother to vet it, to tell them if it was for real. David was in seventh heaven. Surely Dad would be impressed now. He looked at the drawing and said sure it was a Giorgione. It wasn’t just the technique. Only one man could have thought that way. Only one man could have had the invention and the imagination. The right paper and ink, that’s the obvious stuff, but Giorgione’s soul was in that drawing. David knew it had to be his. He just knew!” His brow furrowed and he looked away.
Amanda felt what must be coming, what must have happened, but she was amazed that even after all these years the feeling of surprise and disbelief that invaded Marc’s body, the pain that he suffered for his disgraced brother was as immediate and visceral as the original shock must have been.
“The forger’s book came out just as David’s book was about to be published. The drawing was fake. The book proved it. The forger didn’t even know about some dumb kid betting his whole wad on that particular drawing being real. It cost a very famous museum a lot of embarrassment and a publisher a lot of money. It destroyed David’s rep. Dad…” His voice caught, though his face remained implacable. “My father couldn’t laugh loud or long enough.”
He gave a harsh snort of angry derision. “It was the one thing that kept him going through the cancer. He died with a smirk on his face.”
Such unloving coldness in anyone was beyond Amanda’s comprehension. Her own father may not be demonstrative, she thought, but she had never doubted his love.
“But, your mother?”
“Mom worshiped the ground Dad walked on. She had better,” he added with a trace of resigned bitterness, “Since she never wanted kids anyway.”
“Oh, I can’t believe that. I know…”
Marc turned and faced Amanda. His face blank. “No, Amanda, you do not know what it’s like not to be wanted. And, pray God, you never will.”
Amanda held him tightly. Trying to impress through her body that life was not always like that, with parents so unloving, lives so shattered. Her father and brothers were far from perfect, but they were good men, they meant well. They could impart unknown and unmeaning pain but she knew they were there if ever she needed them. She couldn’t even begin to comprehend the emptiness of the childhood that Marc and his brother had endured.
Her body shuddered with a repressed sob.
“Aw, c’mon, babe. It’s not so bad. That was big brother’s hell, not mine. I was just surfing my little heart out. I didn’t give a fig about anything.” The lilting playfulness drained from his voice. He dragged a grin up, shoving the deep hurt aside. “I’m just playing on your sympathy, hoping to…”
She kissed him deeply, urgently, fervently. She wanted to make him well. Make him whole. But it was more than sympathetic concern. It was realizing that the man she was so attracted to was more and more a complicated human being.
The moods that swung over “Antonio” in their first time together in the Village that she had attributed to his concern with his disguise, now reappeared as part of his total character, as part of Marc’s struggle to deal with all the issues that made him the singular man he was.
He would be a struggle to comprehend, to deal with. But it would be an exciting struggle, ever new, ever fresh, as she discovered deeper and deeper depths in him.
His heart thundered against hers. Her own pulse throbbed in her temples. She so wanted to be a part of this man’s life. He would challenge her, he would thrill her; he would infuriate her and would excite her beyond all reason.
Marc’s fingers threaded into her hair pulling the strands through his strong fingers. His hand revolved to stroke her cheek, to cup her chin. His deep blue eyes, filled with longing and need, searched the depths of hers. She met his gaze, her eyes wide with acquiescence and embraced the inevitable.
The soft light from the bedside table illuminating the planes of his strong face was replaced by the harsh night lights of the city flashing dramatically across his high cheekbones and the firm chin as the cab hurtled them back to David’s apartment.
He held her as if afraid she might spring from him at any moment, but Amanda clung to Marc just as tenaciously. Neither of them spoke as the yellow streak surged its way through the dark pre-dawn cityscape.
Not once did she question her decision.
She only knew what she was about to do was going to change the course of her life.