“I like your suit,” Mel said.
“I like your dress. A lot.”
It was blue and shiny and ran down to her calves. She was wearing heels and they made her almost as tall as him. Her shoulders looked tanner than he thought they would. She must have sun bathed at home.
They walked to his car from her office. They were already in the car when he realized his mistake.
“Damn.”
“What?”
“I forgot. You’re supposed to open the door for the woman.”
She laughed and looked at him.
“You’re such a gentleman.”
“It’s because I’ve never driven.”
“Jake, should you be telling me you’ve never driven?”
“No, no. I’ve driven. But I didn’t have a car in New York. And then I came down here and had to get one. So I’ve never driven as an adult.”
“You’ve driven here as an adult, haven’t you?”
“I meant…” He looked at her and waved his right arm. “I meant I’ve never driven on a date.”
He could feel himself blushing and thought she would too. She started laughing.
“Jake, do you have a tag on your sleeve?”
He thought he’d removed all of them. He was wrong.
“Do I?”
“Yes, right here,” she said and grabbed it. He lifted his hand off the wheel.
“It must be from the dry-cleaners.”
“No, it looks new.”
“Right.” They were on the highway. He tried to make it seem like he needed to pay attention. It didn’t work.
“Is this a new suit?”
“Yeah.”
“It is?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Just for this?”
“Well, that depends.”
“On what?”
“On how you look at it.”
“What do you mean?”
“I got it today. But I’ve needed one for a while.”
She let go of the tag and put her hand around his wrist. She squeezed it and let go. The smell of her perfume mixed with the air freshener’s pine. It smelled like a season they didn’t have in Sarasota.
The drive was only a few minutes long. Rothschild’s headquarters was nearby, almost equidistant between all of its developments in the Sarasota area. Sunset Cove was the second largest community in the county. The competition had the biggest one. They passed it on the highway. Palmstead. Jake and Gary had gone there more than a few times. It was bigger than Sunset Cove, but for the most part the places were the same.
They weren’t actually going to the headquarters, but to a banquet hall nearby. It was a big poured building, a product of too much concrete. Palm trees surrounded the drive as they went to the parking lot in back, a half empty grid with cars clustered at the front. The building stood next to an office supplies store and it was a few hundred feet from a place that sold pool supplies.
“Do you have a pool?” Jake asked.
“My building does.”
“I’m envious.”
“Doesn’t yours?”
“No, I wish.”
“It’s nice. I swim a lot.”
“I saw your tan,” he said and touched her shoulder. It was warm, like she’d just been in the sun.
“Look.” She pointed to a sign. Right beneath the name of the place, Giordano’s, block letters were spread out. “Congratulations to Simeon Rothschild.”
“That’s him.”
A waitress stood in the reception area, which had linoleum floors and potted plants. She wore a green vest and could have been working a casino.
“Names?”
“Melissa Tyllis. And this is my guest, Jake Russo.”
The waitress didn’t bother to check anything off, and she told them to go ahead.
The room itself was better than the reception area. All the concrete in the roof had been covered by dark wood. It was a wide-open space and almost twenty round tables were spread across the floor, like coasters on a coffee table. Rothschild was a popular guy. A band sat in the corner and most of the members had tiny plates in their hands. One middle aged man, the youngest in the group, struggled with a shrimp.
“Where is Mr. Rothschild?” Jake asked.
She scanned.
“I don’t see him yet.”
“I’ve never gotten a chance to talk to him.”
“You haven’t? Well, he’s very busy. I’m surprised though. He’s very good at being open about projects. You’ll meet him tonight.”
“Is he as good at PR as you are?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, how could I not give you a good report?”
She laughed, a little loudly.
“I didn’t want that to be a problem.” She grabbed his arm. “I asked you, remember.”
“I remember.”
“And it isn’t a conflict of interest?”
“I think that I’ll still be able to write puff pieces about ‘Sunny Sarasota’ without a conflict of interest.”
Mel introduced him to the people who came around. He handed out and received business cards. There were a lot of them: a director of public relations; a business development director; an architect; a strategic planner.
“How many people work here?” His suit pockets were full of thick-stock business cards.
“We’re growing very quickly.” She held a martini and didn’t look like she was worried about spilling. He liked that. “In fact, we’re growing a little faster than Palmstead, I’ve heard.”
“Is that true?”
“That’s just what I’ve heard.”
“Who told you?”
“Oh, you just see it in e-mails. I don’t know how they know really.”
“Well, Rothschild won’t catch up to Palmstead just yet, right?”
Mel stood silent. She was looking over his shoulder.
The man standing behind Jake had short white hair, disheveled intentionally. He was wearing a tuxedo with a tight knot at the tie and a wide cummerbund. He stood taller than Jake but it might have been because of his heels. The veins in his face drew little marker lines on his skin. His chin jutted out a little and he looked like he was tilting his head a few extra degrees.
“We’ll catch up to Palmstead soon enough.”
The most noticeable thing were the eyes. They were black, surrounding a deeper black in the pupil.
“Hello Simeon,” Mel said. “We were just talking about you.”
“Hi, Mr. Rothschild,” Jake said quickly. “I’m Jake Russo. I don’t think we’ve met.”
“Did you say Mr. Rothschild?” He looked around the room. “That’s my father. I don’t see him here. Please call me Simeon.”
“Certainly-”
“I’ll tell you something.” His face moved while his eyes stayed steady. “That’s one reason we’re already catching up to Palmstead. They have such an antiquated approach to things. I’m sure that everyone there is calling Jerry ‘sir,’ or ‘Mr. Rubenstein,’ or something formal like that. His staff is busy bringing his puppies caviar instead of scoping new sites. Does he still have that dog?”
“Well, when I interviewed him, there was a dog in the room…”
“Jake,” Mel said, “I told Simeon I’d be bringing you. And he’s read your work, of course. So he knows you’ve met Mr. Rubenstein.”
“He and I play golf sometimes,” Rothschild said, flicking his wrist. “Well, we did. Now things have gotten a little more serious.”
“I see.”
“And that’s off the record. Mel, make sure he doesn’t write too much.”
“Don’t worry. I mostly talk about the good things. It’s just about trends. Lifestyles. Pretty soft focus.”
“That’s good.” He waved at someone. “I have to duck off. It was nice to meet you. And remember, we will catch up.”
He walked away, his chin raised. He moved quickly and stood behind someone else. Jake saw a man turn and start laughing.
“So that was him?”
Mel smiled and nodded.
“Yes, that was him.”
“He snuck up on me.”
“He gets involved in a conversation,” she said, “whether you know it or not.”