Trading Up (55 page)

“I’m an investment banker.”

“I see,” Janey said, nodding wisely. She had no idea where Mougins was or what an investment banker actually did, but decided it didn’t really matter. She was a slate devoid of knowledge on which anything might be written and remembered, and she began asking him questions about his business. She’d had surprisingly little experience with men, but almost immediately Justin warmed up and began talking, and some part of her brain noted that this was the way to get a man’s attention.

By the time the main course was finished, everyone at her end of the table was quite drunk, and Robert was telling ribald stories. Janey had found out that Justin came from Buffalo—“Buffalo!” she’d exclaimed. “That’s not very glamorous!”—and that he was the youngest partner at his firm and had worked his way through Yale.

Her knee just happened to brush against his, and when he didn’t pull it away, she increased the pressure. She felt the heat and confusion of his sexual desire, and, as she had after the sexual encounter with Rasheed, was once again intoxicated with her power to attract men—it was almost like a drug.

As a large bowl of raspberries was served, Ian materialized at her side. He leaned down and whispered that she had a phone call and asked her to follow him; Janey looked up at him in drunken confusion. But as she was about to protest, a look in his eyes silenced her. She glanced toward Rasheed and saw his eyes flicker over her like a snake. Then he gave her a slight nod.

She stood up, steadying herself on the back of her chair. Was this to be the moment then, after all? If it was, she felt ready—she would service Rasheed and then 18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 294

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return to the table with no one the wiser and $3,000 in her pocket, and she was surprised to find that she felt as though she were about to get away with something rather than commit some pathetic crime. She followed Ian into a large room that was furnished with long couches and coffee tables; there was a gold bar at one end and a parquet dance floor complete with a disco ball in the middle.

“Ian,” she whispered, giggling. “Who would be calling me?”

“I don’t ask questions. It’s not my place,” he replied, looking slightly embarrassed.

But instead of taking her into a bedroom, he led her through a hallway and down a spiral staircase into a room that was clearly some kind of office. He excused himself and closed the door.

Seated behind an ornate French desk was one of the Arab men from the lunch.

He motioned for her to sit down.

“Mr. Rasheed has found that you please him,” he began. “He would like to ask you to be a guest on his yacht.”

Janey was shocked—this was the last thing she’d been expecting, although she’d heard that Rasheed did have girls on his yacht, and also that he gave them money.

But she certainly hadn’t imagined he was
that
interested in her; why, he’d hardly paid attention to her at lunch. With a laugh, she asked, “But why?”

“It is not for me to say,” murmured the Arab. “But he offers you ten thousand dollars a week.”

Janey nearly laughed out loud. The ridiculousness of the situation was overwhelming. How on earth had she ended up on some rich Arab’s yacht, being offered $10,000 a week to have sex with him? The craziness of the situation nearly pro-pelled her up from her chair and out of the room. Of course, she had to refuse, she had to return to Paris and try to get some modeling work, but then she remembered that she didn’t have the money for her ticket back, and immediately her mind began making calculations. She lived on about $2,000 a month—$10,000 would buy her at least five months of peace. She could stay on the yacht for one week—and then she would take up her life again and maybe even find a real boyfriend, someone like Justin.

“Do you agree?” the Arab asked.

“Oh, sure,” Janey said, feeling emboldened by the wine she’d drunk at lunch.

“Very good,” the man said. “Then you will sign this.” He slid a piece of paper toward her. “It is nothing. A confidentiality agreement. You will agree not to talk to the press about Mr. Rasheed. You will agree never to write about him. If you do . . .”

“What? Are you going to have me killed?” Janey asked. A sudden jolt of fear had inspired her to attempt a joke, but the man said nothing, staring back at her with black eyes.

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In a second, she made her decision. The $10,000 was too tempting, and besides, she couldn’t imagine a day when she’d ever be in a position to talk to the press or to write about Rasheed anyway. Accepting a silver pen from the Arab, she neatly signed her name in a schoolgirl script.

Sitting back in her chair, she attempted another joke. “So,” she asked. “When do I start?”

“Oh, right now, Miss Wilcox.”

“Then I guess I’d better get my stuff.”

“There is no need. We have people who do these things.”

“But . . . I’ve got to say good-bye to my friends. I have to tell them where I’m going,” she said with rising panic.

The Arab smiled at her coldly, pushing his fingers together to form a tent. “I’m afraid there is no time for that,” he said.

And then it felt like her heart was suddenly being squeezed by a giant claw as he added, “We leave for the Turkish islands in half an hour.” 18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 296

f i f t e e n

the white-hot sun beat down relentlessly on the multicolored buildings that lined the small harbor. It was three in the afternoon and at least ninety-five degrees, but neither the blazing sun nor the heat had prevented the small but determined crowd of tourists from wandering up and down the narrow cobbled street that ran from one end of the harbor to the other. Nestled into the side of a hill at the end of this street was a small café with outdoor tables shaded by a rickety wooden roof, and at one of these tables, Janey Wilcox sat drinking a Coke and fanning herself with an old issue of
Time
magazine.

Not two feet away from her, an orange and yellow tomcat sat on a wooden pil-ing, staring at her with large hazel eyes. He had a torn ear and a scratch over one eye, and when he determined that she wasn’t going to order food and feed it to him, he began licking his paw and slowly washing his face. Janey glared at the cat as she sipped her Coke through a straw. The whole place was overrun with cats; as soon as you sat down they would surround you, even being so bold as to sit on an empty chair at your table.

Janey sighed and leaned her head on her hand, looking out over the harbor. She supposed that it had its charms, but this was now the third day they’d spent anchored outside the harbor and the whole scene was wearing thin. The other girls didn’t understand why they had to spend three days here, but they weren’t bright enough to figure it out, even after the morning they’d anchored in the bay of a remote and seemingly uninhabited island, and had been told to stay in their staterooms with the curtains drawn.

Naturally, they’d complied—but Janey hadn’t, and standing on her bed and 18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 297

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cautiously lifting a corner of the curtain, she’d peeked out and seen three soldiers wearing camouflage outfits and carrying machine guns making their way down a rocky hill toward the boat. Then she’d fallen back onto the bed, covering her mouth with her hand and willing herself not to scream. Ever since that first afternoon, when she’d returned to the deck and found all the guests gone—with the exception of the three young women—and the crew running around and pulling up anchors, she’d been convinced that she was about to be sold into white slavery. And for the next three hours, huddled in her stateroom, which was about a thousand times nicer than the cabin she’d had on Sayed’s boat—it had a marble tub in the bathroom and just about every kind of shampoo, soap, and body cream you could think of—she remained convinced that she was about to be sold into white slavery.

The lunch and the offer of $10,000 was all a con to get her on the boat and then sell her, she’d thought, as she lay moaning on her bed in the fetal position.

After all, Rasheed was a gunrunner—Paul had said so himself—and if he was running guns, maybe he was running girls as well. And on top of that, not one person in the whole world knew she was on Rasheed’s boat with the exception of Estella—

and Estella wasn’t exactly the sort of person who would send for help.

Naturally, nothing whatever of the kind had happened—yet, Janey thought, gazing out at the shallow water in the harbor. On the other side, children were playing on a dirty sand beach, while behind them, two workers hammered lazily at a board of wood on a sawhorse. But the initial sight of the soldiers had convinced Janey that she had been right all along—and that it all, finally, made sense: Where else would they have dared make the transaction but on a deserted island where no one would ever see? And then, she would disappear as completely as if she’d never existed, and God only
knew
what they would do to her. Well, she decided, they were going to be in for a little surprise: She’d already decided that they would have to kill her first before she went with them.

And now, sitting at the café with nothing at all to do, she replayed that time in her cabin, analyzing her reactions. It was interesting what panic could do to a person. For a good ten minutes, she’d been dizzy and confused, and had completely lost her bearings—if it weren’t for gravity, she wouldn’t have been able to tell up from down. And then, for some bizarre reason, she had climbed into the marble bathtub and covered herself with towels. And yet, as frightened as she was, she’d
still
noticed that the towels were exceptionally thick and fluffy. And then she had actually thought about taking a bath, but quickly rejected the idea because if they were going to come for her, she didn’t want to make it easier for them by being naked.

Finally, she got out of the bathtub and, thinking more clearly, decided that if they were going to sell her, she should be prepared in case she got the opportunity to escape. Putting on a pair of khaki shorts, she began stuffing the pockets with any-18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 298

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thing that might serve as a weapon—nail scissors, a sewing kit, even a tiny travel-size bottle of shaving cream. Then she snuck back to the bed and peeked out the window again.

Rasheed was standing on the shore talking to the three men. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew it was him, because ever since they’d left the South of France, he’d taken to wearing the traditional Arab garb of long white flowing robes coupled with a pair of reflective Ray-Ban sunglasses. Rasheed’s two henchmen were standing behind him, also carrying machine guns. There was quite a bit of gesturing, and then all the men turned and began walking along a narrow dirt track, passing out of her line of vision.

She had plopped back down on the bed, poking herself with the nail scissors.

She was being crazy again—it was only some kind of arms deal after all. But that Rasheed was clever. When they were summoned from their rooms two hours later, the salon had been done up as a winter wonderland, complete with fake snow and wooden branches spray-painted white and strung with tiny Christmas lights. In the middle of the disco floor sat a large, white birthday cake on which was written
Bon
Anniversaire Irina
. All twenty members of the crew stood in a semicircle and sang

“Happy Birthday” to Irina, who was tall and dark, with large breasts and hips and a miraculously tiny waist, while Irina looked confused.

“But it is not my birthday,” she protested, in heavily accented English.

“Mr. Carmichael,” Rasheed said to Ian (he never called anyone by his first name). “Is this correct? Miss Stepova says it is
not
her birthday.”

“I checked her passport, sir, and today’s the day,” Ian said firmly.

“Maybe
I
make mistake?” Irina asked. And then Rasheed had given them all diamond tennis bracelets.

“It wasn’t her birthday, you know?” the girl named Sallie whispered later, when the four girls were sunning themselves on the deck. She was English and never tired of reminding them that she came from a good family with connections to the royals, acting as if it were the most natural thing in the world to be a guest on Rasheed’s boat.

“Irina . . . make . . . mistake? No?” said the Brazilian girl named Conchita. She could barely speak a word of English, and cried at least once a day, invoking her

“Mama.” Ian said she was going to be put off the yacht when they got to Monaco.

“Janey?” Sallie asked. Her accent was hard, like two grating pieces of metal, and if Janey had known more about the English, she would have quickly understood that Sallie’s claims to an aristocratic background were completely false. But all she knew was that she couldn’t stand her, and rolling over onto her stomach, Janey said casually, “Who cares?”

“I get bracelet,” Irina said, waving her wrist in the air.

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“You know something, don’t you, Janey?” Sallie said, crawling toward her.

“You’ve probably talked to Ian about it.”

“Ian?”

“Don’t think we haven’t seen you sucking up to him. You’re probably shagging him on the sly. Remember, there are cameras in every room.”

“Then all you have to do is watch the tape.”

“What is
tape
?” Irina asked.

Ian! Janey thought. The sound of a helicopter brought her back to the present, and she looked up to see Rasheed’s shiny black helicopter swoop low over the harbor and then rise into the air, disappearing over the mountain that rose steeply from the back of the town. With Rasheed gone, maybe Ian would come now. She had engineered the possibility by announcing at lunch that she wanted to go into town to look for newspapers. Rasheed raised his eyebrows, and with a hint of a smile said,

“Miss Wilcox, I did not know you read Turkish. Perhaps you have hidden talents we do not know about?”