46
Stone had hardly hung
up the phone when Arrington padded into his room, shucked off her
robe, revealing all, and slithered into bed next to
him.
“I was waiting for
you to come to me,” she said.
“I’m sorry, I had to
make a phone call.”
“That’s all right,”
she said, “I’m here now.” She felt under the covers for
him.
“Right where you
should be,” Stone said.
“Do you have to get
up early in the morning?” she asked.
“Not that I know
of.”
“Good, because I’m
going to keep you busy.”
And she
did.
Stone woke up early
in spite of himself. He tried to sneak out of bed to the bathroom,
but she snagged his wrist.
“Oh, no, you don’t,”
she said, pressing herself against him. “Do you remember when we
started every morning this way?”
“I certainly do,” he
said, kissing her. That had been back when she was practically
living with him in New York, before she had met Vance Calder and he
had stolen her away to Bel-Air.
She rolled over and
sat on top of him, taking him inside her. “There,” she said, “I’ve
got you pinned.”
“You surely have,” he
said, “and I’m enjoying the experience.” They both enjoyed it for a
few minutes until they shared an orgasm.
Stone and Arrington
were having breakfast on the terrace.
“We need to talk
about Prince’s offer for your property here,” he said, handing her
the contract and the twenty-five-million-dollar check.
“Why, it’s a personal
check!” she said, looking at it. “I didn’t know anybody wrote
personal checks in that amount.”
“He wanted to impress
you,” Stone said.
“Well, I’m impressed.
What’s your advice on this sale?”
“First, let me ask
you a couple of questions.”
“Shoot.”
“Are you really ready
to sell the property? Would it make you sad to see it
go?”
“Yes, to your first
question; no, to your second. My life isn’t here anymore. I would
still enjoy visiting, but having a house in his new hotel would
make me feel at home when I’m back here.”
“All right, let me
make a suggestion.”
“Again,
shoot.”
“Sign the contract,
and let me decide tomorrow afternoon whether to tear it up or go
through with the sale, depending on circumstances.”
“I trust you that
much,” she said. “After all, if the sale doesn’t go through, I can
still build my own hotel on the property.”
“Woodman & Weld
could partner you with the right hotel group on that. You’d need
professional management, anyway. You don’t actually want to
run a hotel, do you?”
“Oh, God, no! I just
want to be able to complain about the service and get instant
results.”
“I think we can
guarantee that,” Stone said, laughing.
“What if I end up in
business with Prince?” she asked. “Am I going to like
that?”
“You’ll never have to
see or speak to him,” Stone said. “I’ll take care of that. Also,
I’ve been on his hotel company’s website, looking at his
properties, and they’re all top-notch. I’ve stayed at two or three
of them, and they were all beautifully run.”
“Okay. You decide
tomorrow.”
Stone handed her the
document and a pen, and she signed it. “He’s put in an early
closing date of this Friday, noon, and if he misses that, his
twenty-five million are yours.”
Dino came out of the
guesthouse and joined them. “Witness this, will you?” Stone said,
passing him the document and the pen.
Dino signed the
document with a flourish. “There you are.” “What does your day
hold?” Stone asked him, slipping the document and the check into
his briefcase.
“Rivera and I are
working on something,” Dino said.
“What are you working
on?”
“It’s a secret for
the time being,” Dino said smugly. “You’ll know when you need to
know.”
“You’re very
mysterious, Dino,” Arrington said.
“Yes, I am,” Dino
replied, smiling.
Stone’s cell phone
rang. “Hello?”
“Stone, it’s Harvey
Stein. I’m sorry, but I was down at Palm Springs for the weekend,
and I didn’t get your message until this morning.”
“Thanks for calling
back, Harvey. I’ve heard some rumblings about Jim Long’s trying to
back out of our stock sale.”
“Well, it’s too late
for him to do that, isn’t it? Mrs. Calder owns the stock now.
What’s done is done.”
“Harvey, you know
Barbara Eagle, don’t you?”
“I’ve met her a
couple of times; she and Jim are close.”
“She’s back in town,
and last night she had dinner with Terry Prince. You know anything
about that?”
“Not a thing,” Stein
replied.
“Did you speak with
Jim over the weekend?”
“Yes, I called him
yesterday from Palm Springs, just to see how he was doing, and he
sounded much like his old self.”
“Did he mention
Barbara?”
“No, he
didn’t.”
“I’d heard that she
might be staying with him while she’s in town.”
“That would be news
to me,” Stein said.
“Are you coming to
the shareholders’ meeting tomorrow?”
“Since I no longer
represent a shareholder, no.”
“Well, if I don’t
speak to you again, Harvey, thanks for all your help in getting
this sale closed.”
“My pleasure,” Stein
replied. They both hung up.
Stone called Rick
Barron. “Rick, I just spoke to Harvey Stein, and he says there’s no
problem, that Jim Long’s shares now belong to
Arrington.”
“Well, that’s a
relief,” Rick said. “We’re perilously close to the fifty-one
percent level, and his stock just puts us over the
top.”
“Then we’re okay.”
Stone heard noises in the background. “Are you still in the editing
suite?”
“Yes, it will be
tonight before we finish scoring and tomorrow morning before we
have a print.”
“I can’t wait to see
it, whatever it is,” Stone said.
“I think you’ll find
it entertaining,” Rick said. “Gotta run.”
They hung up.
“Everybody’s mysterious today,” he said to Arrington. “First Dino,
now Rick Barron. He’s working on some sort of presentation for the
meeting tomorrow.”
“I think I know what
it is,” Arrington replied, “but I’m not going to tell
you.”