The Lover From An Icy Sea Read online

  The Lover From An Icy Sea

  by

  Alexandra S. Sophia

  ISBN 1466487429

  EAN 978-1466487420

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

  'The Lover From An Icy Sea' is published by That Right Publishing LLC who can be contacted at:

  http://www.thatright.com

  http://thatright.ning.com

  'The Lover From An Icy Sea' is the copyright of the author, Alexandra S. Sophia, 2011. All rights are reserved.

  All characters are fictional, and any resemblance to anyone living or dead is accidental.

  Chapter 1

  He grabbed his scarf—long, black, woolen; and his jacket—old, brown, leather; picked up his camera; opened the door; made a quick survey to ensure the burners were off, all lights turned out. For a man of modest means, living in a studio apartment in the East Village of New York City in the year 2003, an assessment of his material impact upon the world didn’t require much more than a backwards glance.

  He closed and locked the door, then bounded down the steps directly to the building’s front door, camera strap hung over his shoulder. As he ran, he tied a loose knot in his scarf, just snug enough to cover the front of his neck against the wind.

  Today was the epitome of brisk: clear skies, bright sun. A day, Kit thought, he should capture in pictures. As photography was how he made his living, this particular twenty-first day of May was one he’d decided he needed to bag. Days like this didn’t come often, and he wasn’t going to burn it in a dark room, in a library, in a movie theater, or even in some woman’s bed. Today, he was going out with his only weapon—his only means to an end—to hunt for the only game he cared to hunt: pictures.

  He headed west towards the “N” or “R” line to take him uptown to Twenty-third Street, Madison Square. A quick stop at his studio to pick up gear, then back on the same line to take him north to Fifty-ninth Street, Columbus Circle—and the southwest corner entrance to Central Park. Maybe he’d change to an express train at Thirty-fourth, maybe not; he didn’t care. Five minutes with the one; eight to nine with the other. The faster he got there, the better. Light was everything to a photographer. And twilight—morning or evening—the best.

  At the intersection of Third Avenue and St. Marks Place—Cooper Square—he ignored the pedestrian signal and headed out over the zebra. Halfway across, he noticed an oncoming car moving faster than he’d calculated, and which was heading south along the avenue. The car braked; the driver hit the horn; Kit jumped forward. His camera bag stayed and struck the car’s headlight.

  “Fuck!” he said in a well-tempered Pennsylvania whisper, inspecting first the outside of the bag, then carefully removing the camera.

  The car came to a halt at the other end of the grid and pulled over to the curb. The driver jumped out and rushed to Kit’s side. He assessed the situation, saw at a glance that Kit hadn’t been hurt, then turned his eyes to the object of Kit’s attention.

  “Any damage?” he asked as he leaned in over Kit’s shoulder. Kit looked up. He instantly liked this man. Most drivers would’ve blamed the pedestrian; this man didn’t. This man ignored any assignment of responsibility and focused on possible consequences. Kit smiled at him.

  “Nah. You’ve just helped to clean the lens a bit. Good as new. Better. I dare say it’ll learn to mind where and how it walks in the future.”

  “If there’s any damage, any at all, we’ll pay to have it fixed.”

  We? Kit glanced for the first time at the car and at the license plate—a plate of few digits—then noticed a head and a bob of straight auburn hair against the headrest just inside the rear window. “Don’t even think about it,” he said, again smiling. At that moment, the passenger’s window motored slowly down. The figure inside—Kit could now make out that it was a woman—contorted just slightly as her head turned and slipped out to look at both of them.

  “Ron, is there a problem?” she asked loud enough to be heard over the din of traffic, but with nothing in her tone to suggest more than a perfunctory concern.

  “None, ma’am,” her driver shouted back.

  “Then perhaps we could once again get underway?” It was half-question, half-order. Kit didn’t miss the inflection in her voice or the double message behind it. At the same time, he took a moment to study her face: a bit severe in the bone structure and no longer fresh, yet remarkable in some indefinable way. If anyone had later asked him for a description based on this single visual check, he might’ve said “becoming.”

  “Becoming” was the kind of word that came naturally to Kit.

  She made an equally quick assessment—first of his camera, as it was the object of most immediate concern. She knew cameras, and she knew this one, even at twenty-five yards off. He was clearly no amateur. A cursory second assessment—but now of him—told her that he was also, if professional, probably not yet in his prime. Too young, too slovenly dressed—though slovenly-dressed passed for bohemian in this part of town, and bohemian passed for artsy. Bohemian could mean anything: rich or poor. There was no way, then, to make an assessment of his wealth or of his success; hence, no reason for her to have an interest in his welfare—past, present or future.

  She looked at him more carefully from the neck up. If a man could be called gorgeous, he was that. Not pretty, not a pretty boy by anyone’s definition. He was simply extremely good-looking—and masculine to the core. Chestnut-colored hair, slightly wavy; high cheekbones, but not too pronounced; straight, white teeth—she’d seen them in the rear-view mirror when he’d smiled at Ron. From this distance, she couldn’t make out his eye color—or, in the loose clothes he was wearing, any of his other body parts. He was reasonably tall, slender and compact. That much was clear.

  She ducked her head back inside the car, at which point her driver offered an officious tip to the cap he wasn’t wearing. Probably something atavistic, Kit thought. Comes with the territory, if not directly with the job description. Kit just as perfunctorily returned the gesture in the form of a mock military salute and a third smile.

  The driver turned, walked back to the car, got in. As he put the limo into gear, then moved it slowly out into traffic, the woman glanced again back through the window and saw that Kit was busy rearranging his camera bag and already stepping up to the curb at Astor Place in the direction of Fourth Avenue. The car, driver and woman continued south towards an unknown destination.

  Chapter 2

  Kit descended into the subway at Eighth and Broadway just as an “R” train arrived at the platform. The noise of its arrival was deafening, the cars packed. He waited patiently to the side as several passengers got off, then edged his way in and found little more than breathing space. To the extent he was able, he looked around for interesting faces or situations. Today, however, there was apparently nothing of note. And so he studied the ads over the subway seats—some well done; most, just cheap rip-offs of someone else’s creative efforts. With little of interest to look at and nothing to read, Kit was happy the trip to Twenty-third Street would be quick.

  He was out and back up to street-level within minutes, then walked four blocks south from Madison Square to his studio located near the corner of Nineteenth Street and Fifth Avenue.

  The neighborhood was home to bibliophiles and photographers alike. For their mutual benefit, daily and throughout the day, droves of drop-dead gorgeous women descended—if already successful—from cars driving down from the Upper East Side or in from Westchester County.
Others ascended—if just starting out or only of catalog beauty—on foot from the Lower East Side or from subways coming in from Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx or New Jersey. He’d never heard of a model from Staten Island, but he’d been in the business for only ten years. He figured almost anything was possible in the fashion world: ‘anything’ might even one day include a lovely from Staten Island.

  Kit knew that few of these women had grown up on the Upper East Side or in any of New York’s five boroughs for that matter. The supermodels might be from Stockholm, Milan, Paris or Tokyo—even, on rare occasions, from somewhere like Boise. They looked like a masterfully stirred martini of genes, nutrition and personal hygiene. Education didn’t necessarily figure into the mix, though some of them had an extra olive or onion’s worth of that, too. They promoted their bodies and their faces quite simply because they could. Nobody forced them to—though in Kit’s experience, very few could’ve managed on brains alone. If they were at least street-smart, or had a good manager, they might have a few years’ run and never ever have to work a titty-bar, the street, or a hotel room by the hour. They could simply retire on their savings and dividends—or land themselves a part-time gig as a trophy wife, hang out the rest of the time with the girls at the Club playing cards or just toying with a tan.

  If they weren’t smart, didn’t have a good manager, or simply liked to burn or snort through the cash, well, then—it might be another story altogether, and usually not a very pretty one. From New York on a jet stream to L. A. or Vegas. To Atlantic City or points on an even less desirable compass if nature or bad habits had been unusually swift—then off to Miami, to one of the lesser Keys, or simply off the end of some isolated pier as soon as younger, fresher recruits could be hired, saddled and giddie-upped off to profits.

  In any case, life on the modeling circuit was not gracious. You cut through it like a knife and claimed victory, or it cut through you and eventually cut you out. There were no mercy medals, VA hospitals or quiet retirement homes for those who’d been scarred in battle. Battered hearts were the fashion model’s equivalent of the soldier’s Purple Heart. But unlike a war hero’s medal, a Hallmark paean to a model’s freeze-dried heart wasn’t something that might find a spot on the mantle back home in Hoboken or even in the family’s annual Christmas card. A model’s Miss Lonelyhearts secret simply died—and died with her alone.

  Kit was up the stairs to the first floor studio and in. The room already stirred as production jocks, make-up artists, and a whole crew of personal assistants readied the set for a shoot. He was happy to know it wasn’t his shoot today; he had more interesting things in mind than beautiful faces and bodies. He was here only to pick up film and an extra couple of lenses.

  Mission accomplished, he headed back towards the front door. A step or two away from a quick exit, he was stopped by the arrival of a model. It was easy to spot them—even without make-up: glassy-eyed, flawless teeth and hair, usually tall—though not always—and casually dressed in designer skimp-ware. This one was no exception. He let her pass like a will-o’-the-wisp; ran down the stairs taking two or three steps at a time, then walked out of the building and back to the subway.

  When he arrived at Columbus Circle and came up to ground level, he passed by a familiar scene on the way into the park: camera lights and production people; oceans of cable; big vans parked along Central Park West. Probably a film shoot or maybe just a TV commercial, he thought. In any case, he was no more interested in their activity than he was in the pigeons hustling about underfoot for breakfast crumbs.

  He walked into the park and headed in the direction of The Mall and Poets’ Walk.

  Just as Kit was entering the park seventeen blocks further north, limo, driver and woman arrived at midtown from an earlier errand.

  “Thank you, Ron. I’ll see you again this evening at the usual time.”

  Ron reached up to tip his imaginary cap. The gesture was automatic with or without a cap, which she’d long ago given him the option of wearing—or not—as he saw fit. The woman collected her coat tightly against her, then flung a purse-strap over her shoulder as she made her way from limo to the front door of one of Manhattan’s more modest mid-town skyscrapers several blocks west of Grand Central Terminal. She was about to enter the building through revolving doors when two suits simultaneously opened adjacent doors to let her pass. She gave them a token nod and swept through, then continued straight on to the elevator. When she arrived, the elevator doors opened almost as if by remote control. She entered and pushed the button for the top floor.

  Seconds later, the same doors opened again to another pair of glass doors fifteen feet across the foyer. She pushed one open and walked through.

  “Good morning, Daneka.”

  Daneka nodded and smiled. “Morning, Susan.” The receptionist handed her a small stack of phone messages—something of an anachronism in this day and time, but Daneka had insisted upon it when she’d taken the position. No voicemail, no cell phones, no beepers. She liked to do things face-to-face—occasionally by telephone when face-to-face wasn’t an option or it didn’t matter. But with the telephone, she couldn’t see what she needed to know; she could only hear what the other party wanted her to hear. Daneka liked to engage all of her senses with people when they mattered in any way to her well-being—which was to say, she liked to understand the other party’s motives. She understood that people only seldom revealed their true motives in language—perhaps because she was an expert at concealing her own. But her real talent lay in being able to decipher others’ motives within seconds if she could just see their bodies talk. Once she had her read of them, she could control them and bend their motives to serve her own.

  It was rare that something didn’t become immediately clear to her, or that she didn’t get what she wanted. Her position at work certainly allowed her to expect obedience, though she never commanded it. By virtue of her wealth and status in the neighborhood, she could count on others’ respect, though it was not in her nature to cajole or coerce. She simply won. She won obedience from the one, obeisance from the other—even from perfect strangers—because she knew how to watch, how to listen, how to interpret, how to bend. Quite simply, she knew what made people tick. And she applied her knowledge with the skill of an expert watchmaker, first in tinkering with—then in winding—their clocks.

  “Morning, Kay,” she announced with a well-manicured smile the moment she entered the reception area to her office and saw her Personal Assistant.

  “Morning, Daneka.” Kay returned an equally well-polished smile.

  Daneka walked to her office on the other side of a pair of heavy oak doors leading off from the far corner of the reception area, then to the coat closet to hang up her coat, then to her desk. She glanced at a single portrait mounted in an antique walnut frame sitting on the desk, opened her calendar, picked up the phone and dialed a number by heart. Two brief rings later, the other end picked up.

  “Hello, darling. Yes, I just arrived.” Daneka’s speech was precise, slow. Then, following a pause during which she stared again at the picture—“As we agreed, I’ll bring dinner at seven”—followed by another, longer pause. “Okay. I love you, too. Play well.” She hung up the phone and studied her calendar: first meeting in five minutes. Easy enough—just a pro forma approval.

  When Kit arrived at The Mall, he noted that the light was exceptional. In an hour, it would be too late—too much glare. But now, the light and shadows were still soft—perfect for what he had in mind, and he liked perfect. He dropped the legs on his tripod and inserted a roll of film before mounting his camera, then stepped back to study the vista.

  This, for Kit, was play. He liked bodies and faces, but they were work—unless he was shooting with a telephoto lens, the subject entirely unaware and unselfconscious. Babies and toddlers were sometimes fun, even good. Models had to be good. They had to deal with the camera—if not as friend or lover—then at least as provider.

  The camera, itself, was enti
rely indifferent—however much people liked to insist otherwise. Kit knew better. He knew it was largely the work of the photographer, only sometimes shared by the subject. When both were working well together, he might turn an entire roll into a bonanza.

  Efficiency: he liked it in his work; he didn’t care about it while at play. And today, at least for the next sixty minutes, was playtime.

  Daneka looked up when she heard a soft rap on her office door and smiled at Robert as he walked in, file in hand. She came out from behind her desk; greeted him with a firm handshake; led him by the elbow to a worktable where he could spread out photos and text.

  She liked physical contact, knew that most other people liked it too, and consequently used it whenever she could—first to put people at ease, then to allow them to open up.

  As their brief meeting came to a close, and after she’d given the approval she’d known she would give even before Robert came to her with the lay-out, Daneka invited him to lunch.

  Chapter 3

  Robert, her Art Director, was not by nature a nervous type. His work was excellent; his attitude towards peers, subordinates and Daneka, beyond reproach. But a boss’s invitation to lunch could always be read in a variety of ways.

  Daneka noted his consternation and gently laughed to put him at ease. “No, Robert, nothing like that. I simply thought we could have lunch. We haven’t in a long time, you know. And the truth is, I need your advice on something. My treat, your brains—fair enough? Or have you already got a better date?”

  Daneka could be coy when it served her purposes. She knew that no subordinate would turn down an opportunity to get social with the boss, much less the further opportunity to provide advice at that same boss’s invitation. Coyness, as a tool, had served her well over the years—and so, she’d mastered it. When a woman was in every respect as charismatic as Daneka, that woman could afford to be whimsically coy.