Oliver Benjamin
replied. “You have another visitor.”
Roy got out of bed once again and put back on his shoes. This
time the guard led him into a spacious, comfortable room and served
him a cup of decent coffee. There were no guards inside and he was
left totally alone. Only a security camera on the other side of the
room monitored him. After a few moments he wondered if this was
going to be the scene of one of those good cop-bad cop dramas where
they alternate beating the shit out of you with placing fine French
cigarettes between your bloody, quivering lips. He steeled himself
against the coming trauma.
But nothing could prepare him for the surprise of seeing her
there. Against the far wall she stood, silently, dressed in the finest
tailored clothes, made up, serious, radiating power like a nuclear
reactor. Her makeover was even more striking even than Colin’s
metamorphosis after sleeping with Sprout.
“Leona?” Roy said, rising from his chair.
“You don’t have to get up, Roy,” she said, moving across the floor
gracefully. She sat down opposite him and took his hand.
He pulled away. “What in God’s name?” he said.
Leona smiled. It was a beautiful, broad, carnivorous smile.
“That’s it exactly! His name.”
“You killed Bidden, didn’t you?”
“I did not,” she said, lowering her voice to a whisper. “Not
exactly. The Rastafarian did. And I’m taking good care of him. I can
take good care of you too, Roy.”
“What do you mean? What do you want?”
“The question is not what I want. The question is: what do you
want? Do you want to waste away in exile or do you want to be king
of what’s rightfully yours?”
“Rightfully mine? You mean Undergrounds?”
She laughed starkly, “That little patch? No, I’m talking about
something much bigger. I’m talking about Biddenbrooks,” she said.
“It’s yours for the taking. The board is looking for a CEO. I can make
sure it’s you.”
“I don’t understand,” Roy pushed his fists into his eyeballs. “How
did all this happen?”
“I told you when we split up that I would do what I had to do. You
once told me the story of Sheba and Solomon. Well, I figured she
stole the ark to protect it. She loved Solomon, but she knew the many
enemies of his empire would soon be at the gate. But in the end,
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