Immoral Certainty by Robert K. Tanenbaum Page B

not the kind she thought she would be mixing with when Felix Tighe had asked her out for a “night on the town,” as he had put it.
    The men were either dirty-looking and dressed in trucker’s jackets and baseball hats or sleazy types with shirts open to the breastbone, wearing dangling gold at neck and wrists. One of these was sitting at their table now. Felix had been talking to him for ten minutes, some kind of business deal, something about refrigerators, ignoring her.
    The booths were lit with red glass candle lamps and divided above the seat backs by sheets of glass. Anna sipped her rum-and-Coke and studied her reflection. Not bad for nearly thirty. Good eyes, large and black; straight, sharp nose with flaring nostrils. Could have used some more chin, though. It went double the minute she gained a pound over one-ten. Her black hair had been arranged around her small head in a pixie cut, for an outrageous forty-two fifty. The reflection was flattering, she knew. It didn’t show the lines.
    The other women in Larry’s were brassy-looking, hot-panted, heavily made-up, and loud. Anna had worn her best little black dress, the only thing she owned from the better dresses department of Macy’s. Now nobody could see it, or the haircut, and if they could, she began to fear, they would think she looked mousy and square.
    They all looked like criminals, she thought, but what would a schoolteacher from the Bronx know about how big-time international executives disported themselves. That’s how Felix had described himself when she had timidly brought up the subject of his profession. He always seemed to have money, though. She vaguely recalled that in the old days rich people would hang out with gangsters in speakeasies, for the thrill of it. Maybe this was what was happening now. She tried to feel thrilled.
    The other man got up and left, gold chains jingling. Felix finished his Chivas and water and gestured to the waitress for another. He reached over, patted Anna’s hand, and smiled. Anna got the hot chills when Felix smiled at her like that. She felt herself blushing like a kid.
    They talked, or Felix talked and she listened, rapt. He had been everywhere and done everything. College at Yale, then Harvard for an M.B. A. On the fast track at several big companies. Business adventures in Europe and the Far East. Driving race cars and piloting his own plane. His life among the glitter people of New York. Did she see him in People two months ago? In the picture with Angie Dickinson and Joe Namath? Yes, she had, she admitted. Maybe she had.
    What she did know for certain was that for the past four weeks she had been engaged in the hottest affair of her life, as hot as her dreams, long nights and whole weekends full of pounding, ferocious sex. Anna had been to Hunter and had a reasonably sharp brain. Where Felix was concerned, however, it was disengaged in favor of another set of organs entirely.
    Now he was talking about the problems he was having with his condominium. “… anyway, then I said to him, ‘Mr. MacReady, I don’t know what kind of people you’re used to dealing with, but I’m not used to being treated this way. My contract specifically guarantees a sauna and a Jacuzzi. I am not satisfied with your excuses. Our dealings are at an end. You will hear from my attorney.’ You should’ve seen the expression on his face.
    “So I packed my bags and left. My lawyer, my attorney, advised me. He said if I was living there, you know, it would be, like, implied consent.”
    “Where have you been staying?”
    “Oh, in hotels. My club. But, you know, it’s apt to be a long wait. I mean, it’ll go to court, and all.”
    “Yeah, maybe you could rent a furnished place, temporarily.”
    Felix looked mournful and sighed. “Yeah. Yeah, I could do that, but … Oh, hell, Anna, I’m tired of living alone! I’m so sick of that golden life I lead. It’s so hollow. I need somebody to share with. Somebody real. Somebody