THIRTEEN
A half hour after my unsettling call to Maggie, I sat in the lobby of Harry and Iakovos’s building and held my phone, trying to psych myself up for the second unpleasant call of the day.
“It’s not easy,” I told Valentino where he sat on a plush white leather bench next to me. I ignored the concierge, a woman I’d seen before, and who knew I was allowed up to the penthouse. “But after what the paparazzi said ... well, I think I have to do it. OK. Here goes. Wish me buckets and buckets of luck.”
Valentino put a paw on my leg that I interpreted as his good wishes ... until he used that to leverage his body into a personal-parts grooming pretzel.
“Ja?” a man answered in German.
“Hello,” I said slowly in English, in case he wasn’t well versed in that language. As one of the two und
