Sterling’s Fortune

Chapter 11

Alistair didn't wait.

The moment the elevator doors closed on Elodie’s fleeing figure, he was moving. He didn't chase her down the hall, that would be dramatic and inefficient. He went to his desk.

He made three phone calls in four minutes.

The first was to his Chief Legal Officer. "Slander. Libel. Defamation. I want The Manhattan Tattler sued into oblivion. And release a statement: Miss Rose’s debts were acquired by Sterling Industries as a signing bonus for her exceptional talent. Frame it as an investment."

The second was to the Board of Directors at the St. James Group. "This is Alistair Sterling. I am pulling my funding for your Midtown expansion. Tell Bianca why."

The third was to Arthur. "Bring the car around. We are going to Queens."

"But sir," Arthur hesitated. "The press..."

"I don't care about the press," Alistair snarled, grabbing his coat. "I have a master key to a building in Astoria, and I intend to use it."

An hour later, Alistair was standing in Unit 4B.

It was freezing. He made a mental note to fire the contractor if the boiler wasn't replaced by tomorrow morning.

The apartment was small. Tiny, really. The living room was also the kitchen, which was also the dining room. It was cluttered, but not with trash.

It was cluttered with genius.

Alistair took a step forward, his expensive Italian leather shoes crunching slightly on a drop cloth.

He had expected poverty. He had expected to see evidence of the struggle the newspapers mocked—the unpaid bills, the empty fridge.

Instead, he found a studio.

Canvases were stacked ten deep against every wall. Sketches covered the coffee table. Sculptures made of twisted wire and found objects, glass, metal, stone, sat on the windowsills, catching the grey winter light.

Alistair walked over to a large easel covered by a sheet in the center of the room. He hesitated, feeling like an intruder, then pulled the sheet back.

He stopped breathing.

It was a painting of the city. But it wasn't the city Alistair saw, the grid of power and money. It was a city of veins and arteries, pulsing with gold and blue light. And in the center, rising like a jagged spire of ice and steel, was Sterling Tower.

But at the very top of the tower, in the painting, there was a figure. A man made of grey geometric shapes, looking out at the world. He looked powerful. But the way she had painted the shadows... he also looked devastatingly lonely.

"She sees me," Alistair whispered.

He moved to the desk. There were charcoals. Ink washes. A sculpture of a hand holding a coin, but the coin was melting into water.

The technique was flawless. The emotion was raw.

"She isn't a gold digger," Alistair said to the empty room, his heart aching in a way he hadn't felt in decades. "She’s a visionary."

He looked around the dingy apartment with new eyes. She lived in a shoebox so she could afford paint. She wore thrift store clothes so she could buy canvas.

She wasn't hiding from her debts because she was irresponsible. She was sacrificing everything for her art. And he had treated her like an Excel spreadsheet.

Click.

The lock turned.

Alistair spun around.

Elodie walked in. She looked exhausted. Her eyes were red-rimmed and puffy. She was carrying a Tupperware container, leftovers from her mother’s house, no doubt.

She froze when she saw him standing in the middle of her living room, surrounded by her soul.

"Alistair?" She dropped the Tupperware. It clattered to the floor. "How... how did you get in?"

"I own the building," he said softly. "I have a key."

"Get out," she whispered, her voice shaking. She rushed forward, trying to pull the sheet back over the painting on the easel. "Don't look at this. It’s private. It’s messy."

Alistair caught her wrist. Gently.

"It’s magnificent," he said.

Elodie stopped. She looked up at him, searching his face for the mockery she expected. She found only awe.

"It’s just a hobby," she stammered, tears welling up again. "It’s stupid."

"It is not a hobby," Alistair corrected firmly. "I am a collector, Elodie. I own Warhols. I own Basquiats. And I am telling you, with absolute certainty, that you are better than them."

"Stop it," she cried, pulling her hand away. "Don't pity me. I saw the article. I know what I am. I'm a bankrupt nobody who ruined your reputation."

"The article is gone," Alistair said calmly. "The digital scrub began twenty minutes ago. Bianca St. James is currently dealing with a sudden audit of her family trust. The narrative has been corrected."

"Corrected?" Elodie laughed bitterly. "How? Did you tell them I'm a charity case?"

"No," Alistair reached into his coat pocket. He pulled out a thick envelope. "I told them the truth."

He handed her the envelope.

"What is this?"

"Open it."

Elodie opened the envelope. Inside was the deed to the apartment, stamped and notarized. But underneath it was something else.

A contract. But not an employment contract.

Representation Agreement: The Sterling Gallery.

"I am opening a gallery in the lobby of Sterling Tower," Alistair said, watching her read. "It needs a debut artist. Someone who captures the spirit of the city. The struggle. The hope."

Elodie looked up, her mouth agape. "You... you want to show my work?"

"I want to buy it," Alistair said. "The painting on the easel? I want it for my office. Name your price. Fifty thousand? Eighty?"

"Alistair..."

"It’s not charity," he cut her off, his eyes blazing. "Look at me, Elodie. I don't do charity. I do investments. And you..." He stepped closer, navigating through the maze of canvases until he was toe-to-toe with her. "You are the most valuable thing I have ever found."

Elodie trembled. "Because of the luck?"

"Forget the luck!" Alistair shouted, his composure finally cracking. "To hell with the luck! I don't care if the stock market crashes tomorrow. I don't care if the tower falls down."

He grabbed her shoulders.

"I sat in this room for an hour, looking at your heart splashed on these canvases. And I realized that I don't want to be the grey man in the tower anymore. I want to be the man you see. The man you painted."

Elodie looked at the painting, then back at him.

"You really like it?" she whispered small.

"I love it," Alistair said. His voice dropped to a hush. "And I love you."

The silence in the apartment was absolute. The radiator clanked, a lonely metallic sound, but the air between them was electric.

"You said it earlier," Alistair said, his gaze intense. "Before you ran. You said you loved me. Did you mean it? Or was that just the heat of the moment?"

Elodie looked at him, this powerful, arrogant, brilliant man who was standing in her messy, freezing apartment, offering her the world not because he pitied her, but because he saw her.

"I meant it," she whispered. "I love you, Alistair. Even when you're being an ass."

Alistair let out a breath he seemed to have been holding for years.

"Good," he said. "Then come home."

"To the penthouse?"

"To me," he clarified. "Bring your paints. Bring your clay. We’ll turn the library into a studio. I don't care if you get paint on the Italian leather. Just... come back."

He held out his hand.

Elodie looked at his hand. The hand that had held hers during the crash. The hand that had signed the papers to save her home.

She reached out.

As her fingers interlaced with his, the rose gold bracelet on her wrist didn't just glow. It pulsed. A wave of warmth, pure, golden, and steady, exploded from her wrist.

It rushed through Elodie. It rushed into Alistair.

The radiator in the corner suddenly hissed and kicked on with a mighty whoosh. The bare lightbulb overhead flickered and brightened to a warm, steady hue. The drafts from the window stopped.

"The balance," Alistair murmured, looking at their joined hands. "Mr. Kringle was right. It wasn't about the stocks. It was about this."

Elodie smiled, squeezing his hand. "Ready to go home, Mr. Sterling?"

Alistair smiled back, a real smile, one that reached his grey eyes and lit them up.

"After you, Miss Rose."