The Disobedient Virgin

“It’s new. No mention of it yet in the papers. It’s in the meat-packing district. The buzz is that Madonna was spotted there last week.” Belle paused. “ Vickers will like it.”

Jake grinned. Was there a hint of distaste in his P.A.’s tone? He suspected she didn’t approve of Samantha Vickers. His mother didn’t, either, even though—maybe especially since—she’d only seen Sam on the T.V., sashaying down the runway in the Emmeline’s Lingerie primetime special, wearing little more than a garter belt, a thong, a wisp of lace, a pair of stiletto heels and a look that said she couldn’t be tamed unless you had a very, very large…whip.

“Your name has been linked with hers in the paper but you’ve never brought her here,” Sarah Reece had told him. “I figured this was my chance to get a look at her.”

He never brought any of the women he dated to his mother’s condo, Jake had thought, but he’d wisely kept silent.

“That outfit Vickers was wearing…” Pink had swept into his mother’s cheeks. Jake had done all he could not to roll his eyes. Sometimes, he thought Sarah was a throwback to an earlier time. She was so prim. So proper. He loved her for it, but he really wasn’t in the mood for where he knew the conversation was heading. “Joaquim, it’s time you settled down. All these young women you date…I know the world has changed, but—”

“But, you’d like me to find a nice, old-fashioned girl.”

“Yes.”

“Marry her.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Have a houseful of kids, a dog, trade the Porsche and the Mercedes for a station wagon and a van—”

“Now you’re making fun of me,” his mother said, and Jake had put his arms around her, assured her that he wasn’t, that he’d do all those things some day.

But not yet.

Not yet, when the city, when the world, was brimming with Samanthas. More to the point, not when building his empire was still the most important thing in Jake’s life.

“If you don’t like Sebastian’s or Leonie’s,” Belle said, dragging his thoughts into the present, “I can call that French place on—”

“Sebastian’s is fine. What would I do without you, Bellissima?”

“Cross your wires again, probably, and get your face on Page Six by sending roses to a woman you stopped seeing a month before.”

“Once,” Jake said. “I only did that once.”

“Once was enough,” Belle said, with the crisp assurance of a woman who’d been with her boss since he’d made his first million. “All right, then. After your breakfast appointment, you have a meeting with—”

“I know.”

“And late lunch at Gracie Mansion with the Mayor.”

“Belle,” Jake said with a touch of amused impatience, “have I ever forgotten a business appointment? Now, is there anything new?”

“No. Wait…Kelsey just brought me something from the reception desk.”

“What is it?”

“A large padded envelope. She says it was hand-delivered.”

“Well, open it.”

“I already did. There’s a letter inside, sealed, and—”

“And it smells of perfume.” Jake sighed. Some women were persistent, even though he always made his intentions, or lack of them, clear. “Just toss it.”

“No perfume. In fact, it’s quite formal-looking. Heavy vellum, no return address…but it says ‘confidencial’ as well as ‘private.”’

Jake frowned. Belle wasn’t a latina but she’d pronounced the word con-fee-den-see-al so clearly that he could almost see the non-English spelling.

“Spanish?”