Trump Tower
Authors: Jeffrey Robinson
TRUMP
TOWER
Also By Jeffrey Robinson
FICTION
A True and Perfect Knight
The Monk's Disciples
The Margin of the Bulls
The Ginger Jar
Pietrov and Other Games
NONFICTION
The Takedown
There's A Sucker Born Every Minute
The Sink
Prescription Games
The Merger
The Manipulators
The Hotel
The Laundrymen
Bardot: Two Lives
The End of the American Century
The Risk Takers: Five Years On
Rainier and Grace
Yamani: The Inside Story
Minus Millionaires
The Risk Takers
Teamwork
Bette Davis
AS CO-AUTHOR
With Gerald Ronson
Leading from the Front
With Ronnie Wood
Ronnie: My Life as a Rolling Stone
With Joseph Petro
Standing Next to History:
An Agent's Life Inside the Secret Service
Official Website:
http:/www.jeffreyrobinson.com
Follow Jeffrey Robinson on Twitter @writingfactory
A NOVEL
JEFFREY
ROBINSON
Fo
r Barbara and M
el
Copyright © 2012 by Jeffrey Robinson
Published by Vanguard Press,
A Member of the Perseus Books Group
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information and inquiries, address Vanguard Press, 387 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016-8810.
Books published by Vanguard Press are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200, Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call (800) 810-4145, extension 5000, or e-mail
[email protected]
.
Trump Tower
is a work of fiction. The novel's characters are purely products of the author's imagination. All incidents and dialogue are completely fiction. Where real-life historical figures, organizations, businesses or public figures appear, the situations, incidents and dialogue concerning those persons, organizations or businesses are entirely fictional and not intended to depict actual events or to change the entirely fictional nature of this work. In all other respects, any resemblance to persons living or dead is entirely coincidental. The real-life organizations, businesses and public figures who appear in the work have not endorsed and have not approved any aspect or part of this fictional work, and no such endorsement or approval should be inferred.
Designed by Jeff Williams
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Robinson, Jeffrey, 1945â
Trump Tower : a novel / Jeffrey Robinson.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-1-59315-736-4 (e-Book) 1. Trump Tower (New York, N.Y.)âFiction. 2. Rich peopleâNew York (State)âNew YorkâFiction. I. Title.
PS3620.R859T78 2012
813'.6âdc23
2012010191
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
List of Characters
Residents
Mr. and Mrs. Prakash Advani and daughter, Amvi
(40th and 41st floors)
Rebecca Battelli
(19th floor), owner of Scarpe Pietrasanta shoe company
Cyndi Benson
(59th floor), model and former face of Chanel and Dior
Mme. Odette de La Chabrillan
(58th floor), French cinema star from the 1940s
Tina Lee Cove and David Cove
(45th and 46th floors), traders in distressed cargoes
Katarina Essenbach
(41st and 42nd floors), longtime, wealthy resident
Zeke Gimbel
(39th floor), Hollywood agent
Mikey Glass
(31st floor), television sitcom star
Dr. Robert Gildenstein and Dr. Susan O'Malley
(37th floor), married, orthopedic surgeons
Alicia Melendez (Haynes) and Carson Haynes
(52nd floor), she's the anchor of
News Four New York
; he's a former tennis player, now cochairman of First Ace Capital
Ricky Lips and his son, Joey
(32nd floor), rock star/bass player with the British group “Still Fools”
Roberto “Espiritú” Santos and his mother
(61st floor), center fielder, New York Yankees
Trump Tower Staff
Pierre Belasco,
vice president and general manager
Brenda,
resident services
Harriet,
commercial services
Little Sam,
human resources
Big Sam,
building engineer, maintenance
Bill Riordan,
head of security
Anthony Gallicano,
director of operations at Trump Organization
Antonia Lawrence,
assistant to the director of operations
D
onald Trump only thinks he rules Trump Tower
.
Pierre Belasco reminded himself of that every morning as he stepped into his antique-filled office.
But he doesn't
.
He was always tempted to say that out loud.
Because I do
.
But he couldn't say it, and he wouldn't say itâeven though he knew it was trueânot to anyone, not even as a joke. After all, he'd been raised in a business where the first rule in the list of The Ruler's Rules is . . .
“Sir.”
. . . ultimate discretion.
“Sir?”
He'd just come in and hadn't even had his coffee yet. “Tanya?”
An attractive redhead in a black Trump Tower concierge uniform was standing in the doorway. “I'm afraid there is a very irate young gentleman . . .”
Belasco pushed the large, high-backed, ornate chair away from the eighteenth-century Louis XV table that he used as a desk, straightened his dark blue suit, and was about to follow her out to the small reception area when Tommy Seasonsâcurrently the toast of Broadway in the smash revival of
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf
âbarged in wearing faded jeans, a tight black T-shirt, and a very weary up-all-night expression.
“Get your thrills dude,” he said, “then tell the slut she can't do that to Tommy.”
“And what is it exactly,” Belasco asked quietly, “that Madame has done to Mr. Seasons?”
“What is it exactly,” he mimicked Belasco's slight accent. “You mean, what did Mr. Seasons do to Madame? Well, exactly, he said,
bon appétit
. You know what that means? Ask Madame. And fuck you, too, dude.”
With that, the actor, widely acclaimed as the next Richard Burton, stormed out of the residents' foyer and disappeared down Fifty-Sixth Street.
Tanya seemed shocked. “Did you understand . . .”
Belasco told her, “Make certain that he does not go back upstairs.”
She asked again, “But did you . . .”
“Yes,” he said, waited for her to leave, then went to the French sideboard behind his deskâwhere he kept his three favorite Ming ginger jarsâopened the drawer on the left, took out a small, brown leather pouch and put it in his pocket.
Turning to the large French cherry-wood Louis XV armoire along the far wall, he unlocked the doors with a small metal key. Built inside was a huge safe with a digital combination lock and a card reader. He took his card-key out of his pocket, inserted it in the slot, then punched in his eight-digit code.
The door clicked open, electronically registering that he now had access to the contents.
On the left there was a bank of computer hard drives, which served as the secondary backup for all the security cameras in the Tower, plus the office phone logs. On the right there was a grid with several hundred keys, each lying in their own little slot, each electronically tagged so that as soon as one was removed, a digital time and date stamp would show that the key had been taken out. Another digital time and date stamp also noted when the key was returned.
He took two keys from the slot labeled “Benson-59,” put them in his pocket, shut the safe, relocked the armoire, and left his office.
One of the three elevators was waiting. He told Tomas, the uniformed operator, “Fifty-nine, please.”