Page 25 of Threads of Hope

Ever since they’d met in the nineties, Walter Billington had lived in a gorgeous old-world building on the Upper East Side— a place with ornate crown molding, a doorman with an elaborate uniform, and a history that included affairs, murders, spontaneous marriages, celebrities, and so much more. Because Walter had more money than he knew what to do with, he often said he liked living in the midst of so many other people’s stories— as stories were free but also worth more than anything he could understand.

Walter was twenty years older than Oriana, which put him at seventy. It seemed strange for a powerful man like that to age, as though money should have allowed him to remain in his forties forever. Still, time came for everyone.

Oriana got on the elevator and went to the top, where Walter’s apartment took up the entire floor. When the doors opened, Walter’s wife, Priscilla, greeted Oriana with a gentle smile, took her coat, and said, “Walter’s in the dining room. He’s looking so forward to seeing you.”

As Walter had always liked keeping his business affairs and private life separate, Oriana didn’t know Priscilla very well. They had been married for as long as anyone could remember. Yet, Priscilla was often not at Walter’s public appearances, and they’d rarely been photographed together. Oriana suspected Priscilla liked it that way.

“Oriana! Welcome back to the city!” Walter stood up from the dining room table and greeted her with a bear hug. Oriana suspected most billionaires didn’t bear-hug (or hug at all), and it touched her.

“Thank you.” Oriana blushed and sat at the table, drinking him in. He’d recently dyed his hair, and his eyes were alight and alive, just as animated as they’d been the first day she’d met him. “You look great, Walter.”

“Don’t flatter me,” Walter ordered, just as one of his waitstaff approached to pour them both glasses of wine. “It’s you I want to hear all about. How are you? How’s your grandson?”

Oriana blushed at Walter’s gentle nature and his ability to remember everything. “Benny is healthy as a clam, running around the house like a monster. It’s hard to believe he was ever so sick.”

“I can’t tell you how happy that makes me,” Walter said.

Walter had been instrumental in securing the best pediatric oncologist on the east coast. It was something Oriana would never be able to thank him enough for. It had changed her life and her family’s life.

In fact, Walter had changed Oriana’s life in many ways over the years. The first of those ways hung just off to the left, in the hallway beside the dining room. It was there Walter kept the modern art painting she’d first sold to him in 1998— her very best deal at the time. Four million dollars. It had kickstarted her career and allowed her to return to Martha’s Vineyard, just as she’d planned. As usual, Oriana tried not to look at the painting too hard. It brought back too many memories.

“I heard a rumor about an award,” Walter said, his eyes shining.

Oriana blushed. “It’s silly, isn’t it?”

“Why would that be silly? You’re a marvelous art dealer. Just look around you, Oriana. Every single piece of art in this entire apartment was something you brought to me because you understood my taste on such a unique and personal level.” Walter gestured toward a sculpture on the side table, one Oriana had secured from an artist from Indonesia, along with a smaller painting on the dining room wall of an orchid from a painter from Vietnam.

“I mean, heck.” Walter laughed and stood to see the painting in the hallway better. “Don’t you remember the first day you showed me that painting? I came out to meet you in that gallery space, and you initially tried to charm me.”

“But you told me you wanted to let the art speak for itself or something.”

“Right. I did that. Can you believe how pretentious I was?” Walter chuckled. “In any case, that was one of the very first major art purchases I ever made. It felt like a big deal to me. I was asking myself what kind of collector I wanted to be. And some combination of that art, and the woman selling it, spoke to me.”

Oriana’s cheeks burned with embarrassment.

“But I didn’t let you have that deal easily,” Walter remembered. “I forced you out on the town with me if I remember correctly. You and that wonderful assistant of yours. What was her name?”

Oriana’s voice was nearly stuck in her throat. “Brea.”

“That’s right! Brea. She was smart as a whip and very funny. What ever happened to her? Did she leave the industry?”

“She did, yes,” Oriana said softly. “We lost track of each other over the years.”

That was the understatement of the century.

“Well. You had the tenacity to stick around,” Walter went on, “And now, look how they’re rewarding you! It’s completely deserved.”

Walter went on to say that he was interested in two of the paintings she’d recently told him about and that they could finalize the deals as early as this week if she wanted to. This perked Oriana up for a little while, distracting her from the chaos of her mind and her fears about what would come next. Occasionally, she assessed Walter, wondering if he was picking fun at her or if he’d figured out what had happened. Maybe he was pretending to blackmail her as a joke because he’d learned the truth. That was sort of something Walter would do, she supposed. He had so much money. He didn’t need three million from her.

After dinner, Walter and Oriana said goodbye with another hug, and Oriana escaped down the elevator and into the electric night of Manhattan. For a few blocks, she walked with her hands in her coat pockets, her head swirling with worries and memories. Just before she got into a cab, Meghan texted her to ask how her trip was going, and Oriana was so distracted, so lost in her mind, that she promptly forgot to write her back.

She was more selfish than she’d been in ages. But she had no idea what would happen when her world fell around her. And the worry had begun to eat away at her mind.

ChapterTwelve

Oriana hadn’t heard from the blackmailer in nearly two weeks. This had left her feeling anxious, wanting to look over her shoulder constantly. With limited success, she tried breezing through life as though the bogeyman wasn’t chasing after her— as though her world wasn’t about to crash down around her. Everyone was very congratulatory about her upcoming award, coming out of the woodwork to write her emails and messages or call her on the phone. Reese doted on her, calling her his “multi-talented and gorgeous wife.” She felt she didn’t deserve any of the praise nor the love.

Still, Rita hadn’t found Brea, which made Oriana lose her mind. She’d begun to question if she’d made up the entire story or if Brea still existed at all. At one time, Oriana and Brea had been so close that spending one day apart had felt like a nightmare. Now, she was petrified to ask Reese about her, to confirm she either had or hadn’t existed. She imagined him saying:“Who’s Brea? What are you talking about?”and then having her committed.

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