Scott Sherman - First You Fall

Next, I searched the name of the older brother, Michael. The first link took me to the Center for Creative Empowerment Therapy. There on the homepage was a picture of Michael, with a caption reading “Founder and Leader.”

Although the picture was just a head and shoulder shot, you could see Michael Harrington was a powerful y built and stunningly good-looking man.

Square jawed, heavily muscled, with sharp cheekbones and electric blue eyes. Although there was some resemblance between Paul and him, Michael seemed to have gotten both brothers’ al otment of testosterone.

Like his brother’s official portrait, Michael’s also showed him unsmiling. With his stern expression and piercing eyes, Michael gave you the feeling that if his “creative empowerment therapy” (whatever that was) didn’t work, he could just beat the neuroses out of you.

Hunky as he was, he could have made a fortune with Mrs. Cherry doing just that.

A click on his picture took you to his bio. I was just about to read more about him when an instant message popped up on my screen.

“Angel, what r u doing up?” Freddy typed.

I wrote him an abbreviated synopsis of my evening, making out with Tony, and my mother’s moving in.

“Just when I thought ur life couldn’t get any more dramatic,” Freddy wrote back. “What tragedy wil befal you next? A plague of locusts? Boils? A new Celine Dion album?

“Speaking of crazy divas,” he continued, “would u say hel o to ur mother for me?

I assured him I would.

“Good. Now go to bed. We have to be beautiful for the reading of the wil tomorrow.”

I looked at the time in the Windows taskbar. 2:45

A.M. Ugh.

I signed off and lay on the couch for another hour until sleep came.

Three hours later I was awakened by the sound of grenades exploding in my kitchen. “What the hel?” I shouted.

“Honey,” my mother said cheerily. “I was just looking for where you keep the food.”

Welcome, Hurricane Momma. For one blissful moment, I had forgotten about my new roommate.

“I don’t keep any food,” I groaned.

“Toast?”

“Toast is food.”

“Coffee?”

“Nope.”

“How about some tea?”

“I have protein powder, milk, and bananas.”

“Maybe some eggs?”

“Am I going to have to get out of bed?”

“You’re not in bed,” my mother reminded me.

“You’re on the couch. And yes, you have to get up.

Momma’s going to take you out to breakfast at that greasy spoon on the corner. You know, breakfast is a very important meal. The most important of the day, I always say. I don’t know how you can be productive if you don’t start out with a good breakfast

…”

Maybe I should have taken Tony up on that offer to shoot her.

After our breakfast, my mother and I went our separate ways: She to the beauty parlor she runs in Hauppauge, Long Island, I to my apartment to change. I told her that the super would let her in if she got home before I did, but she assured me that he had already given her an extra key. Great.

I put on a pair of tan khakis, a white dress shirt, tan boat shoes, and carried a blue linen blazer, the outfit I wear when a client requests “a nice, clean boy.” I considered wearing a tie, but the blistering heat made me decide otherwise. I don’t know how people who have real jobs survive in this city.

I took a cab to the law office where Al en’s wil was to be read. Standing outside was Freddy, looking spectacular in a black suit with a white silk T-shirt underneath. The outfit was just this side of Miami Vice, but Freddy could pul it off.

“What happened to the sequins?” I asked, getting out of the cab.

“I thought, ‘why detract from my natural beauty?’”

Freddy answered. “You look very Lands End, darling.”

“Thanks for coming.” I kissed him on the cheek.

“These people scare me.”

“Wel, Auntie Freddy wil protect you,” he said, ushering me inside. “You know there isn’t a white person in the world who scares me.”

We rode the elevator to the forty-fifth floor, where we entered the offices of Al en’s law firm. I could see why rich people would trust them with their finances.

Everything about the place screamed old money and new tax loopholes. Even the mail clerks were better dressed than me.

Two receptionists sat behind a long mahogany desk. One looked as if she was in her mid-sixties, with silver hair sprayed into a stiff wave seen only in fifties horror movies and Town and Country magazine. Her facelift was pul ed so tight that every time she blinked her hairline moved down an inch.

From the way she was looking at Freddy and me, it was impossible not to imagine she had one hand on the police cal button.

The other woman looked to be in her mid-thirties.

She was attractive, but in a less artificial and frightening way. I told her we were there for the reading of Al en Harrington’s wil.

After checking my name against a printed list, she ushered us to a plush waiting area, where we sank into brown leather armchairs that cost more than I made in a month. And I make a lot in a month. An older man sitting across from us snorted. A passing attorney looked at Freddy and me questioningly.

“May I bring you something?” the nicer, younger receptionist inquired. “Coffee, tea?”

“Valium?” I asked.

“Five or ten mil igrams?” She winked.

“Fifty,” I answered.

The receptionist whispered. “Don’t be intimidated.

Most of them take the train back to Brooklyn just like the rest of us.”

“You’re a dol,” Freddy said to her. Then, to me:

“See? I told you there was nothing to be afraid of. I’m sure everything’s going to go fine. How bad can it be?”

Ten minutes later, the receptionist took Freddy and me to a swank, windowed corner office, where the other invitees were seated at a smal oval conference table.

I recognized the Harrington sons, Michael, the oldest, and Paul. Michael was as handsome and wel — built as he appeared in his picture. His forehead was high and distinguished. Strong cheekbones pointed the way to a perfectly sculpted nose and thick lips.

He had a footbal player’s body. Bulky and dense, with wel — rounded shoulders and biceps that peaked even under his suit jacket. You could have posted a bil board on his expansive chest.

Paul was even more effete than he looked in his picture. He was dressed in true metrosexual style, in a Hugo Boss suit and two-tone Prada shoes that were new for this season.

In person, he was better looking, though. Thinner and less muscular than his brother, he was nonetheless trim and fit. He shared his brother’s handsome features, and although not quite as striking as Michael, his blue eyes and lighter hair made him look less imposing and more approachable.

His wife, Alana, perched at his side. She, too, was perfectly turned out in a charcoal gray Chanel-like suit and an impenetrable mask of Clinique. Even seated, you could see she was tal er than Paul.

She was wearing a sweet perfume that I could smel from across the table. It did little to soften her attractive but harsh features.

There were two other women in the room I didn’t recognize. One was long and skinny, with smal dark eyes and a short-cropped haircut. The other was short and stocky, with an attractive face that looked nervous. Her eyes were red and teary.

Their clothing was sensible and modest. I guessed Banana Republic for the skinny one and Lane Bryant for the other.

No one was speaking.

Alana regarded me and Freddy with narrowed eyes. She whispered something to her husband, who chuckled.