Page 32 of The Oligarch's Daughter

She looked uncomfortable. “Let me introduce you to my father.”

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Arkady Galkin was a big, bald man around seventy with a great big potbelly and large, prominent ears with floppy lobes. He appeared to be deep in conversation with a red-haired, pale-skinned, hatchet-faced man wearing an earpiece. The man had a scar under his left eye.

Tatyana went right up to her father and interrupted him. “Pápachka,” she said, “this is my friend Paul Brightman.”

Galkin’s eyebrows were like gray caterpillars and seemed to move independently of each other. They shot up when she said “friend.”

“So you’re my daughter’s latest victim,” he said. He didn’t smile.

“I’m Paul Brightman,” Paul said with a grin.

“I’m Arkady Galkin. I own the joint. I know I don’t look like it, but appearances can be deceiving.”

“It’s a beautiful home,” Paul said. He didn’t know what else to say.

“So you work in finance, Mister Paul Brightman?” He had a thick Russian accent but seemed to speak English reasonably well.

“Right,” Paul said. So that was as much as Tatyana had told her father. Just to let him know his daughter wasn’t going out with some bum. “Finance” sounded serious and could mean anything.

“So, Paul Brightman,” Galkin said, “how you like working for Bernie Kovan?”

So he’d done his research. “He’s great,” Paul said. “He’s a mensch. Bernie’s not a psychopath like some other hedge fund managers.”

Galkin laughed. “So you are born in California. How you end up in New York?”

“Did an internship at Morgan Stanley my junior year in college, and then they offered me a job. One of our clients was Aquinnah Capital.” He paused and shrugged. “Well, I guess Bernie thought I was good, because he hired me.”

“He is good man?”

“He is.”

“Aquinnah Capital is good firm?”

“I’d say so.”

“Three billion under management.”

“Thereabouts. How do you know so much about my business?”

“It’s my business, too, Mr. Brightman.”

“Hedge funds?”

“Well, I like to do a little investing from time to time.”

“Probably more than a little,” Paul said with a crooked smile, looking around at the digs.

“I noticed you don’t like caviar,” Galkin said. “What do you like?”

So Galkin had seen him getting rid of his toast point. At least he hadn’t wiped out his mouth with the napkin.

“Actually, I could go for a good burger right about now, to be honest,” Paul said.

Galkin stared at him for a long time, a stern glower, and then abruptly burst out laughing as if he couldn’t maintain a straight face. He laughed so hard his belly shook. Then he said to Tatyana, “May I borrow your boyfriend for moment?”

Tatyana shrugged as her father gripped Paul’s shoulder and said, “Come with me.”

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