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called.
    “I’ve got the offer sheet ready for that block trade.” Abby smiled politely at Jay, then looked back at Oliver. “I’m going to fax it over.”
    “Good.” Out of the corner of his eye Jay noticed Oliver’s and Abby’s fingers intertwine momentarily. Then she rushed away and the scent of her perfume drifted over him.
    “Abby’s a sweet girl,” Oliver said. “A tremendously hard worker. She’ll be here until at least ten o’clock tonight.” He glanced at Jay. “Abby is the associate on the arbitrage desk I mentioned earlier. You’ll like her.”
    “I’m sure.” Jay checked Oliver’s left hand and saw a wedding band.
    “Hey, pal, I saw you checking Abby out, and I’ve got to say I agree with your taste.” Oliver gave Jay a friendly punch on the upper arm. “But don’t get any ideas. She’s spoken for.” He turned and began moving forward again. “As I was saying, the capital market desk is over there, next to the fixed-income people, and our home, the equity arbitrage desk, is positioned in the far corner. We have only one workstation, but we make more money than anyone else on the entire floor.” He waved toward the desk casually. “The difference between us and the equity guys in the far corner is that we trade only takeover stocks. They trade all other stocks.”
    Jay followed Oliver’s gesture and caught a glimpse of Bullock sitting in front of a computer, studying one of his screens.
    “Hey, it’s God!”
    Jay’s head snapped right. A young trader twenty feet away had directed the remark at Oliver.
    “You the man, Oliver!” another yelled.
    “What’s that all about?” Jay asked.
    Oliver gave the two traders a friendly nod. “The arbitrage desk has performed tremendously well since I arrived here five years ago,” he explained immodestly. “As I said, we’re small in terms of people, but we make more money than any other desk. The fixed-income desk those two guys work on didn’t do too well last year. In fact, they lost money for the firm, but they still received decent bonuses because my desk, the desk you are about to become a part of,” Oliver emphasized, “tore the cover off the ball. Again,” he bragged.
    “There goes the king!” someone yelled.
    Jay shook his head. It was like accompanying royalty.
    “Upstairs are the merger-and-acquisition, corporate-finance, and project-finance groups,” Oliver continued, ignoring the last accolade. “Bill doesn’t like those groups being located on the trading floor because of the potential conflict of interest. Like it isn’t a conflict of interest to have the arbitrage desk on the same floor with the equity traders,” he said smugly. “They hear about takeover bids before almost anyone except the M and A people, and it would be very easy for one of them to run over to us and give us the inside scoop so we could trade on it. But hey, it’s Bill’s firm. He can do what he wants.”
    Jay scanned the floor. Most of the several hundred individuals talking into phones, checking computer screens, or conversing with each other were men, and the few women on the floor were young and attractive. He noticed the way most of them nodded deferentially to Oliver, and how Oliver acknowledged very few of them.
    “You will sign a contract with us tomorrow,” Oliver remarked. “You probably never did that at National City, did you?”
    “No.”
    “Don’t worry, it’s standard stuff. It’ll spell out in detail the financial and legal terms of your employment.” Oliver clapped his hands and laughed. “It’ll stipulate that you can’t sue us for anything. That any dispute you ever have with McCarthy and Lloyd will be settled by an industry arbitrator. Probably by someone who owes Bill a big favor. A lot of the big investment banks have gotten away from that policy and have allowed employees to sue them, but not us. We don’t have to.” Oliver slammed the wall with his open palm. “What a crock of shit that is, huh?