Glitter Baby

Chapter 18

Kissy’s apartment sat above an Italian restaurant in the Village. The interior decorating looked just like her: lollipop colors, a collection of stuffed teddy bears, and a poster of Tom Selleck taped to the bathroom door. As Kissy was showing Fleur how the makeshift shower worked, a bright pink lip print on the poster caught Fleur’s eye. “Kissy Sue Christie, is that your lipstick on Tom Selleck?”

“So what if it is?”

“You could at least have aimed for his mouth.”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

Fleur laughed. Kissy had taken the fact that Fleur would be her roommate for granted, and Fleur was more than grateful. Despite her success with Neon Lynx, her self-confidence was shaky at best, and she was plagued with doubts about her decision to return to New York.

Parker begrudgingly gave her a week to get settled before she had to report to work, and she forced herself to leave the safe haven of the apartment and get reacquainted with the city she’d once loved. It was early February, and New York was at its worst, but she found it beautiful. Best of all, no one recognized her.

She ran every morning that week, only a few blocks before she had to walk to catch her breath, but each day she felt stronger. Sometimes she passed a place she and Belinda had visited together, and she felt a sharp, bittersweet pang. But there was no room in her new life for misplaced sentimentality. She was carving out her own future, and she wouldn’t take any dirty laundry from the past with her. She tested herself by sitting through an Errol Flynn retrospective, but she didn’t feel anything for the dashing swashbuckler on the screen.

The day before Fleur had to start work, Kissy threw out all her clothes. “You’re not going to wear those vile rags, Fleur Savagar. You look like a bag lady.”

“I like looking like a bag lady! Give me my clothes back.”

“Too late.”

Fleur ended up trading in her old jeans for ones that fit her slimmer shape and bought a supply of funky tops to go with them-a Mexican peasant shirt, an old varsity letter sweater, and some turtlenecks. Kissy frowned and left a copy of Dress for Success conspicuously displayed on the coffee table.

“You’re wasting your time, Magnolia Blossom,” Fleur said. “I’m working for Parker Dayton, not Xerox. The entertainment world has a more casual dress code.”

“There’s casual and there’s dowdy.”

Fleur could peel away only so many layers at a time. “Go kiss Tom Selleck.”

It didn’t take her long to discover Parker wanted his pound of flesh for the generous salary she’d forced him to pay. Her days blended into nights and spilled over into the weekends. She visited Barry Noy’s purple-painted Tudor in the Hamptons to console him on his loss of Kissy. She wrote press releases, studied contracts, and fielded calls from promoters. The business, finance, and law classes she’d sat in on immediately began to pay off. She discovered she had a talent for negotiation.

She’d known she couldn’t remain anonymous forever, but by dressing inconspicuously and staying away from anyplace connected with the fashion world, she avoided attracting attention for almost six weeks. In March, however, her luck ran out. The Daily News announced that former Glitter Baby Fleur Savagar was back in New York working at the Parker Dayton Agency.

The phone calls started coming in, and a few reporters showed up at the office. But all of them wanted the Glitter Baby back, signing perfume contracts, going to marvelous parties, and talking about her rumored affair with Jake Koranda. “I have a new life now,” she said politely, “and I won’t be making any further comments.”

Try as they might, she refused to elaborate.

A photographer appeared to capture the Glitter Baby’s whirling cloud of streaky blond hair and couture fashion. They got baggy blue jeans and a Yankees cap. After two weeks, the story died of boredom. The fabulous Glitter Baby was yesterday’s news.

Over the next three months, Fleur learned who the record producers were and managed to keep track of the television executives as they played musical chairs at the networks. She was smart, dependable; she honored her commitments, and people began to ask for her. By midsummer she’d fallen in love with the entire business of making stars.

“It’s great to pull other people’s strings instead of having my own pulled,” she told Kissy one hot Sunday afternoon in August as they sat on a bench in Washington Square eating dripping ice cream cones. The park held its usual colorful complement of characters: tourists, leftover hippies, skinny kids with ghetto blasters hoisted on their shoulders.

After six months in New York, Fleur’s hair swung in a jaw-length blunt cut that shimmered in the summer sun. She was tan and too slim for the shorts that sat on her hip-bones. Kissy frowned over the top of her ice cream cone. “We are getting you some clothes that aren’t made out of denim.”

“Don’t start. We’re talking about my job, not fashion.”

“Wearing something decent won’t turn you back into the Glitter Baby.”

“You’re imagining things.”

“You think looking good will somehow ruin everything you’re building for yourself.” She adjusted her red plastic barrettes, which were shaped like lips. “You hardly ever look in a mirror. A few seconds to slick on lipstick, another couple of seconds to run a comb through your hair. You are a world-class champion at avoiding your reflection.”

“You look at yours enough for both of us.”

But Kissy was on a roll, and Fleur couldn’t distract her. “You’re fighting a losing battle, Fleurinda. The old Fleur Savagar can’t hold a candle to the new one. You’re going to be twenty-four next month, and your face has something it didn’t have when you were nineteen. Even those disgusting clothes can’t hide the fact that you have a better body now than when you were modeling. I hate to be the bearer of tragic news, but you’ve turned from boringly gorgeous into a classic beauty.”

“You Southerners do love your drama.”

“Okay, no more nagging.” Kissy circled the double-decker mound of raspberry ripple with her tongue. “I’m glad you love your job. You even seem to love the ugly parts, like having Parker for a boss and dealing with Barry Noy.”

Fleur caught a dab of mint chocolate chip before it dropped on her shorts. “It almost scares me how much. I love the wheeling and dealing and the fact that something is always happening. Every time I head off another crisis, I feel like one of the nuns just pasted a gold star next to my name.”

“You’re turning into one of those awful overachievers.”

“It feels good.” She gazed across the square. “When I was a kid, I thought my father would let me go home if I could be the best at everything. After it all fell apart, I lost faith in myself.” She hesitated. “I think…maybe I’m starting to get that back.” Her self-confidence was too frail to hold up for examination, even from her best friend, and she wished she hadn’t been so open. Fortunately Kissy’s thoughts took a different path.

“I don’t understand how you can’t miss acting.”

“You saw Eclipse. I was never going to win any Academy Awards.” Unlike Jake and his screenplay.

“You were great in that part,” Kissy insisted.

Fleur made a face. “I had a couple of good scenes. The rest were barely adequate. I never felt comfortable.” In deference to Kissy’s feelings, she didn’t mention that she also found the whole process of filmmaking, with all the standing around, boring beyond belief.

“You put your heart into modeling, Fleurinda.”

“I put my determination into it, not my heart.”

“Either way, you were the best.”

“Thanks to a lucky combination of chromosomes. Modeling never had anything to do with who I was.” She drew in her legs to save them from amputation by a skateboard. One of the drug dealers stopped talking to stare. She gazed off into space. “The night Alexi and I played out our smutty little scene, he said I was nothing more than a pretty, oversized decoration. He said I couldn’t really do anything.”

“Alexi Savagar is a whacko prick.”

Fleur smiled at hearing Kissy dismiss Alexi so inelegantly. “But he was also right. I didn’t know who I was. I guess I still don’t, not entirely, but at least I’m on the right path. I spent three and a half years running from myself. Granted, I acquired a world-class university education along the way, but I’m not running anymore.” And she wasn’t. Something had changed inside her. Something that finally made her want to fight for herself.

Kissy pitched the end of her cone into the trash. “I wish I had your drive.”

“What are you talking about? You’re always juggling your schedule at the gallery so you can get your hours in and still hit the auditions. You go to class in the evenings. The parts will come, Magnolia. I’ve talked to a lot of people about you.”

“I know you have, and I appreciate it, but I think it’s time I face the fact that it’s not going to happen.” Kissy wiped her fingers on her very short pink shorts. “Directors won’t let me read for anything other than comic sexpots, and I’m terrible in that kind of part. I’m a serious actress, Fleur.”

“I know you are, honey.” Fleur put all the conviction she could muster behind her words, but it wasn’t easy. Kissy-with her pouty mouth, pillowy breasts, and smudge of raspberry ripple on her chin-was a perfect comic sexpot.

“I got a raise at the gallery.” She made it sound as thought she’d gotten a terminal disease. “Maybe if I had a more disagreeable job, I’d push myself harder. I should never have gotten my minor in art history. It’s turned into my security blanket.” Her eyes automatically slid over a good-looking college student walking past, but her heart wasn’t in it. “I can only take so much rejection, and I’ve just about had my fill. I do a good job at the gallery, and I get recognized for it. Maybe that should be enough.”

Fleur squeezed her hand. “Hey, what happened to Miss Positive Thinking?”

“I think I’m thunked out.”

Fleur hated the idea of Kissy giving up, but with her own history, she wasn’t in a position to criticize. She rose from the bench. “Let’s go. If we play our cards right, we can catch the beginning of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on television before we have to get dressed for our dates.” She dropped the remainder of her cone and napkin in the trash.

“Good idea. How many times will this make?”

“Five or six. I lost count.”

“You haven’t told anybody about this, have you?”

“Are you nuts? Do you think I want the whole world to know we’re perverts?”

They left the park walking side by side, a dozen pairs of male eyes following them.

Fleur’s daily runs had firmed her muscles, and as the extra pounds melted away, her sexuality emerged from its long hibernation. The flow of water over her body in the shower, the slide of a soft sweater on her skin-everyday acts became sensual experiences. She wanted to be held by someone who shaved, someone with biceps and a hairy chest, someone who cussed and drank beer. Her body was starved for male contact, and as part of her self-improvement campaign, she began dating a personable young actor named Max Shaw, who was appearing off-off-Broadway in a Tom Stoppard play. He was Hollywood handsome, a rangy blond whose only drawback was a tendency to use phrases like “practicing my craft.” They had fun together, and she wanted him.

She donned jeans and the black tank top she’d bought on the clearance table at Ohrbach’s for their date the night of her twenty-fourth birthday. They’d planned to go to a party, but she said she’d had a tough week and suggested they skip it. Max wasn’t stupid, and half an hour later, they found themselves in his apartment.

He poured her a glass of wine and settled next to her on the foam slab that served as both couch and bed in his studio apartment. The smell of his cologne bothered her. Men should smell of soap and a clean shirt. Like Jake.

But her memories of her treacherous first lover were shackles made of dusty cobwebs, easy to break free of, and they drifted away as she kissed Max. Before long, they were naked.

He pushed all the right buttons, and she had the release she’d been craving, but she felt empty afterward. She told him she had an early meeting and couldn’t stay. After she left his apartment, she began to tremble. Instead of feeling energized like Kissy after one of her casual encounters, Fleur felt as though she’d given up something important.

She saw Max a few more times, but each encounter left her more depressed, and she eventually ended it. Someday she’d meet a man she could give herself to with all her heart. Until then, she’d keep things casual and direct her energy into her job.

Christmas arrived, then New Year’s. The longer she worked for Parker, the more she disagreed with the way he ran his business. Olivia Creighton, for example, had spent most of the fifties as the queen of the B movies, specializing in torn dresses and being rescued by Rory Calhoun. With those days gone, Parker, along with Olivia’s personal manager, a man named Bud Sharpe, had decided to capitalize on what was left of her name with commercial endorsements. But Olivia still wanted to act.

“What do you have for me now?” The actress sighed into the telephone when she heard Fleur’s voice. “Laxative commercials?”

“Florida condominiums. The company wants a more glamorous image, and they know you’ll give it to them.” Fleur tried, but she couldn’t manufacture any more enthusiasm than Olivia.

“Did anything happen with that new Mike Nichols play?” Olivia asked after a moment’s silence.

Fleur toyed with a pencil on her desk. “It wasn’t a lead, and Bud wouldn’t consider it for you. Not enough money. I’m sorry.”

Fleur had argued with Bud and Parker over Olivia, but she couldn’t convince either of them to let Olivia have a shot at the Nichols play.

After she hung up, she slipped into the loafers she’d kicked off under her desk and went to see Parker. She’d worked for him for a year and had gradually assumed so much responsibility that he’d begun to rely on her for everything, but he still didn’t like it when she questioned his judgment. The new Lynx album was bombing, Barry got lazier all the time, and Simon had started talking about setting up his own group, but Parker behaved as if Lynx would go on forever, and he used Fleur to pacify his other clients. Although she was gaining valuable experience because of his neglect, she didn’t believe this was the way to run an agency.

“I’ve got an idea I want to talk over with you.” She sat on the plush burgundy couch across from his desk. His squished-in face looked even more unpleasant than usual.

“Why don’t you send me another of your memos?”

“I believe in the personal touch.”

His voice dripped cynicism. “But I look forward to all those bright college-girl suggestions. They make great toilet paper.”

It was going to be one of those days. He’d probably had a fight with his wife.

“What is it this time?” he said. “More nonsense about computerization? A new filing system? A frigging newsletter for our clients?”

She ignored his testiness. “Something more fundamental.” Acting under the flies/honey/vinegar theory, she adopted her most chipper manner. “I’ve been thinking about what happens when we negotiate a contract for our bigger clients. First, we have to clear everything with the client’s personal manager. Then, after our legal looks it over, the personal manager studies it, passes it on to a business manager, who passes it on to another lawyer. Once the deal has gone through, there’s a publicist, and then-”

“Get to the point. I’m dying of old age here.”

She carved a column in the air with her hand. “Here’s the client. Here we are. We get ten percent for finding the client a job. The personal manager gets fifteen percent for directing the client’s career, the business manager five percent for handling money, the attorney another five percent for studying the small print, and the press agent gets two or three thousand a month for publicizing. Everybody takes a cut.”

Parker’s high-back chair squeaked as he shifted his weight. “Any client who’s big enough to have a team like that is in the top tax bracket, so all those commissions get deducted.”

“They still have to be paid. Compare that to the way you operate with Lynx. You’re their agent and personal manager. We do their tour publicity, and the pie isn’t split so many ways. With some smart expansion, we could make that kind of service available to your best clients. We could charge twenty percent commission, which is ten percent more than we’re getting now, but fifteen percent less than the client is paying out to all those different people. We make more, the client pays less, and everybody’s happy.”

He waved her off. “Lynx is a different situation. I knew from the beginning that I had a gold mine, and I wasn’t letting it get away from me. But an operation on the scale you’re talking about would be too expensive to run. Besides, most clients wouldn’t want their business centralized like that, even if it cost less. It would leave them too open to mismanagement, not to mention embezzlement.”

“Regular audits get built into the package. But the current system leaves them open to mismanagement, too. Three-quarters of these managers care more about their own cut than their client’s interests. Olivia Creighton is a perfect example. She hates doing commercials, but Bud Sharpe won’t let her accept any of the parts she’s been offered because they don’t pay as much as condominium commercials. Olivia has some good years left, and that’s shortsighted management.”

Parker had started glancing at his watch, and she knew she was beat, but still, she plunged on. “We can make money with this kind of organization, and it would be more efficient for clients. If we’re discriminating, being represented by Parker Dayton would become a real status symbol. We’d be a ‘caviar agency’ with great clients beating down our door.”

“Fleur, I’m going to try this one more time, and you’d better watch my lips. I don’t want to be William Morris. I don’t want to be ICM. I’m happy with things just the way they are.”

She shouldn’t have wasted her breath. But as she headed back to her office, she couldn’t stop thinking about her idea. If someone honest and reliable had taken care of her interests when she was nineteen, she wouldn’t be out two million dollars.

She thought about her “caviar agency” all that day and into the next week. Putting together the kind of operation she imagined would be much more expensive than a standard agency. The nature of the project required a prestigious address and a diversified, well-paid staff. It would take a fortune just to get started. Still, the more she thought about it, the more certain she became that the right person could make it work. Unfortunately the right person had only five thousand dollars in her savings account and an under-abundance of courage.

That evening she met Simon Kale for tandoori at the Indian Pavilion. “What would you do if you weren’t already filthy rich and you needed big money?” she found herself asking.

He plucked some fennel seeds from the bowl in front of him. “I’d clean apartments. Really, Fleur, it’s impossible to find good help. I’d pay a fortune for someone reliable.”

“I’m serious. How would you go about it if you only had five thousand dollars in the bank and you needed a lot more? Like six figures more.”

“Are we eliminating drug dealing?”

She lifted an eyebrow at him.

“Well, then…” He selected another fennel seed. “I’d say the fastest way would be to pick up our telephone and call that bitch Gretchen Casimir.”

“That’s not an option.” Modeling was the one thing she wouldn’t consider. If she did this-not that she would, but if she did-it would have to be all hers.

“Have we considered prostitution?”

“Fishnet stockings are so unflattering.”

He brushed a stray seed from the sleeve of his silky gray shirt. “Since we’re being so picky, the best way would probably be to demand a loan from a filthy rich friend.”

She smiled at him. “You’d do it, too, wouldn’t you? I’d only have to ask.”

He pursed his lips. “Which, of course, you won’t.”

She leaned across the table and planted a kiss on his cheek. “Any other ideas?”

“Mmm…Peter, I suppose. He’s your best bet, considering all these silly restrictions you’ve set up.”

“Our Peter Zabel? Lead guitarist for Neon Lynx? How could he help me?”

“Tell me you’re kidding, pet. You used to place all those phone calls to his brokers for him. Peter knows more about making money than anyone I’ve met. He’s made a fortune for me in precious metals and new stock issues. I can’t believe he never gave you any tips.”

Fleur nearly knocked over her water glass. “Do you mean I was supposed to take him seriously?”

“Fleur…Fleur…Fleur…”

“But he’s such an idiot!”

“His banker would most definitely disagree.”

Another week passed before Fleur got up the courage to call Peter and lay out the situation in the vaguest terms. “What do you think? Speaking hypothetically. Could a person do anything with only five thousand dollars to start?”

“Depends on whether you’re willing to lose it or not,” Peter said. “High return means high risk. You’re talking commodities trading-currency, fuel oil, wheat. If sugar goes down a penny a pound, you lose your nest egg. Very risky. You could end up worse off than you are now.”

“I supposed…Yes.” And then she was horrified to hear herself go on. “I don’t care. Tell me what I have to do.”

Peter explained the basics, and she began spending every spare minute with her head buried in the books and articles he recommended on commodities trading. She read the Journal of Commerce on the subway, and she fell asleep with Barron’s propped on her pillow. All her classes in business and economics helped her grasp the basics, but did she really have the guts to do this? No. But she was going to do it anyway.

Following Peter’s advice, she invested two thousand in soybeans, bought a contract for liquefied propane, and, after studying weather forecasts, spent the rest on orange juice. Florida had a killer freeze, the soybeans rotted from too much rain, but liquefied propane went through the roof. She ended up with seven thousand. This time she divided it between copper, durum wheat, and more soybeans. Copper and wheat tanked, but soybeans pulled through to the tune of nine thousand dollars.

She reinvested every penny.

On April Fool’s Day, Kissy landed the plum role of Maggie in a workshop production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. She danced around their apartment as she broke the news to Fleur. “I’d given up! Then this girl who was in a couple of my acting classes called. She remembered this scene I’d done…I can’t believe it! We start rehearsals next week. There’s no money, and it’s not a big enough production to attract anybody important, but at least I’ll be acting again.”

Once rehearsals began, Fleur didn’t see Kissy for days at a time, and when she did, Kissy was distracted. Not a single hunk passed through their apartment, and Fleur finally accused her of celibacy.

“I’m storing up my sexual energy,” Kissy replied.

The day of the production, Fleur was so nervous she couldn’t eat. She didn’t want to see Kissy humiliated, and there was no way her little fluff ball of a roommate could take command of a heavyweight part like Maggie. Kissy belonged in sitcoms, exactly where she didn’t want to be.

A freight elevator took Fleur up to a chilly Soho loft with clanging pipes and peeling paint. The small stage at one end held nothing except a big brass bed. Fleur tried to convince herself the bed was a good omen where Kissy was concerned.

The audience was made up of other unemployed actors and starving artists, without a casting agent in sight. A bearded guy who smelled like linseed oil leaned forward from the row of chairs behind her. “So, are you a friend of the bride or the groom?”

“Uh-the bride,” she replied.

“Yeah, I thought so. Hey, I dig your hair.”

“Thanks.” Her hair brushed her shoulders now and attracted more attention than she liked, but cutting it felt like a weakness.

“You want to go out sometime?”

“No, thanks.”

“That’s cool.”

Fortunately the play started right then. Fleur took a deep breath and mentally crossed her fingers. The audience heard the sound of a shower running offstage, and Kissy made her entrance in an antique lace dress. Her accent was as thick as summer jasmine. She stripped off the dress and stretched. Her fingers formed tiny claws in the air. The man sitting next to Fleur shifted in his seat.

For two hours the audience sat spellbound as Kissy prowled and hissed and scratched her way across the stage. With dark, desperate eroticism and a voice like dime-store talcum powder, she radiated Maggie the Cat’s sexual frustration. It was one of the most riveting performances Fleur had ever seen, and it came straight from the soul of Kissy Sue Christie.

By the time the play was over, Fleur was drained. Now she understood Kissy’s problem in a way she couldn’t have before. If Fleur, Kissy’s best friend, hadn’t believed she could be a serious dramatic actress, how could Kissy hope to convince a director?

Fleur pushed her way through the crowd. “You were incredible!” she exclaimed, when she reached Kissy’s side. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“I know,” Kissy replied with a giggle. “Come tell me how wonderful I was while I change out of costume.”

Fleur followed her to the makeshift dressing room where Kissy introduced her to the other female cast members. She chatted with all of them, then perched on a chair next to Kissy’s dressing table and told her another dozen times how wonderful she’d been.

“Everybody decent?” a masculine voice inquired from the other side of the door. “I need to pick up the costumes.”

“I’m the only one left, Michael,” Kissy called out. “Come on in. I have somebody I want you to meet.”

The door opened. Fleur turned.

“Fleurinda, you’ve heard me talk about our brilliant costume designer and the future dressmaker to the Beautiful People. Fleur Savagar meet Michael Anton.”

Everything stopped like a damaged frame of film frozen in a movie projector. He wore an antique purple satin bowling shirt and a pair of loosely cut wool trousers held up by suspenders. At twenty-three, he wasn’t much taller than he’d been the last time she’d seen him, maybe five feet, seven inches. He had shiny blond hair that fell in long waves level with his chin, a set of narrow shoulders, a small chest, and delicately carved features.

Gradually Kissy realized that something was wrong. “Do you two know each other?”

Michael Anton nodded. Fleur reached deep inside her. “This is one of your better moments, Kissy,” she said, as lightly as she could manage. “Michael is my brother Michel.”

“Oh boy.” Kissy’s gaze flicked from one to the other. “Should I play some organ music or something?”

Michel shoved one hand into the pocket of his trousers and leaned against the door. “How about a few notes on the kazoo?”

He carried himself with the languid grace of old money and the assurance of someone born with an aristocratic bloodline. Just like Alexi. But as he gazed at her, she saw eyes as blue as spring hyacinths.

She curled stiff fingers around her purse. “Did you know I was in New York?”

“I knew.”

She couldn’t stand there with him any longer. “I have to go.” She gave Kissy a quick peck on the cheek and left the dressing room without so much as a nod in his direction.

Kissy caught up with her on the street. “Fleur! Wait! I had no idea.”

She faked a smile. “Don’t worry about it. It was just a shock, that’s all.”

“Michael is…He’s really a terrific guy.”

“That’s…great.” She spotted a cab and stepped out from the curb to hail it. “Go to your cast party, Magnolia, and make them all bow when you come in the room.”

“I think I’d better go home with you.”

“Not on your life. This is your big night, and you’re going to enjoy every minute.” She climbed into the cab, waved, and shut the door. As the taxi pulled away, she sagged back into the seat and let the old bitterness swamp her.

In the weeks that followed, Fleur tried to forget about Michel, but one evening she found herself walking along West Fifty-fifth Street studying the numbers painted above the shop doors, now closed for the night. She found the address she was looking for. The location was good, but the unimposing storefront had badly lit windows…and the most beautiful garments she’d ever seen.

Michel had bucked the tide of current fashion trends where women were dressing up in evening tuxedos and neckties so they could look like men. The small window held a quartet of outrageously feminine dresses that conjured up lavish Renaissance paintings. As she gazed at the silks, jerseys, and gracefully draped crepe de chine, she couldn’t remember how long it had been since she’d spent money on decent clothes. These exquisite garments rebuked her.

Spring drifted into summer and then into fall. Kissy’s theater company folded, so she joined another group that performed almost exclusively in New Jersey. Fleur celebrated her twenty-fifth birthday by making Parker give her another raise. She bought cocoa beans with it.

She lost more often than she won, but when the wins came, they came big. She studied hard to learn from her mistakes, and her initial five thousand quadrupled, then quadrupled again. The more money she made, the harder it became for her to sink it back into risky speculations, but she forced herself to keep writing out the checks. Forty thousand dollars was as useless to her as five thousand had been.

Winter settled in. She developed an enchantment with copper and made almost thirty thousand dollars in six weeks, but the stress was giving her stomach pains. Beef went up, pork fell. She kept going-investing, reinvesting, and biting her fingernails to the quick.

By the first day of June, a year and a half after she’d jumped on her financial roller-coaster, she stared at her balance sheets, hardly able to believe what she saw. She’d done it. With nothing more than sheer nerve, she’d accumulated enough to start her business. The next day, she put everything into nice, safe, thirty-day certificates of deposit at Chase Manhattan.

A few evenings later as she was letting herself into the apartment, she heard the phone ring. She stepped over a pair of Kissy’s heels, crossed the room, and picked up the receiver.

“Hello, enfant.”

It had been more than five years since she’d heard that familiar endearment. She tightened her grip on the telephone and made herself take a slow, steadying breath. “What do you want, Alexi?”

“No social amenities?”

“You have exactly one minute, and then I’m hanging up.”

He sighed, as if she’d wounded him. “Very well, chérie. I called to congratulate you on your recent financial gains. Rather foolhardy, but then one doesn’t argue with success. I understand you started looking for office space today.”

She felt a chill. “How do you know that?”

“I’ve told you, chérie. I make it my business to know everything that affects those I care about.”

“You don’t care about me,” she said, her throat tight. “Stop playing games.”

“On the contrary, I care very much about you. I’ve waited a long time for this, chérie. I hope you don’t disappoint me.”

“A long time for what? What are you talking about?”

“Guard your dream, chérie. Guard it better than I guarded mine.”