Succubus in the City (33 page)

After we left the conference room, Danielle cornered me in the corridor. “What do you think of this Mr. Carroll? Why do we need him? I have heard stories…and I think they are planning to take over our departments and put us under Fashion.”

I smiled. “Don’t be paranoid,” I said, mostly because I was fine with a lighter month. And I had the big shawl issue. “He only cares about the Fashion department and I’ll bet he won’t even notice us. Besides, he’ll be too wrapped up in his white shirt project for a while so that you can plan something really killer—maybe even a cover article. You know, I just heard about something that I bet you could run with. Don’t tell them. But anyway, I’ve heard a number of women buy high-end shoes, Manolos, Jimmy Choos, the best, wear them for a season or so, and then resell them on eBay. There’s a whole secondary market out there, and it means that the women who can’t really afford a full wardrobe of high-end shoes can still indulge, knowing that they’ll recoup at least half or more of their investment. And we can coordinate that with something I’ve been toying with. Did you know there are purse-renting clubs?”

“No!” Danielle’s eyes went as wide as a kid’s on Christmas morning.

I nodded. “I don’t know all the particulars, but it would be easy enough to find out for an article. The women join, pay a fee, and they get a high-end bag for a month. Chanel, Gucci, Hermès, Prada, Dior, things they could never afford. The very latest styles, and they pay only a tenth of the price. Or something like that.”

“And they get the bag for a month?” she asked, not quite sure I wasn’t teasing.

“That’s what I’ve heard. But with reselling high-end shoes and renting designer purses, we could take over an entire issue and show that the best is not only for the wealthiest. To show how fashion-conscious women who don’t have a trust fund can still dress on a budget.”

“You think Amanda will go for it?” Danielle asked, skeptical. “I don’t think our advertisers and designers would be thrilled with our telling our readers how to get their products secondhand.”

I shrugged. “We’ll see. But you’ve got to admit, it’s the kind of thing
Trend
is all about. How normal women can have high-fashion looks. It’s on our masthead.”

We had now passed the ladies’ room and the reception desk and were at the end of the hall where our offices were located. “How long have you been thinking about this?” she asked me when we got to my office door.

I shrugged. “A while, just a little bit,” I admitted. “I saw something about it online. You could probably take a quick look on eBay and see if there’s any truth to the resale thing. I didn’t actually do any research, I just thought it was an intriguing idea.”

“I wouldn’t want to wear shoes someone else had worn,” Danielle said with a delicate shiver.

“I wouldn’t rent a purse, either,” I agreed. “But clearly, people do. That’s worth some ink.”

I ducked back into my office for the first time of the day, threw my coat onto the hook behind the door, and slumped into my chair. Danielle, no doubt, was perusing eBay entirely for the sake of an article. I didn’t even turn on my computer. I’d just rest my eyes for a minute.

Hours passed as I blissfully dozed, no one the wiser. Until the phone rang and startled me back awake.

It was Sybil.

“Lily, have you talked to Vincent since you got home?” she asked without preamble.

“No, not really. I figured you would talk to him before me,” I told her groggily. I wasn’t really all that functional, and had used up at least a week’s worth of creative ideas with Danielle.

“You didn’t tell him anything about Aruba, about the guys I hung with?” Her voice held suspicion.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said firmly. “I have said maybe five words to Vincent since I came back, and they were mostly things like ‘I need a cab’ and ‘Where’s my mail?’ He’s my doorman, and he’s been a good doorman and that’s the only conversation we’ve had. Why?”

“Because he’s not talking to me,” she sobbed. “He’s not taking my calls. I’ve called his cell phone three times and all I get is voice mail and he used to always pick up for me before we went away. And he hasn’t called back and he always used to call back immediately if I did leave voice mail. Which mostly I didn’t have to. And we had a fight last night.”

“Sybil, have you talked to Eros? Eros would tell you not to call,” I said. Really, I was too tired for this. And since I wasn’t all that good at following Eros’s advice myself, I felt like a hypocrite suggesting it to someone else. Satan loves hypocrites.

But Eros was right. Right right right.

“Can I come over tonight to see you and maybe then I could run into him?” Her voice was so plaintive that I felt dreadful, but I had to say no.

“I’ve got a date tonight with Nathan,” I told her. “I’m not even going to have time to get home after work. I’m going straight to meet him from here.”

She just broke down sobbing on the phone. “It wasn’t worth it. Those guys in Aruba, they were fun, but it wasn’t worth losing Vincent.”

“There’s no reason to think you’ve lost Vincent,” I interrupted. “And there’s no reason to think that he knows anything about Aruba anyway. I certainly didn’t tell him and I wouldn’t. And Desi or Eros wouldn’t either, and neither of them have been over since we got back. So they haven’t talked to him here, that’s for sure. You know, Sybil, it could be some other thing. He could be studying for an exam. You know how he’s been taking extra courses and really working to advance. Or maybe he’s got something else on his mind. You really don’t know all that much about him.”

“You think so?” An edge of hope sounded through the tears.

“I think it’s reasonable,” I told her. “We really don’t know much about him, and there’s no reason to think that he’s found out anything about Aruba, or that he’d care if he did. He’s a demon, not a human.”

“Demons get jealous. There are demons who specialize in jealousy,” Sybil sniffed into the phone.

“Yes, true, but we don’t know what kind of demon Vincent will become yet. He hasn’t even finished all the introductory classes, let alone begun to specialize. And at least he’s good enough that he’s doing that. He’s ambitious. He isn’t just some demon slug who’s satisfied being my doorman for the next fifty years or so. It’ll be okay, really, Syb, I think it’ll be okay. Just give him a little time, you know. And remember what Eros always says. Let him have to work for you a little more. Let him have to make the effort. They don’t value what they have too easily.”

“I know that,” Sybil said. “Thanks, Lily. I mean, I’m still feeling pretty freaky. Are you home tomorrow? Can I come by tomorrow if I need to talk about it more?”

“And have an excuse to run into Vincent? I don’t think that’s such a good idea.” I said. “Let’s go to dinner at Ono instead, and you can tell me everything and we can figure it out. I think you need to stay away from him for a little while and let him stew. But wait, I’ve got a question for you. You’re an Oracle. What do you know about the Akashic?”

“I don’t know much more than anybody knows,” she said cautiously.

“Well, here’s my question. When I came home I got an e-mail from Azoked and she says that Marten targeted me in particular, that he’s a ceremonial magician and he thinks that I owe him a favor for telling Craig Branford the truth. That he’d slept with me and was still alive. Which means that he knows more about the rules than the Burning Men.”

Sybil laughed, but it was a tight, frightened laugh. “Ceremonialists tend to be pretty intellectual and scholarly in their magic. They do a lot of research. I think they get caught up in the trivia a lot of times, but they do do their homework. Burning Men? They’re fanatics and ignorant and proud of it. They’ve decided what the truth is before they’ve ever met a fact, and they’re not going to let reality get in the way of their assumptions. The stupider the better. And the Burning Men hate ceremonial magicians almost as much as they hate us. They assume that all magicians of any stripe, include the hippie pagans, are in league with us and do our bidding.”

“Wouldn’t that be great if it were true?” I mused. Wiccans do not help Hell. Nor do magicians, alchemists, psychics, or other dabblers in the arcane arts. Once in a great while we make a working convert, but that’s so rare as to be historical. Last time might have been three centuries or more back.

But that meant that the Knight Defenders had not set Marten on me. Either he had come looking for his own reasons, or he hadn’t known when he first met me but had figured out what I was. I didn’t know how he could have done that, but I’m not all that conversant with ceremonial magic. Maybe they had ways of knowing.

“But the Akashic.” I returned to my original line of inquiry. “Could Azoked have known in advance? Could she have told me when she showed up at Margit’s?”

“I don’t know,” Sybil said carefully. “My own oracular gift is from Apollo and has nothing to do with the Records. I know that some ceremonial magicians and cabbalists do try to access the Akashic, but I don’t know how successful they are. My impression is that it’s a fairly difficult undertaking for a mortal. But what a librarian could get to, and how quickly, I have absolutely no idea. But you know, Lily, if you’re asking whether Azoked is enough of a bitch to know something useful like that and hold out, she is.”

“Thanks, Sybil,” I said. “That’s helpful. I might want you to talk about this some more when we have dinner.”

“Then it’s a date,” she said. “I’ll see you at Ono at eight.”

“Sounds good,” I told her, and hung up. And felt somewhat better. Just knowing that I would see Sybil and not spend the night alone after seeing Nathan, no matter how it went, was reassuring.

It was too late for lunch. I went downstairs and picked up two lattes with double espresso and two scones. How did we live before coffee? Imported Chinese tea had seemed so helpful in the court of James I, but thinking back the stuff did not even come close to a good French roast. Right at the moment coffee was my best friend. I was still so tired that I was afraid that Nathan would be sick of me or leave me off halfway through the evening. Two huge servings of tasty natural speed were going to take care of that. I hoped.

I managed to get through the afternoon somehow, answering my phone and my e-mails and even choosing accessories for our regular feature page for July and final photos for the page for May. Then I felt very productive for someone functioning with only half her brain intact, so I took two hours of sick time, lied and said that I had a doctor’s appointment and went home at four. I fell asleep as soon as I saw my bed, and I’m only glad that I didn’t sleep through the second alarm.

Two hours’ sleep is a wonderful thing. I wasn’t entirely refreshed, but I was feeling much better. No circles under my eyes, no yawning, and I could even think of snarky things to say about postmodern art if I needed them.

A long hot shower also helped, and by the time I was in my lingerie and pulling wardrobe pieces out of my dresser and closet and discarding them on the bed I was feeling almost like myself. All black always works for an art opening, especially in Chelsea.

We were meeting at the gallery at seven thirty. So I studied myself one more time in the mirror, added heavier eyeliner because loads of black eyeliner always looks “artsy” (and goes with fatigue), kept the rest of the look very neutral and declared victory.

Chelsea is on the West Side, north of the Village. The West upper teens and twenties used to be industrial and warehouse areas and are full of chic, sophisticated lofts that once upon a time housed sweatshops and vast department stores. I remembered the days when I would go down to Seventeenth and Sixth and walk up the great avenue, stopping in the great ornate shops that lined the street.

Then the department stores moved up to Herald Square and Chelsea fell on hard times for a few decades. Now it has been reborn as the new SoHo, since the real SoHo has become way too expensive for not only the artists but for the galleries that represent them. Now SoHo has become the trendier satellite to the Upper East Side, and the actual art has moved to Chelsea.

The gallery was on a side street but the building was old and ornamented, the granite face carved with Egypto-Deco motifs, simplified lotuses and sphinxes and heads that were supposed to look vaguely pharaoh-like. As Babylon and Egypt were the leading rival great powers of their day, I felt vaguely threatened and very much at home. Inside, the gallery space was new and glistening with blond bamboo floors (so very eco-conscious), the white moveable walls required of any art space, and the requisite industrial ceiling with suspended utilities and lights. Just like every other gallery I’d seen in the past twenty years or so. Ho hum.

Nathan was standing near the drinks table in an animated conversation with three very well-dressed urbanites. I walked over and waited until he turned around. “Lily,” he said, his whole face lighting up with a smile. “Come on over and meet my friends.”

I covered the few steps and Nathan presented me with a glass of tolerable white wine before introducing me to his friends. “Everyone, this is Lily. She’s a magazine editor. Lily, this is Shula Samuels, the artist. We went to college together, and would you believe back then she was a French major? Now she’s starting to get attention from collectors and has started teaching at Cooper Union.”

I muttered something complimentary about the work.

“And this is her boyfriend, Greg, who does something with finance, and the disreputable-looking guy with the red wine is Jonathan Fields, my college roommate.”

I said hello to all of them and then stood quietly as they gossiped about people I’d never met and exchanged memories from days gone by. I hadn’t expected a “meet the friends” date so soon. And I was sure that afterward he would care a lot about what they said about me. I tried to pay special attention to Shula, because I had no doubt that he would listen to her judgment of me.

“I would like to take a little time to look at the paintings alone, if you don’t mind.” I excused myself gracefully from what was rapidly becoming an awkward situation. “I really like to have some personal space to interact with art privately the first time I look seriously.”