Trading Up (49 page)

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about the luggage—the stewards will take care of it and send it on to the hotel. I’m going to tell the driver to go around the Eiffel Tower. It’s a little tradition of mine,” she said, taking Janey’s arm as they walked to the Mercedes. “In any case, we’re going to have fun. Won’t it be nice to forget about our husbands for a week?” Janey laughed and nodded, thinking that this would be easier said than done.

She was perfectly willing to forget about Selden, she thought grimly, but she had no intention of allowing George to escape.

The dream began in the ocean under moonlight.

At first she could hear the splash of the foam on top of the huge gray-green waves and she felt the salty wind in her face. And then she saw that she was riding a huge dolphin, standing on its back and holding a dorsal fin that was taller than she was. She was slim and muscular and tanned, a Valkyrie from another world, the only one who could ride the magical dolphin. They were on a mission to rescue a man, but as they reached the man, they were hit by a towering wave that shot the man forward, throwing him to safety. And when the wave crashed to the shore, the girl and the dolphin were gone. With her heart breaking, Janey knew that she, the girl, was dead.

The man was carried to a tiny seaside village populated by locals and a motley yet beautiful band of young Americans. The man—he was hardly a man, really, not more than twenty-four years old—had a broken leg. Two days later, the dolphin was discovered. He was badly injured and the villagers had made a pen for him in the water, hoping he would recover. The next day, a young woman appeared in the village. It was Janey, but not the Janey who was the girl on the dolphin, but her younger sister. Not Janey’s real sister, Patty, but some kind of sister to herself. She was beautiful as well, but wondered if she could ever live up to her older sister’s heroic acts. But still, she had to try. The heroine was dead, and she had to find out what had
really
happened.

She stood on the beach, tracing a line in the sand with her toe. Her heart hurt over the injured dolphin and the dead heroine, but she had a mission to accomplish.

The young man approached, looked at her, and they instantly fell deeply in love.

The young man led her to the Kon Tikki bar. She had lonely and dangerous adventures ahead, but she wondered if she might indulge in love one last time.

Could she hold his interest? All the other young women on the island were beautiful, far more beautiful than she, but
he
wanted
her
.

She danced for him in the Kon Tikki bar. And then taking her hand, he led her away from the crowd. He was in love with her. They kissed and made love, melding together perfectly as one, losing themselves in each other and in the overwhelm-18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 263

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ingly delicious sensation of pure sex. It went on and on. He took her from every angle. She felt no fear, no anger, no insecurity, just that bright white love of complete acceptance . . .

And then she had to go. She had to complete her mission. She walked down the beach to the dolphin’s pen. She reached out her hand and the dolphin looked at her with the saddest eyes she’d ever seen . . .

With a deep cry of anguish she slowly awoke, the dolphin materializing into the hard outlines of the armoire against the wall on the other side of the room, the sea fading into the heavy red silk curtains that blocked out the daylight. For a moment, she couldn’t recall where she was or what she was doing there, but then, through a process of elimination, she remembered that she was in Paris, at the Plaza Athénée, and that she had arrived two days ago with Mimi. But emotionally, she was still in the dream. She longed to go back, to be in that place where she had a purpose, and to feel that love again . . . If only she could find that feeling in the waking world, she thought with frustration, leaning back against the down pillows.

If she could experience it just
once
in real life . . . And turning over to gaze wearily at the clock—it was 10 a.m.—she remembered that there
was
one man who might have satisfied her longings, and that man was Zizi . . .

Why hadn’t he wanted her? she wondered. And recalling the last moments of their awful encounter, it suddenly struck her that somewhere along the road of her life she might have made a wrong turn. That wrong turn was like a tree trunk, spawning a series of branches that had also become wrong paths, and yet she had trudged on, hoping that one of the paths would somehow lead her back to the right road. If only she had grabbed hold of her life at an earlier age, and taken the risks to do what she’d believed in for herself, she might never have ended up here, she thought angrily—in Paris, and married to a man who didn’t love her, or who at least didn’t love her in the way she wished to be loved. As she lay in bed, terrible memories of that embarrassing week in Mustique came flooding back, and she heard the words of Selden’s conversation with his mother as clearly as if they were in the room mocking her:

“She and her sister have problems . . .”

“Janey gets these little ideas in her head . . .”
And she put her hands over her ears, thinking she was going to scream. Somehow, she thought frantically, she would get back on the right road . . . She would get the respect she deserved . . . It was all possible, if only George would come through!

She glanced at the clock again—it read 10:10, meaning it was just past 4 a.m.

in New York and far too early to call. She’d left three messages for George in the past two days, and each time his secretary had asked her to hold on for him, only to 18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 264

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get back on the phone to inform her that, actually, George was out at a meeting and would have to call her back. So far, he had yet to do so, and now Janey was beginning to fear that he was
deliberately
avoiding her calls. If only she wasn’t in Paris! she thought with frustration. If she’d stayed in New York, she would have been able to track him down, contriving to run into him at a restaurant or even on the street.

George was a creature of habit, and she had unconsciously recorded his regular movements: Wednesdays found him lunching at Dingo’s, Thursdays at Patroon, and at five-thirty sharp three evenings a week, he went to the New York Athletic Club on Central Park South.

She willed herself to get out of bed and into the shower, adjusting the temperature to produce a cool stream of water. Jet lag was always worse on the second and third days, and she needed to be sharp. George must be made to understand that in the matter of their project, he had but one move: to sign the contracts and write the checks. And he had to know that if he thought he could put it off by shipping her to Paris, he was seriously mistaken.

The cool water took the fuzziness out of her head and, drying herself with a thick towel, she objectively examined the “George situation.” Was it possible that she had played her cards wrong? For the last month, ever since she’d broached the topic with him just after New Year’s, she’d played her hand beautifully, resisting giving him the one thing—she imagined—he
really
wanted. Thanks to her relentless (yet gentle) cajoling, he had finally given in to the idea of her producing the movie based on Craig’s book, and had even embraced its merits. Contracts were drawn up and reviewed several times by his lawyers. And then, convinced of her own desirability, and certain that sex would seal the deal, she had “given in” to him one afternoon in his office.

She had known when she’d begun pitching him the idea that ultimately it would probably come down to that, and in the beginning she’d made a cold, calculated decision that her success was more important than some false notion of virtue.

Of course, it didn’t hurt that she
did
find George attractive and amusing, and at times even entertained fantasies of what it would be like to be married to him. But it wasn’t until the act was over, and he was zipping up his pants, that she had an inkling that something had changed. He’d kissed her warmly on the cheek, but it was what he’d said afterward that had disturbed her:

“Thank you,” he’d commented, as if praising a waiter after a good meal. “That was very nice.”

“Nice?” she said in surprise, slightly hurt by his assessment. Knowing that the act would have to be memorable, she’d given him her very best blow job, sticking her index finger up his anus as she twirled her tongue over the top of his penis.

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“Okay,” he relented, sensing her disappointment. “It was very good. Will that do?”

And then he had escorted her to the door with about as much interest as he would have shown his accountant, and for one moment, she’d felt horribly guilty about Mimi . . .

“What about the contracts?” she’d asked casually, trying to pretend that nothing had happened.

“Oh, the contracts,” he said, rolling his eyes. “We’ll talk about them tomorrow.” He was holding open the door—she had no choice but to walk through. “Have a nice afternoon,” he called after her.

But he hadn’t been willing to discuss the contracts the next day, or the day after that. Oh, he still took her calls, but every time she tried to bring the subject up, he quickly changed it, and then, as if on cue, his secretary would cut in, telling him he had an important call on the other line. By the time the evening to leave for Paris had arrived, he still hadn’t signed the contracts, nor had he told her when he
would
sign them. And by then, Craig was calling daily . . .

Craig had been promised $300,000 to write the script, and another $700,000

on the day the picture commenced shooting. Janey was to receive $100,000 up front, and an additional $400,000 on the completion of the shoot. They would have eighteen months to write the screenplay and sell the movie to a studio. Naturally, George was technically a producer as well (although, as the person who had put up the money, he didn’t necessarily have to do anything) and would receive the biggest percentage of the profits. But it was all so frustrating, Janey thought, tossing the wet towel onto the bathroom floor and wrapping herself in a terry-cloth robe. Especially as all George had to do was write a check for $400,000—a pittance for him, and probably less than what Mimi was spending on her couture dresses . . .

And now, here she was, thousands of miles away from New York and George.

If she could actually see George, she had no doubts about her ability to influence his hand. If only she hadn’t played her last card, she thought, hadn’t been so sure that the game was over. Suddenly, those last fatal minutes with George played in her head like a bad movie, and she threw herself onto the counterpane, pounding the pillow in aggravation.

But she mustn’t think about it. She had to put those ten minutes out of her mind, and never think of them or speak of them ever. If she didn’t think about them, it would be like they never happened; gradually “they” would go away and no one would be the wiser. Instead, she had to focus on the project; on getting George to take her call and sign the contracts, and afterward, everything would be okay.

She glanced around the room. The ornately furnished suite, which she’d found 18947_ch01.qxd 4/14/03 11:24 PM Page 266

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charming at first with its decorative eighteenth-century furnishings, suddenly seemed to be closing in on her, and it occurred to her that a walk and some fresh air might give her a better perspective. She brushed her hair and powdered her face, then slipped on a pair of Versace slacks with a silky wrap top. She threw a matching coat over her shoulders and picked up her purse, preparing to venture out into the city she detested.

“Pardonnez-moi,”
she said, leaning toward the attractive balding Frenchman standing behind the concierge’s desk.
“Est qu’il y a un message pour moi?”
she asked in her broken, badly accented French. Passing the desk, she’d decided to stop and inquire if she had any messages—after all, it was entirely possible that George had called her during the night but hadn’t wanted to disturb her.

“
Oui,
madame,” the concierge said smoothly, as Janey wondered why it was that in France, bald men always managed to look elegant, while in America they all looked like Bruce Willis. “I believe there
is
one for you.” It was all
fine
then, she thought with relief, eagerly tearing the envelope open in anticipation. But it was only a message from Mimi, asking Janey to meet her at Christian Dior at one.

Her first reaction was anger and disappointment, and seeing her expression, the concierge inquired, “Is everything all right, madame?”
No, it’s not,
Janey nearly snapped, but caught herself in time. She couldn’t let her fear get the better of her, for if George sensed it, he would be certain to drag out the process of signing the contracts even longer . . .

“C’est d’accord,”
Janey said to the concierge, smiling. George was a tough businessman, she reminded herself; he was probably playing a game with her to find out how tough
she
could be. Well, she thought, glancing at her watch, he was about to discover she could be very tough indeed . . .

She still had a good hour and a half before she had to meet Mimi; in the meantime, she would visit that cosmetics shop and pick up a few extra tubes of her favorite lipstick, Pussy Pink. Signaling to one of the taxis lined up in front of the hotel, she decided that she might not even call George that day, or the next, or the day after that. Knowing that she was with Mimi and not hearing from her for a few days was bound to make him at least a little nervous . . .

She took the taxi to the boulevard Saint-Germain on the Left Bank. The sights of the city were as familiar to her as if she’d never left fifteen years ago, from the mad traffic on the boulevard that ran from the Hotel Crillon, past the Tuileries and across the Seine, to the quaint little shops on the boulevard Saint-Germain. Spotting the place she was looking for, she motioned for the taxi driver to stop.