by Amelia Wilde
“I could buy it from you,” I say, which suddenly seems like the best idea. “It would be my personal library, so it follows the rules of the trust fund. And I’d give you whatever you paid for it. More, even. So it would still make money for you.”
“That’s assuming I would sell it to you,” he says, almost gently now. That’s what’s different about him. There’s no derision in his expression. Less coldness in his voice. He’s almost, almost human. And he sounds apologetic, as if he wished he didn’t have to disappoint me.
“I’m not going to beg.” Mostly because I know it won’t do any good with him. I’ve already tried that, when I was far more desperate than I am now.
“I’m not selling it, for many reasons. The location of the library was calculated based on many different factors. We won’t find another place ripe for gentrification like this one.”
“Why do you care so much about gentrification?”
“Because it’s going to make me a rich man.”
“If you had two million dollars to put into it, you’re already a rich man.”
“One million,” he says. “Sutton put in the other half. And a million dollars doesn’t make you a rich man in this economy. There’s more in the trust to maintain the damn yacht.”
“Good Lord. How much does it cost to wax the deck?”
Christopher gives me a half smile that looks so much like him as a college boy that my heart skips a beat. “That depends on how shiny you want it.”
“The library is a monument to knowledge and community and the irrepressible spirit of mankind. You can’t just tear it down and build a mall.”
“Malls are irrepressible. And profitable.”
There’s no way I can save the library. Failure makes my chest feel tight, which isn’t a totally new feeling. Especially when I’m in Christopher’s presence. Why do I always feel crushed when he walks away? And why do I keep seeking him out, even though I know how it will end?
I can’t save the library, but the worst part is I’m not sure I can save the mall project either. We would have to convince the historical society to let us build it.
Another cocktail appears in front of me, sent by the too-knowing Penny with sympathetic brown eyes. I take a large swallow of my cocktail, enough that even this top-shelf liquor makes my throat burn.
“You can use the office,” Christopher says. “Invite them over and show them the plans. I don’t mind letting them see, but I’m not going to change a damn thing.”
“There’s the spirit of compromise and community that will endear you to them.”
Penny shines a perfectly clean glass with a rag, managing to look conspicuous as she does it. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but I’ve met some of the women in the historical society.”
“Are you friends with them?” I ask hopefully.
“I wouldn’t go that far, but I like to think I know how they operate. And if you bring them into a boardroom and show them documents that are already drafted, they’re going to say no.”
“That’s what I’m thinking, too. And the worst part is I don’t totally disagree with them. It’s a gorgeous building. It should be lovingly restored, not torn down for the land.”
Christopher gives me a dire look. “And Sutton asks why I don’t think it’s a good idea, you being our liaison with them. Maybe because you’re not on our side.”
“I’m not on anyone’s side,” I tell him, annoyed. “I’m on my own side. There’s only me on this side. You and Sutton, you’re not invited.”
A smile plays on Penny’s lips. “Did you hear about the show that’s come to the Grand? It’s sold out on Broadway, with limited tour dates, so it’s a coup that we got a stop. One night only. Tomorrow night.”
The implications run through me like warm water. Mrs. Rosemont may have asked to hear details about the project, but it won’t help to show them to her. Those councilmen that are holding the permits in perpetual review? They’ll nix them for good. “So everyone will be there. Can we get tickets?”
“It’s been sold out for weeks. Damon and I have been looking forward to it since we heard. And I happen to have a couple of extra seats in my box.” She glances sideways where Sutton sits, watching us now with an unreadable expression. “Only two, but we know the owners of the theater. They’ll let us add another chair to the box.”
“Thank you so much,” I say, clapping. “This will be perfect.”
Christopher sounds droll. “I don’t suppose you’d accept money in exchange for the seats.”
She laughs. “Of course not. You’ll owe us a big favor, because if there’s one thing Damon Scott loves collecting more than information, it’s favors.”
24
Gold Standard
“He has friends,” I tell Avery, on my bed and staring up at the chandelier hanging from the ceiling. I took a cab back to L’Etoile, refusing to let either Sutton or Christopher bring me home.
“He’s probably had friends before.”
“I don’t know.” I remember how he looked bent over his textbook, forlorn and serious and determined. “He may have given his textbooks names and had whole conversations with them.”
“You just never lived in the same city as him,” she says.
“Did you know about this Thieves Club? That’s what they call themselves, Sutton and Christopher and Hugo. And this man whose name is Blue, like the color.”
“Because they steal jewels from the bank?”
“That’s what I asked!” This is why talking to Avery grounds me. She understands me like no one else. Besides she asked for the scoop, which is only fair since she gave me the tip about going to the Den. “Apparently it’s because every dollar they earn is one taken from someone else and money is finite or something.”
“Hmm,” she says. “So he has friends and you met them. Does that mean he’s human now, instead of a big symbolic version of your dad you can hate?”
“Don’t psychoanalyze me,” I say in a singsong voice. “Two can play at that game and you sold your virginity in a public auction, so you’re always going to be weirder.”
That earns me a laugh. “So you’re going to the theater tomorrow.”
“And I still have no idea what I’m going to say to Mrs. Rosemont. Hey, the library is a gorgeous piece of history. Can we have your blessing to burn it down?”
“Burning it seems inefficient. Won’t there just be a wrecking ball or bulldozer or something?”
“In my head it’s going to be burned like the libraries at Alexandria. And then Christopher will fire me. And Sutton will spank me. And my mom probably won’t even do the experimental treatment even if I can get the hospital to let her in after this.”
“There will be other libraries,” she says gently.
I swallow down the acid that threatens to come up, ruining the pretty lace bedspread. “You’re right. The treatment is the most important thing.”
This reminder could not be more important. The treatment is more important than making Christopher Bardot jealous. More important than seeing if Sutton Mayfair can be the man who might actually replace him in my heart. More important than the library and painting and anything else in the world. That’s the kind of focus that gets things done.
It’s the kind of focus that’s kept me alive in the cold years since the will reading. Having some goal set for me, however impossible it seemed. Making a living for Mom while going to college. Finding some peace despite the mockery the media made of us.
The butterfly garden was a natural extension of everything that came before. Useful and elaborate and slightly over the top.
There will be other libraries. “Is this how men feel when they sell their morals?”
“It’s how I felt,” she says, and I know she’s thinking of her time at the Den.
“I’m sorry. I wish you’d have come to me then.” She’s able to laugh about it now, mostly because that’s how she found Gabriel Miller. It was terrible at the time.
“And I wi
sh you would fly to the Emerald right now instead of going there tomorrow. We can eat popcorn and watch Mean Girls and talk about how boys suck. And then you can tell me about Sutton spanking you, which I did not overlook by the way.”
“There was possibly a thing with a dusty old book.”
“Oh my God.”
“And a library counter.”
“So you guys are officially… you know. Doing it.”
“We’ve done some things,” I say, as breezy as if I’ve done every single thing on the sexual menu. Repeatedly. “Not all of them. He’s very skilled with his hands. And his mouth.”
Avery doesn’t precisely know that I’m a virgin.
She thinks I’ve had sex because she knows I go into bedrooms with frat boys and let them hang socks on the door, so it’s a reasonable assumption. But I’ve perfected the art of listening to their troubles and keeping all my clothes on. I’ve also perfected the art of a hard kick to the balls in case one of them gets particularly persuasive.
Like I told Sutton, I don’t think one particular act matters that much. I never thought I was saving it for marriage, but in my head, when I touch myself at night, it was always a dark head of hair and black eyes that looked down on me. Always the same.
No matter how much I hated him, Christopher was always the gold standard.
“He’s fun to play with while I’m in town,” I say, still casual, because I’d like to have casual virginity-removing sex with Sutton. Then I can stop the stupidity of imagining Christopher being my first. “Not anything serious.”
“Oh my God, Harper.” She sounds scandalized. “Two men?”
“No,” I correct sharply. “There’s only one man. Even that is temporary.”
Temporary, the word my mother used to describe my father’s wives. And her husbands.
Nothing lasts forever.
“Two men,” Avery says, insistent. “There’s always been something between you and Christopher. Mostly you two have never stayed in the same city long enough to do anything about it. And now he’s seeing you with his business partner…”
Seeing me with my dress up around my waist, my sex exposed in the hallway while his business partner licks my pussy. “Nothing is going to happen.”
“But call me when it does.”
“I’m literally never going to call you again, because nothing is going to happen.”
“Okay,” she says, not believing me for a second. “Talk to you tomorrow.”
I hang up with an exasperated smile, tossing the phone onto the nightstand. I’m feeling a little punchy without any of my supplies with me, but I don’t want to make a trip to the art store.
For one thing I don’t think the concierge would take kindly to me splashing oil-based paint all over their antique furniture and old wallpaper. I also don’t want to imply, even to myself, that I’ll be staying in Tanglewood for longer than a few days. I’ll sort out the issue with the Tanglewood Historical Society and be back in LA with my mother and her new treatment and my brushes.
The only thing of interest in the hotel room is the book on Cleopatra, which is more interesting than the cover could possibly imply. There’s intrigue in here about her life, going beyond her experiences with Julius and Antony. Chapters and chapters from before she was ever a glint in their eyes. The making of a powerful woman, through the only means available to her.
Those men, who wanted her for her body. And her mind?
Did they think they were in love with her?
She was more than a pretty face to them, this much we know. They used her, and she used them back. And in the end she outlasted them both, so maybe that’s the moral of the story.
It ended in tragedy for all three of them, though.
Maybe that’s the true moral of the story.
25
My Father’s Daughter
The Grand fits its name with a gorgeous fountain in the front and ornate carving along the front that’s been lovingly repaired with plaster. Old trees surround the property like an embrace. A thick red carpet covers the cobblestone close to the entrance.
“See?” I tell Sutton, who looks ridiculously handsome in a suit. “This is how you treat a place with history. You don’t blow it up into a million pieces.”
“We aren’t going to blow up the library,” he says, that rough voice underlaid with amusement. “And besides, I don’t think this is the example we should follow. The Grand used to be a strip club.”
Through an arched doorway I can see gilded wood box seats and a wide stage. “And you know this by rumor only, I’m sure. It’s not that you would have gone to a strip club yourself.”
He laughs in a fully masculine way that does not confirm or deny anything. “I work with the construction company that did some of the restoration.”
It’s almost impossible to believe that this place was anything but a theater. It’s cleaner and more elegant than some of the theaters I’ve been to on Broadway, which maybe isn’t saying much. “Some businesspeople clearly value culture.”
“Ivan Tabakov values beautiful women,” Sutton says. “Especially the beautiful woman he married, who was herself a stripper until they converted it to a theater. Or back to a theater, I should say, since that’s how it started.”
“That’s what the mall would be,” I say, quiet so only he can hear.
“A strip club?”
“I’m not judging the women who worked here, but there’s a reason they converted it back. Because desperation and money and sex are not the answer.”
“Hey,” he says, laughing silently. “Leave sex out of this.”
I look at the ceiling, at the dark wood beams and the faded pink textured wallpaper. They’re original to this place; I can feel it in my bones. “I’m not bashing malls or strip clubs,” I say, still looking up. “I’m not even bashing money, but it’s a problem when you have to destroy something beautiful to have them.”
When I glance back at Sutton, his expression is grave. “What other beautiful things have you seen destroyed?” he asks softly.
I don’t answer him, but I think he already knows. My mother’s dignity. My own innocence. The better question is, what beautiful things does money not destroy? It touches everything with its dirty hands, marking us, leaving us weaker than before.
“There they are,” he murmurs, nodding toward a box to the right of the stage.
It’s the one with the best view, of course. The best view of both the stage and the rest of the theater. Seats fit for royalty. Penny transformed from a bartender in a crisp white button-down to a gorgeous asymmetrical lilac gown of different textures. The man beside her must be Damon Scott, the angles of his face severe as he surveys the crowd.
And beside them is Christopher, murmuring softly to Damon. Probably making a backroom deal. That’s why men come to these things, isn’t it? It’s an excuse to do business.
Of course I can’t blame the gender, since that’s why I’m here.
“Wait,” I say, when Sutton moves to escort me toward the stairs. Half the seats are full with people settled in, chatting and flipping through the program. The other half of the seats are still empty, waiting for the people who are milling around or still out with their glasses of champagne.
It takes a few minutes, but finally I spot Mrs. Rosemont when she turns to glance up at the balcony. She’s sitting with an older man who I’m guessing is her husband. They have seats right up front. Not quite as glamorous as the box seats, but definitely expensive.
Sutton gives me a curious look but lets me lead us down the row toward them. Maybe he thinks I’m going to sit down and have a chat with her about the library in the ten minutes before the curtain rises, but I’m about two percent more subtle than that. Instead I stand in the aisle, half turned away, flipping through the program they gave us at the door.
Finally the couple beside the Rosemonts stands and makes their way to the exit, probably taking a potty break so they don’t have to stand in a monumentally long line d
uring intermission.
“Excuse me,” I say when they reach us, sounding nervous and flushed, which isn’t that difficult since I’m trembling. “I know this is forward of me, but my brother’s in the show tonight.”
I spin a story of my brother, the understudy, who’s been part of the cast since they started touring. But this will be his first show. They gave us seats, of course, but they’re all the way up in the boxes. I want him to be able to see me when he looks out at the audience. There are little touches I pulled from the program—a name of an understudy and the part he’ll play.
The woman looks only a few years older than me, and not particularly pleased at the idea of switching seats. She seems the suspicious sort, which is reasonable considering I’m conning them. It’s when the husband sees exactly which box they’d be in that things change.
“Is that Damon Scott?” he says, trying to hide his excitement.
“Oh, he’s very kind. He’s the one who gave us the seats. But my brother will be disappointed if he can’t see me in the audience. I promised to wave at him.”
So that’s how we end up sitting next to the Rosemonts.
I can feel Sutton shaking with laughter beside me, but he manages to hold any words inside. “You hired me to do a job,” I tell him under my breath. “I’m doing a job.”
“I have no complaints,” he murmurs, his hand finding mine.
I let him hold my hand because that’s the part we’re playing for Tanglewood society right now. Not because it feels warm and comforting for him to rest my palm against his. Not because it’s strangely sensual for him to rub his thumb along the outer edge of my hand.
The lights dim without me exchanging a single word with Mrs. Rosemont. We watch the show, which I fully intend to enjoy since I haven’t seen it yet. The rave reviews are fully deserved, and I’m laughing and gasping along with the rest of the audience.
She notices me first during intermission, but I’m careful not to look her way. I feel her think about saying something to me two different times. Didn’t we meet at the gala? she would ask.