“This is a huge opportunity for me. Once the curtain opens, my job is done, and I’ll be ready to push my resume on producers and directors here. Kara, I want to be able to hold my head up high. I want you to be proud of me, to be able to introduce me as a choreographer or performer with some real credentials. It would kill me to have people think I’m just some showgirl you picked up in Vegas.”
“Like my dad will say to everyone who’ll listen to him?”
“I don’t think you care too much about what he says.”
“I care if he’s saying trash about you!” She tried to stand and was forced to accept Madeleine’s help.
“Easy, honey. Where would you like to go?”
“The boxing club! I want to beat the shit out of something.”
“Okay…” Madeleine looked around the roof terrace in a panic. Finally, she led Kara to the garden sofa and helped her sit. Once she was comfortable, she snuggled in beside her. “I think your dad already got your point. And as for beating the shit out of something, you’ve already done a pretty good job on yourself. Don’t you think?”
Kara nodded, then changed the subject, far too stubborn to admit she was right. “Honey, eh? I like that. Never thought I would like endearments like that.”
Madeleine wrapped an arm around her shoulders. How is it this woman could have so much love to give and have experienced so little of it herself? “You are a wonder, Kara Wexler. No matter what the future brings, I love you. I never imagined it could be like this. All I can hope is that you feel even just a smidge of what I feel.”
Kara turned her head as best she could, delivering a smoldering kiss. Then she said, “You know what they say, still waters run deep. I do love you. I don’t know how that happened and… It’s just that I love you and I want to know you. I want to learn about you. I want to share things with you. And I want you to flourish. Go to New York and yes I’ll write every day. On some days we can text and others I’ll go all Jane Austen on you. So now I’m going to have to send Harjitt on a snipe hunt for handmade paper and sealing wax, and I’ll need a seal for the envelope. Any suggestions?”
She giggled at Kara’s silly attempt at romance. “Can you see the postman’s face?”
“I can, but I’d rather focus on yours.”
Madeleine snuggled in as close as she dared, laying her head against Kara’s. “Me too, honey, me too.”
Chapter Twenty
Madeleine was so deep in thought, she almost missed her stop. Following the other passengers, she climbed the stairs from the subway station, heading for the Joyce Theatre. Today she would start work with the primaries. She’d been promised they were better prepared than the dancers had been. They were already a month behind. Most of the dancers who had been pre-hired before she arrived she’d had to let go. They were young and more interested in celebrating their new gig than actually preparing for it. The routines she had designed were complicated, but no more than any Vegas show, and nothing the average showgirl couldn’t master in an afternoon. Luckily for her the producers and the director knew that and supported her position. New auditions had taken up weeks and had been a worry she discussed with Kara more than once. But there was no advantage to letting lesser performers make a half-assed attempt. Yes, this was an opportunity worth celebrating…for a day or two. Now was the time to settle down and focus. Her dancers needed to commit, and she smiled as she entered the theatre. They knew this was her first big gig as a choreographer. Now they also knew she was a serious artist and wouldn’t put up with second-best or good enough.
* * *
Kara had just finished another virtual board meeting when she received Madeleine’s text: “Primaries arrived fresh and ready to work. You were right. They are ready to listen and work hard. What a difference!”
Kara replied, “It’s not like millennials can’t work hard, they just don’t know they need to.”
“TY Honey, 4 listening last night. I was worried about today, but these guys are amazing—real pros.”
“Pls tell me they’re treating you with respect?”
“You were right about that 2. And Dame Anderson may be in her 50s but holy cow!!!! That lady can dance!”
“;-)”
“U!”
“Off to wrangle the Interns now. Want to switch jobs?”
“NOYL :) Luv U”
“I love you too. Talk tonight?”
“Y :)”
Kara slid her phone into her suit jacket and headed for the social media war room. What she had been calling the atrium meeting room was now overflowing with millennials, tech, and pizza. All of which were producing remarkable results. Once she delivered her daily update and inspiration to the crew, she moved on to the creatives, spending most of the morning working out the design and focus of their newest campaign. Her afternoon too was already committed to interviewing for new positions. She needed a Facebook specialist with some real experience and not just for Facebook. She needed to conquer Twitter and half a dozen other social media platforms that would appeal to the target audience of various ad campaigns. It was important she got this right, and fast. She had a board to satisfy and clients to please.
This morning she had briefed the board, but for some reason they seemed a little cold, even disdainful. She assumed the combination of having this online meeting experience foisted on them and the added work of having to attend monthly meetings, even just virtually, felt burdensome when her father had been satisfied to catch them up just once a year. She didn’t care. Annual meetings were inefficient and impractical in this day and age. Her job wasn’t to make them comfortable. It was to make them money, and that was her plan. After her rowing accident, she’d been limited to working only half days her first week back. She had spent all her spare time then and since reading reports: financial, business planning, even employee pension assessments. With the numbers now engraved in her head, she was sure she could double profits this year and raise the bar even higher for the next.
It was after seven when she finally took the big service elevator to her apartment, walking in to find the kitchen bristling with activity. Finding Joanne, Samantha, and her mom waiting was not a good sign. In the four months since hurting her back, she had recovered well but still felt a little stiff after a long day. The smaller kitchen table was set for dinner and was loaded with food. Joanne, forever the happy hostess, held out her favorite hard drink, a Labrador Tea. Suspicious and a wee bit worried, she accepted the highball. “I have a feeling this is going to be really good or really bad.”
“Girls, let’s sit and have supper. We can talk once Kara’s had a chance to relax a bit. Now sweetheart, why don’t you come sit over here with me? You know, I was just telling Samantha I think it’s time to update these kitchen furnishings. Perhaps something a little more playful—”
“Mom, what’s going on?” Not often, but sometimes she could prattle on as much as Joanne. But she hadn’t heard her mom talk like this in years. The last time she was this unreservedly garrulous she was trying to explain that she and their father were divorcing.
Samantha, never as patient as Kara, clarified the news for her. “Zack spilled the beans to your father. We don’t know if he’ll do anything…”
“Too late,” Kara admitted with a sigh, closing her eyes as she recalled and reassessed the attitude of the board that morning. Flopping back in her chair, she finally opened her eyes to see the worry on their faces and something more. “Joanne, stop. This isn’t your fault.”
“I know, but I feel like it is. I don’t know what’s wrong with him sometimes. He said he didn’t mean to and he’s sorry if that means anything.”
“It would if it came from him.”
Joanne looked prepared to take all the heat, and it was enough to stop Kara from blowtorching her. Trying to remain reasonable, she said, “It was always a matter of time. I knew that coming home. Although to be fair, my worry was with Madeleine first, then Zack. And don’t take that personally, Jo. Zack’s just young,
and he’s loyal. Plainly that loyalty is to the old man, but he’s loyal.”
Moving closer and wrapping her arm around Kara’s shoulders, her mother asked, “Should I call the board? Maybe if I explain…”
“No way. Sorry Mom, I know you’re just trying to help, but I will not have my mommy on the phone trying to apologize for something I will not apologize for.”
“And Madeleine?” her mother asked. “You’re not going to…”
“To what? Dump her over this? No Mom. No worries there.”
“What will you do?” she asked, her voice thick with concern. “You haven’t been this happy since…since I don’t know when.”
Kara nodded, thinking this through from every angle she could quickly come up with. “Wait. Maybe you should make some calls to the board but not a conference call. Mom, would you mind taking a quick trip to Montreal and then perhaps West Palm Beach?”
Understanding her implied agenda, her mother agreed wholeheartedly. “You know, I haven’t seen Richard Sinclair in years. It’s about time I drop in for tea, and while I’m in Montreal I should drop in on Tom too. I understand his sweet niece is at his side day and night. I can spot that girl for an afternoon and let her have some down time with her friends. And after that I should fly down to Florida…”
“I think that will do it, Mom.”
“But darling, what about Corine Rusk? You know she’s the inside leader of the board. I mean, if Corine approves, the rest will too, but if she’s bothered…”
“Oh she’s bothered all right, but I think this is one I need to sway myself.” She crossed her arms defiantly but inside she was smiling. If her father thought he could play dirty he had it all wrong. Madeleine wasn’t a weak point he could exploit. She was the very thing that gave Kara the strength to lead and she would defend her at all costs. “Jo, can you book me a flight to New York? I think it’s time I introduce Madeleine to the real power behind Wexler-Ogelthorpe.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Kara cursed United Airlines as she ran the length of the terminal to catch her flight. The terminal had to be more than a mile long and while they kept announcing her name and urging her to board immediately, she couldn’t run any faster. By the time she was down the jetway, the other passengers were on board and seated. They gave her the collective stink eye to let her know they’d been inconvenienced for all of thirty seconds. Rolling her eyes and still trying to catch her breath, she dropped into her business class seat and let the flight attendant figure out where to stow her bag.
While the aircraft pushed back, she found her belt and listened to the emergency procedures briefing. She did enjoy the quick flight on the regional jet. It was fast and quiet, and unlike the Airbus or Boeing 737 sometimes used on this route, the smaller load made getting off and through customs much faster.
When they reached cruise altitude, she ordered a drink. Harjitt was picking her up, so drinking and driving weren’t an issue. The flight was short. Maybe she should order two drinks? Two, three, ten. No amount of alcohol would help. Madeleine wasn’t coming home. She had found her place in New York and more, she had found the kind of personal attention more suited to a straight woman: a handsome leading man. Madeleine had assured her it wasn’t like it looked. They were friends and enjoyed hanging out, not that they had a lot of time with their rehearsal schedule. Kara, sitting in on the full rehearsal, caught the obvious and almost choked. When the leading lady faltered, Madeleine had stepped in, demonstrating the sultry main number, in the arms of the show’s leading man. They meshed so perfectly, their movements more than practiced. They were intimate.
Refusing to double over from the shock and biting back acrid tears, she was the picture of stoicism when the cast took a break and Madeleine dragged her leading man, Briar James, over to be introduced. He was charming and attentive, and that made it even harder for Kara to figure out what was going on. The show’s opening had been pushed back until Christmas, after Madeleine had promised she would be home right after the American Thanksgiving. Well, that was last weekend. When she asked Madeleine if she still wanted to move to Toronto, the “Not yet” was all the reason she needed to pull away.
She understood that Madeleine still had work to do and she was proud of her work. From what she had witnessed from the rehearsal, Fever was shaping up to be a big hit. The logical side of her mind was in complete agreement with Madeleine’s determination to see this through to the opening curtain. Technically, her contract had been up weeks ago, but she was a pro, resolved to get her show to the opening. Still, the emotional part, her heart, didn’t understand and no amount of logic was going to make that better. Instead, from now on she had to focus every ounce of energy on work. Madeleine had sworn it was just about publicity. Whether there was anything going on or not, there was nothing she could do from Toronto. That is, even if she wanted to do something. If Madeleine was telling the truth, the future would play out in her favor. If not, if not, she had a lot of soul searching ahead of her. Why was it so hard to know what to do and why the hell did it hurt so much?
* * *
Sitting in the ninth row just next to the aisle, Madeleine watched the first dress rehearsal. It was a disaster. The actors and dancers had their numbers down pat, even her leading lady was performing well, but the production people and the costumes were out of control. The chorus line had been fitted with hats designed as replicas of every hotel on the Vegas Strip, big, heavy, and unruly. They had trouble getting them on, keeping them on, and passing through curtained parts of the elaborate stage set. She had voiced her concern weeks ago to the producers, only to receive a scolding that it was her job to wrangle the dancers. Now the executive producer was sitting beside her and begging her to find a fix, and quickly. Every day they weren’t open and selling tickets was a day they lost money.
“I don’t understand. We measured everything! Why the hell are they having such a hard time?”
Madeleine wanted to hit him over the head with one of the stupid hotel hats. “Measuring the height of a dancer standing still doesn’t work. Some of these moves can add two or three feet. And I’m sorry, but that headgear isn’t going to work. It’s just too heavy and unruly.”
“Have you any idea how much those fucking things cost us?”
“Anything was too much. Really. You have to decide if our chorus line is supposed to dance or act as moving billboards for your Vegas buddies.”
Her executive producer shot her a venomous look, then settled into a half-assed grin. “Franco told me you could be a bitch on wheels when it came to getting things right. Okay, how would you do it?”
“Go with the glitzy look. This is supposed to be Vegas of the sixties, so drop the hats—they don’t even match what the Strip looked like back then. Go with a simple hairpiece with the peacock feathers. Then use pageant-style sashes with the hotel names on them, you know, a la Miss Desert Inn, Miss Flamingo, Miss Riviera, Miss Stardust, etcetera, etcetera.”
He stood, pulling his phone from his jacket while calling a halt to the rehearsal. “Get those stupid fucking hats off!” he shouted, sending the cast on break. “We need to make some changes.”
Madeleine smiled to herself. They’d get this right she was sure, and the sooner they did the sooner she could have a sit down with Kara and find out just what was going on with her. Ever since her last visit she had been acting strangely.
Briar James, the star of the show, chose that exact moment to dump himself in the seat beside her. “How we looking, Guv?”
“Better,” she said, and grinned. “Now that we can dump those stupid hats we should be on our way.”
“’Bout time,” he groaned. “Now if you could just teach young Miss to stop stepping on my feet.”
It was their standing joke. The female lead, Hollywood’s latest princess, was twenty years Briar’s junior and not a professional dancer. That she could sing and act was a given but dancing at the same time was turning out to be a greater challenge. “Admit it. She’s getting
it. Except for that one misstep today. And really Briar, most of it is star envy. I swear that girl practically breaks into hives when she gets near you. You could work on making her feel less of an off-stage gawker and more of a cast member and costar.”
“I could,” he admitted, then grinned his trademark grin. “But where would the fun be in that?”
“You know you’re incorrigible?” she accused.
“I know. Listen, why don’t we discuss it tonight. I’ve got tickets for the new Clive Owen show. We can grab a quick sup at Daniel or would you prefer Gabriel Kreuther? Either is fine with me. I just need to know by four, so my publicist can handle it.”
“Leak it, you mean?”
“Hey now. It’s all good for the show. Besides, even your friend said we looked good together. Might as well keep the media abuzz. What did that Entertainment Today piece call you? This season’s surprise catch, a sensational young choreographer from Fever! Huh? Huh?” he coaxed as if she should be pleased with the attention.
She wasn’t naive enough to think his attention wouldn’t help her career but the constant reminders were wearing thin. Besides, the magazine had called her Briar’s sensational new thing and only added the fact that she was the show’s choreographer in the last paragraph. She wanted to believe Kara’s withdrawal stemmed from Briar’s insinuations that he could help her career more than she could. She knew Kara could help too, and she kept her promises. Her application to become landed had already been approved, not as Kara’s lover but on her own merits under the category of “Talent.” There was just something about Kara knowing and understanding the importance of earning her keep and she fully supported her need to prove herself capable. In comparison, Briar wanted to be the center of everything, even her career advancement. That didn’t mean he couldn’t serve up some awesome opportunities, but she did wonder what the catch would be if she lowered herself to accept.
Cause and Affection Page 22