“That hurts…” she cried into the soft blue pillow, pleasure ebbing, pain rushing in. She hated him, hated men. She bit her lower lip to hold back words she knew she couldn’t say. She tasted blood.
“Women who … bitches who…” He bucked spasmodically until he shuddered to a stop against her soft, hot thighs. Within seconds he pulled himself free and got out of bed. Soon Melina heard the gentle roar of the shower. She cursed him silently for not even asking after her needs. But then, she reminded herself, her larger needs were more important.
“Hurry, please,” Alain instructed her when he strode back into the bedroom, a monogrammed towel wrapped around his waist, wet hair slicked back. “I have a lunch meeting. And I assume we need a few minutes to talk.”
She showered and did the best she could with makeup, but she was at a distinct disadvantage when she walked back out into the sitting room. She felt used and slightly unclean. Alain stood at the window, staring down at the park, impeccable in a blue blazer, khakis, a crisp open-necked shirt.
“So, what is it?” he asked, not even turning to look at her as she entered the room. “This little ‘professional difficulty’ you mentioned?”
“You’re being awfully rough, aren’t you?” Melina replied, sitting down somewhat shakily on the striped settee.
“My dear,” Alain replied, turning toward her, “I believe we’re both adults, no? Let us not play games. You came here this morning for a specific reason, and I’m afraid that what we did in there”—he glanced at the bedroom door—“was just … how do you say it? It was just foreplay. Tell me what it is you want.”
“I have left Dorn & Delaney,” Melina told him.
“Ah…” Alain smiled at her. “That is a pity for them, I think. But it eases my mind a bit. I don’t think Zachary would be pleased with our recent exertions.”
“I think you give Zach too much credit,” Melina retorted. “Zachary’s so worried about making sure he’s in control of everything, he doesn’t have time to think about who’s screwing whom. He barely can keep track of whom he’s screwing.”
“My dear,” Alain answered, laughing, “I see there’s no love lost between the two of you. But please go on. You didn’t come all the way up here to tell me you left Dorn & Delaney.”
“No,” Melina told him, “I came to tell you that I’ve started my own agency.”
“How very nice,” Alain replied vaguely. “How very ambitious of you.”
“I would like the opportunity…” Melina stood up to say her piece, but she suddenly felt absurdly out of place. “I’d like the chance, Alain, to pitch part of the Chanson account.”
“I already have an agency,” Alain replied impatiently, turning from the window to stare across the room at her. She looked pale and somewhat shaken. It was obvious that she hadn’t in the least liked the final stage of their lovemaking, and he rather enjoyed her distaste. She had done what he wanted, had she not? Well, he had forced her to … but then that, he knew, constituted a good part of his pleasure. She was a fine lover, actually, her taut, well-toned body perfect for the kind of long, exquisitely drawn-out sessions he preferred. He could still teach her a good many things, and he sensed she would be a quick and easy study.
“I’m aware of that, Alain,” Melina continued uncertainly. “I’m merely suggesting that you give me the opportunity to…”
“And what, my dear, do I tell Zach?” Alain demanded. “I’m not unhappy with his work. I’ve been enormously pleased with the creative he’s supplied, and the service, well…” Alain laughed to himself. “I will miss your service, my dear, after this morning. But perhaps we can continue that on our own?”
“No,” Melina replied firmly, “not unless there’s a tacit agreement between us that you’ll give me a shot at Chanson.”
“Ridiculous,” Alain retorted. “Absolutely out of the question. I don’t bargain with my lovers. I don’t need to. Your behavior is hardly commendable … do you realize that?”
“Oh, yes,” Melina admitted, adjusting the strap of her shoulder bag and turning to the door. “I’m quite aware of how I’m behaving. And that’s because I do need to bargain, Alain. I intend to make my little enterprise work. And I will.” She turned back to look at him. “Sorry you don’t want to be involved.”
He watched her close the door, noticing the way her pale pink skirt clung—just enough to be noticed—to her buttocks. Though short, she had damned good legs, he realized for the first time—slim, well-muscled, delicately tapering to her high stiletto heels. She left a fresh, outdoorsy fragrance behind—a smell both warm and grassy—as if they had been making love in a sunny, wide-open field. It had been a long time since he had enjoyed sex that much. She was a bit wild, definitely unbridled, with so much potential. Of course, she would never do in the long run. But it would be convenient to have someone—someone who knew exactly what he liked—available to him in New York. And would it really hurt Zach, after all, if he threw a bit of business her way?
“Front desk? There’s a young woman coming down on the elevator now. She’s wearing a pink outfit … a suit, I think. Do me a favor? Send her back up, please? Yes? Merci!”
Chapter 15
It was crazy. It couldn’t go on. Janie was putting in full days at D&D, then running downtown in the evenings to help Melina out at the new office. The launch campaign for City Slickers was taking a lot more time than either of them had anticipated and then—because she was there and Melina seemed to rely so heavily on her judgment—Janie had gotten involved with other projects.
“Is this what you’re planning for Madame Ramona?” Janie asked one evening as she picked up a well-executed layout of a sumptuously furnished apartment. The headline read, “This Upper East Side co-op is on the thirtieth floor … yet the scents of an open meadow refresh every room.”
“Yes,” Melina replied from across the loft where she was sorting through City Slicker apparel for the upcoming photo shoot. “Philip Bosco did it. I think it’s pretty good, but I don’t know. Something seems to be missing.”
“It doesn’t have any focus,” Janie replied, taking a step back, but at the same time analyzing the composition more closely. “It looks like a page layout of House Beautiful. Everything’s there—the paintings, the sofa, the gorgeous views—but not one thing stands out.”
“You know,” Melina responded, coming across the room to stand beside Janie, “you’re right, dammit. I’ve been staring at that thing for four days now, trying to figure out what was wrong. It does need something in the foreground. But what? Have any ideas?”
So, slowly, but somehow inevitably, Janie took over more and more of the art direction for Melina. And it wasn’t all due to Melina’s subtle maneuverings of which Janie was well aware. The larger problem was D&D and the growing feeling that she had reached a dead end. When neither Zach nor Michael asked her to sit in on the Chanson meetings in Melina’s stead, Janie decided to fight for her right to be there. The opportunity of seeing Alain every month or so made it easy for her to screw up her courage and pay Zach an after-hours call. For a brief moment when he glanced up from his desk and saw her, Janie felt as though the last few months of animosity and distrust between them had never existed. He smiled his crooked smile, leaned back, and gave her a look that only Zach could: searching, concerned, as though he knew her deepest thoughts … and that they worried him.
“I used to know you, didn’t I?” he asked, waving her into the room. “Come in. Close the door. Remind me of your name … Jeannie, isn’t it?”
“Very funny,” Janie replied, sitting down across from him. Of course, nothing had changed. The furniture was still a disaster. Zach was still Zach: acerbic, funny, wary, cocksure of himself. It irritated Janie to realize how much she had missed him—and she’d be damned if she was going to let that show. So perhaps more sarcastically than she intended, she said, “I’ve been meaning to tell you how amusing I think you are these days. Just full of high jinks
and fun. Zach the card, that’s what we call you around here, did you know that?”
“I find it a little embarrassing to have to remind you that I am your employer here, Jeannie,” Zach replied, his tone still playful, though Janie noticed a shadow had fallen over his eyes. He was a hard man to read when he wanted to be, Janie knew. He wasn’t about to make this easy for her. “Which means, may I point out, that though you perhaps find fault with me … it behooves you not to express those criticisms directly. Whereas I, as your superior, can and should feel quite free to air my unfavorable opinions of you whenever I choose.”
“Please do,” Janie replied stiffly.
“Oh, come off it, sweetie,” Zach retorted, standing up suddenly. “I hate this, you know? I don’t want to fight with you, okay?” He sat on the edge of his desk, looking across at her. He’d aged in some way Janie couldn’t quite place. Though he still looked ridiculously young for a man of thirty-eight, the boyish features seemed tired, sad. The wildness, the spark, had gone out of his eyes. Something far deeper than Melina, than the agency, than any day-to-day trouble, was eating at Zach. Janie felt an unwanted rush of concern.
“You’ve an odd way of showing it, then,” Janie replied, more gently than before. “I doubt we’d ever be talking to each other again if I hadn’t stopped down here tonight.”
“Not true,” Zach retorted. “I’ve been thinking of the best way of suggesting a détente between us. I just needed a bit more time to let recent events cool.”
“You were wrong about Melina,” Janie began. “You know, she never—”
“I won’t discuss that woman with you, Janie,” Zach cut in. “If you came by here to plead her case … to try to get me to take her back, forget it.” Zach started to pace the room, clearly agitated.
“Firstly, I would never beg you for anything,” Janie replied, trying to keep her voice under control. “Secondly, I doubt she has any desire to come back. She’s doing just wonderfully on her own.”
Zach stopped at the window, looking down at the rush hour traffic. Then, without turning, he said, “We’re on dangerous ground here, Janie. I don’t want to know how you come to know that Melina’s doing just wonderfully, as you say. You’re perfectly well aware that Michael and I instructed the staff not to have anything to do with her. This was not a casual request. It was a command, okay?” His tone turned harder, rougher. “She’s undermining everything Michael and I built. She’s a conniving little bitch. I just hope to God she hasn’t got you fooled.”
It was Janie’s turn to be silent. Zach turned to stare at her, then he came back across the room and perched again on the edge of his desk. “Promise me she’s not someone you trust,” Zach told her.
“I didn’t,” Janie replied, “come here to discuss Melina.”
“Just assure me,” Zach urged, “that you won’t see that woman.”
“I want to talk about me,” Janie retorted.
“And I want your word on Melina first,” Zach answered hotly.
“Oh, forget it, Zach,” Janie replied, standing up. “Forget I even came down here. Forget I tried to talk to you. You like to think you’re so open, so giving … but you’re not. You only love people who love you back on your own terms. You can’t stand it when someone—especially a woman—goes up against you.”
“Don’t dish feminist palaver at me, Janie,” Zach retorted. “It doesn’t suit you.”
“Oh, Zach,” Janie said, as she marched to the door, “forget it. Just forget it.”
That conversation, though it solved nothing about Chanson and only exacerbated her problem with Zach, certainly made Janie feel less guilty about working for Melina after hours. More often than not, Janie found her mind turning to Melina’s projects during the day, and letting her work at D&D drift. But Janie knew she was stretching herself, hardly getting more than four or five hours of sleep a night. And, too, it was frequently awkward to ask Melina’s clients to work around Janie’s schedule, though Melina was adept at massaging egos and calming tempers. For instance, she had somehow convinced the City Slickers people that shooting their ads on three consecutive Saturday mornings, rather than during the workweek, was actually in their own best interests. She didn’t think it necessary to add that it was the only time Janie would be available to supervise.
The first two Saturday shoots—at the Odeon and the Palladium—went surprisingly smoothly, Janie thought, considering the number of models and the various problems of on-location work. The free-lance photographer and crew Melina had hired turned out to be seasoned pros: efficient and easygoing. Everyone, and most importantly the City Slickers contingent, seemed to enjoy themselves. The third shoot was to take place on the Staten Island Ferry, the scene being a small group of all-night partygoers returning home at dawn across Manhattan Harbor. But from the moment Janie woke up that Saturday, everything seemed destined to go wrong.
The crew had decided to meet at South Ferry at five-thirty in the morning, giving themselves a requisite hour and a half to set up before the sun rose. Janie, jerking awake a little before five, realized she had slept through her alarm and that she had a half hour to shower, dress, and get downtown. She threw on the most comfortable clothes she could find: a pink stonewashed Ralph Lauren workshirt over faded denim overalls, and a soft brown fedora to keep her hair from blowing in her eyes on the ferry. She grabbed her jean jacket and glanced at herself in the hall mirror as she was going out: she looked, she decided ruefully as she ran for the elevator, like an overweight and not particularly able farmhand. She could just imagine Faith shuddering past her with distaste if they met on the street.
Blessedly, she found a taxi on Seventh Avenue, but it wasn’t until they were barreling downtown through the early morning darkness that Janie realized it had started to rain. Though they’d be shooting under the shelter of the ferry, it was already mid-November and sure to be a cold, damp day. Janie could already imagine the models stamping their feet between takes to keep their circulation going and the grumbling light crew, their breath coming out in angry puffs, as they tried to work and keep their equipment dry at the same time. Don’t even think, Janie told herself, about how picky and dissatisfied clients become when they’re denied creature comforts. By the time Janie was running up the walkway to the ferry entrance, she was wondering what madness had prompted Melina and her to propose this outdoor session … and how best they could stop this ill-fated venture before it went any further.
“Great, here comes our star!” Melina’s voice rang out gaily as Janie hurried along the upper level of the ferry to where the group was setting up. They’d gotten permission from the city to rope off the area they needed to operate in. The thirty square feet of space along the upper rail they’d selected had been chosen for the stupendous, close-up views it offered of lower Manhattan, but with a sinking heart Janie could see that the Wall Street area they had hoped to use as background was shrouded in fog, the World Trade Center barely visible through the chill morning rain. She stepped carefully over the snaking ropes of cable, around the heavy black packing boxes, and came up to the cold and already weary-looking group that hovered around a buffet of coffee, pastries, and fruit juice Melina had had catered by a downtown party service.
“Terrific morning, huh?” Janie asked with an apologetic grin. Three models, the makeup artist, two men from the camera crew, even the waiter behind the coffee tureen greeted Janie’s smile with cheerless silence. Fran, the president of City Slickers, gave Janie a look of suspended surprise, then, tipping her head back for a second, sneezed violently into her cup of coffee.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Fran answered, snuffling and fixing Janie with a red-rimmed doubtful gaze. “Do you really think you can shoot in this muck?”
“But of course,” Melina answered, taking hold of Janie’s elbow. “This is just the sort of foggy, you know, kind of otherworldly effect Janie was really hoping to get. We’re going to save a fortune not having to airbrush in mist.” As Meli
na uttered this blatant untruth, she squeezed Janie’s arm, then added, “Janie and I have a few last-minute details to cover. Excuse us a sec, okay?”
When the two women were safely out of the group’s hearing, Melina hissed, “God, what a disaster! Where the hell have you been?”
“Overslept,” Janie replied simply, shaking off Melina’s grasp and turning to face her. Melina was wearing a black City Slickers pantsuit, belted with a black leather-and-silver-studded cinch, and low-heeled black suede boots with miniature silver spurs. A voluminous red vinyl poncho swirled around her. Janie felt fat and sloppy beside her. “Sorry,” she added. “Now what’s all this about me longing to shoot on location in zero visibility weather?”
“We haven’t any choice,” Melina retorted. “Fran sprung on me this morning the fact that they’ve decided this is the ad they want to break with, rather than the Odeon page. And we’re closing next Friday for materials in half the magazines. We’ve just got to plow ahead.”
“But you know it’s insane, don’t you?” Janie tried to reason. “We’re going to get nothing but gray mist for a backdrop. You’ll only be wasting everyone’s time … and money.”
“My money thus far,” Melina retorted, pulling her hair back with one arm and looking hard at Janie. “I’ve shelled out at least five thousand all together for setup and production on this. The clock is already ticking on the models’ sessions fees and the crew’s time. Listen, I’ve already talked it over with Conrad,” Melina went on, referring to the photographer. “We can silhouette the models and print against a stock photo of Wall Street.”
“Great,” Janie replied, nodding her head in agreement to the practical wisdom of the decision. “So then let’s break down this set and shoot at Conrad’s studio.”
“Janie, wake up, dammit!” Melina retorted, digging her hands into the depths of her poncho and turning to look up the fog-bound Hudson. “We’ve got to pretend we’ll use the film from today … otherwise I’ll be out a hell of a lot of up-front money. You know these women analyze every goddamn penny. We’re just going to have to fake it.”
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