by Maryann Reid
“I’ll think about it.”
He let the door shut, and Blake locked it.
When Antonio rapped his knuckles on the door and said “The black bird flies backwards,” Blake was still staring at the door, wondering what the hell to think of Brett Skeet.
Chapter Twenty-Two
June 5
New York, New York
At lunchtime Blake was finished with all twelve mentoring sessions and pleased with most of the way her life was progressing. She still needed a solution to her Wishman Spears one-year-to-profitability problem, but that was the only cloud currently on her horizon. It was, however, a pressing cloud, owing to the fact that Thomas Mills was on the board of directors of her Mentors & Protégés, and she’d be seeing him at the first directors meeting that afternoon.
Meanwhile, she had lunch with Margot at the Four Seasons to look forward to. When she and Antonio were inside the taxi, she tried to phone her best friend to tell her they were on the way to pick her up from the hotel where the Mills were staying. After the line rang ten times, Blake disconnected the call and muttered, “That’s weird.”
“What’s up?” Antonio looked up from the ebook he was reading on his smartphone.
“Margot isn’t answering my call.”
“She’s probably in the bathroom. There are bathroom things you can’t hurry, and some people don’t take their phone to the toilet with them.” He paused, then added, “And I wish there were more people like those some people.”
Blake couldn’t help giggling like a silly schoolgirl. “You don’t like hearing the sound of piss pouring into a porcelain throne, Antonio?”
“No, ma’am, I do not. And I like the other bathroom noise even less.” His lips turned down in a scowl.
She tried Margot’s number again as they neared the hotel, but again got no answer. Antonio’s theory that Margot was in the bathroom had comforted Blake the first time Margot didn’t answer her phone. Now she couldn’t help but worry about her best friend.
They took the elevator to the fourth floor, and Blake knocked on the door of 407. Nobody opened the door. Blake threw an anxious glance at Antonio, then knocked again. And again, the door stayed shut.
Antonio tried turning the handle, and the door opened. “Let me,” he murmured, and he stepped into the hotel room, calling, “Hello? Mrs. Mills?”
The room was a shambles, and the air reeked of booze. Blake breathed through her nose as she followed Antonio inside. She noticed that Margot and Thomas were renting a room with two beds, rather than one, and wondered if the couple were at odds with each other. Neither Margot nor Thomas were in the bedroom, but water was running in the bathroom.
For a moment, Antonio hesitated. “We’ll both go,” he said, and they went to look in the bathroom.
Margot was sprawled in the bathtub with the shower running, a nearly empty bottle of Pearse Lyons single malt whiskey clutched in both hands. She was singing tunelessly, murdering Toni Braxton’s “Un-Break My Heart.” In the confines of the bathroom, the alcohol smell was so strong that Blake felt tipsy just from the fumes.
Blake stared at Margot, who was oblivious to their presence, for at least a full minute while thinking about what to do. Finally she turned to Antonio and motioned him to step out of the bathroom, and she followed him.
“Order room service. Lots of it. Filling stuff. And coffee, and a pitcher of ice water.” She found Margot’s suitcases and looked for something casual and comfortable to dress her friend in. “I think we’ll be having lunch with Margot here, this time.”
Back in the bathroom, Blake shut off the shower, which finally got Margot’s attention. “Margot… Honey, what’s wrong?”
Margot turned glazed eyes on Blake and moaned, “Oh, Blake. Thomas doesn’t love me anymore. He told me so himself, this morning.” And then she gave voice to a howling, heart-rending cry.
#
What should have been a joyous occasion for Blake was instead an afternoon of torment. She phoned Suki to take over bodyguard duty two hours early, leaving Margot in Antonio’s care.
As the board of directors arrived for the first meeting of Mentors & Protégés, Thomas cornered Blake and asked about her Wishman Spears profitability plans. “That’s due July first, you know,” he reminded her.
Swallowing a burning desire to ask him why he didn’t worry as much about his marriage as he did about Blake’s only mistake in more than a decade of real estate development, Blake said with forced calm, “I still have almost a month, Thomas.”
“There won’t be any extensions,” he grumbled. He turned on one heel and took a seat at the table of the conference room, located in the same hotel where his wife lay in a drunken stupor while Antonio tried to revive her.
Blake retreated to the seat at the head of the table, intending to review her notes while she waited for all the board members to arrive. Robin was there. She had practically begged Blake to sit in on the meeting to get a bird’s eye view on how this sort of thing worked. Blake was happy to oblige, hoping that Robin may be interested in sitting on her board one day. From the corner of one eye, however, she noticed Robin watching Thomas with wide eyes and slightly open mouth. Oh, hell, no. You may be lonely, Robin, and Margot’s marriage may be in trouble, but I’m not having one friend make bedroom eyes at another friend’s husband.
She got to her feet again and beckoned Robin to step outside the conference room with her. They went for a walk to the women’s restroom, Suki trailing after them.
“I know that look, Robin,” Blake said, keeping her voice quiet but firm, once they were in the bathroom and she’d made sure they were alone except for the bodyguard. “Forget about it. Thomas Mills is a married man.”
Robin chewed her bottom lip, then said, “He must not be happy in his marriage. A happily married man doesn’t…”
“Doesn’t what?”
“Pat another woman’s tush as he walks by, and hand her a business card with his personal cell phone number written on it.”
“Thomas…” Blake didn’t finish the thought. She wasn’t altogether sure what the thought was, really. But she locked gazes with Robin and said, hammering her words, “Let him be, Robin.”
“Okay…” Doubt clouded Robin’s eyes.
“I mean it. His wife is my best friend.”
“I said okay.”
They stared at each other until Blake’s BlackBerry beeped to alert her that the meeting was due to start in five minutes. Blake nodded and turned to go. “Well. Let’s go have a charity-launching meeting.”
Suki followed Blake, and Robin followed Suki. Blake wasn’t certain, but she thought she heard Robin whisper, “Best friend. That’s what you used to call me.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
June 10
New York, New York
The twelve beginning contestants of The Takeover had completed the first week’s challenges, and their work had been evaluated by a panel of marketing experts. Blake had reviewed the mission statements and logos submitted by the contestants, and the evaluations of the marketing gurus. A studio audience had watched film of Blake’s mentoring sessions with the contestants, the development by contestants of their mission statements and logos, and the experts giving their analysis of the results.
Now the hour of reckoning had arrived: It was time to choose the first contestant to eliminate due to second-rate performance. In a staff meeting prior to filming Blake’s decision and the second week’s challenges, the producers and NBC advertising execs discussed who Blake’s choice for elimination should be.
“I’m sure you’d like to send your ex-husband’s girlfriend home, but the audience reaction to her is extremely favorable,” producer Vanessa Reeves told Blake. “She’s one of the early front-runners to win.”
“Gabby is fun,” producer Jerome Harper observed. “Her idea to play against the stereotype of blondes as dumb is really clever, and her logo—a Betty Boop–looking blonde in a Rosie the Riveter pose, with a tattoo of the
Blondes With Brains BWB logo on her forearm—is attention-getting and amusing. She’s definitely a contender.”
“I know all that,” said Blake, warming her hands with a mug of steaming coffee. It was an unseasonably cool morning. Thanks for global warming and wild weather, world. Blake scowled at the Italian dark roast. “Gabby Truitt is not my choice for the first elimination.”
“Who is, then?” Vanessa posed the question, but all the ratings- and reviews-minders leaned in toward Blake in breathless anticipation of her answer.
“Spencer Jett.”
“You can’t be serious!” Some NBC advertising twit slapped his palm to his forehead.
Melodramatic, that. He should be in front of the camera, not behind it, Blake thought at her coffee.
“Our audience rating for him was almost as favorable as Gabby’s,” the ad twit continued. “He looks a lot like a young Tom Cruise, and he oozes sex appeal. Women want him, and men want to be him. He’s got to stay.”
“He’s an empty-headed clown.” Blake looked up from her mug and met their gazes, one by one. Each of her opponents flinched. She, by contrast, did not.
“We don’t have another contestant as sweet to look at as Jett is,” moaned Jerome, confirming Blake’s belief that the man was gay. She didn’t care, except that in her experience a liking for dick could be quite distracting. “If Blake sends him home, what will we do for eye candy?”
“Maybe we’ll look at the business pros and cons of the challenges the contestants complete, instead of imagining them naked,” Blake suggested. She stood and opened the office door, Antonio behind her. “I’m ready to film my decision.”
She left without waiting to see if they followed. They’d hired her to be a business coach, not judge of a beauty contest. As one of the world’s leading businesswomen, she knew her decision was the right one.
And so she seated herself at the head of the long table on the denlike set, and the twelve contestants gathered around. She looked at the nearest camera operator and asked, “Are we live?”
He shook his head. “We haven’t been given the order.”
“You’re getting it now, on three. One. Two. Three.” Blake looked around at the contestants and said, “A week ago I challenged you all to create business mission statements and logos. I reviewed your work, and so did expert marketers. Some of you show promise, and a couple of you even have start-up-ready visions and visuals for your business. One of you, I’m afraid, had nothing original or appealing to offer.”
Blake stood and moved to a new addition to the set: a six-foot-tall plush toy that looked like an old-fashioned grandfather clock. “Before everything was computerized, employees would put a card in a clock to stamp the time they started and ended work. They called it punching the clock. I’m sorry, but one of you must punch the clock for the last time.” Her eyes roamed the anxious contestants seated around the long table, and she announced, “Spencer Jett, punch out the clock.”
Jett sat dazed for several excruciating seconds. Then a few of the other contestants shook hands with him or hugged him, and realization sank in. He got to his feet and trudged to the plush clock, bumped a fist against it, and exited the stage, all while Blake looked on.
She returned to her seat at the table and said, “Now, let’s talk about your second week’s challenges.”
#
“Say, sexy man, haven’t I seen you before?”
Brett stood in the queue at a Korean BBQ street food vendor’s cart. He didn’t recognize the voice, but it must have belonged to the curvaceous, auburn-haired woman in a skintight dress barely longer than her crotch. He found himself salivating for more than lunch, and had to swallow before he asked, “Uh, I think I would have remembered meeting you.”
She smirked. “Well, I remember you, foxy fella. You were at the pre-opening party Blake Bertrand had for the Blake Tower, back in Miami in…February, I think it was.”
“That’s some memory you’ve got. I wasn’t there long, maybe half an hour.” He couldn’t help himself—he was talking to her boobs, which were in serious danger of escaping the minimal confinement offered by her dress. “To be honest, I crashed that party. I really wanted to meet Blake Bertrand.”
“And did you?”
“Yeah. But I blew it with her, eventually.”
“Hey, pal, you gonna order something or not? Because if you’re not, you should stop holding up the line,” grumbled a man two places back from Brett.
“Sorry.” Brett turned to the friendly Korean family operating the food cart, ordered and paid for his food, and had a thought. “Want anything?” he asked the auburn lady.
“Just you, thanks.” She winked at him.
His little best friend saluted that idea. Moving away from the cart so the line could advance, he said, “Well, after I eat lunch I’ve gotta go back to work. But maybe I could buy you dinner tonight?”
“That sounds brilliant.” She took a notepad and pen out of her purse and scribbled a phone number on a sheet, ripped it off, and tried to hand it to him, but his lunch was making a mess of his hands. Laughing, she tucked the sheet of paper into his pocket…and gave his buddy a gentle nudge. “I’m Sherry, by the way. Don’t forget to call me.” She walked away, hips swaying mesmerizingly, and vanished in the Midtown crowds.
Eventually, Brett remembered to eat his lunch.
#
Arguing with television producers, eliminating a contestant, mentoring the remaining contestants for their second week’s challenge… It all added up to a stressful day, and Blake still had an evening of desperately searching for a solution to the Wishman Spears problem ahead of her. She needed to purge some frustration and worry by working her body. Taking Suki with her, Blake took a taxi to the sports club.
Suki pushed Blake hard. They did strength and flexibility training and aerobic conditioning for an hour, and then Suki put Blake through two and a half hours of combat jujitsu hell. By the time Blake performed acceptably on Suki’s “exam time,” she felt achy and wobbly all over—but she was in a good mood.
They both took brief showers to remove the sweat and changed into clean clothes because they planned to get takeout for dinner. As they were about to exit the club, however, the voice Blake hated to hear called out, “Blake, you’ve got to stop following me around. We’re divorced now, remember?”
“Ignore him, Boss,” Suki recommended, and they stepped out into the New York night.
Lang followed them, and, looking over her shoulder, Blake saw that he had half a dozen burly men around him. She also saw Suki go into a subtle “ready” stance, watching Blake’s ex and his henchmen as a cat watches a family of mice.
“We can talk about this, or I can request a restraining order of my own,” said Lang.
Suki positioned herself between Lang’s posse and Blake. “From what Boss has told me, I knew you’re an asshole, but she never mentioned you’re also insane.”
Lang shook his head. “Not so. After ten years of marriage, I certainly know Blake’s handwriting. She’s sent me a threatening letter.” He held out a hand, and one of his goons took an envelope out of a duffel bag he was carrying. The dude handed the envelope to Lang, who handed it to Suki. “I have the original in my hotel room. This is a copy, but there’s no denying it’s Blake’s writing style.”
Keeping the men in view all the while, Suki extracted a sheet of paper from the envelope and scanned it. “This does look like your writing, Boss.” She handed it back over her shoulder to Blake.
Hands trembling with baffled rage, Blake squinted at the handwriting in the city’s night lights. Incredibly, she was indeed looking at her own handwriting, threatening to hire a hit man to kill Lang for getting his “new whore” on Blake’s television show.
“I didn’t write this.” Though Lang had said it was only a copy, Blake ripped the page to shreds and threw them down on the sidewalk.
“We’ll see what a handwriting analysis expert says, if you threaten me again in any way.” Lang
sneered, then turned to go back inside the sports club.
“Goddamn you, Lang, you want something from me. I know you. What will it take to make you leave me alone?” Blake started to rush after him, but Suki grabbed her and held her back.
“There is nothing,” Lang said, looking back at Blake, “that you can say or do to make me happy anymore.”
Blake cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted, “Si tu pito fuera mas chico, solo se vería con microscopio, puto comemierda!”
One of Lang’s goons choked with laughter. Lang’s face turned beet-red as he charged toward Blake, snarling, “What did you say about my dick?”
He got almost in arm’s reach, then Suki moved and Lang soared backward a few feet, tripping two of his henchmen rushing to do battle. Suki struck out with one foot and another goon went down on his knees, fighting to breathe. The other three thought better of trying their luck, but one of them helped Lang stand.
“You’re getting served with a restraining order, bitch. And Gabby is going to win your shit show,” he spat at her.
“She’ll win if she earns it, Lang.” Blake touched the scar on her forehead, powerless to stop herself. Her heart raced, and she fought just to make her voice sound cool and collected. “All I care about is making sure you can never fuck with me again.”
“Maybe I’ll just fuck with everyone you care about, instead.” Lang watched Blake with his sooty eyes ablaze as she and Suki climbed into the taxi they’d called for.
“I think he means it, Boss,” said Suki as the taxi merged with traffic. “I think he already started, with that senseless attack on Henry.”
“I think you’re right.” Blake wiped her hand against her eyes, brimming with tears now that the crisis was over. “But if it can’t be proved, what can I do about it?”
“Well.” Suki glanced at Blake, then turned her attention to the passing scenes. “My agency has more than three bodyguards, Boss. Just saying.”