Agent Provocateur

by Faith Bleasdale

  ‘But how?’ Johnny softened and stroked her hair. He knew how hard Betty had found it – she had been candid with him about her insecurities when they first met – and although he didn’t often see her as someone who would be bullied, there were times when the scars were still visible. He found it hard to be angry with his wife at the best of times, but especially when she was vulnerable.

  ‘She just does. Her confidence, her poise, her job, destroying people’s lives – only someone arrogant would ever think they could do that. Her upbringing was perfect; she has always been beautiful. She was the type of girl that made my life a misery, that meant I had to rebuild myself. I don’t fully understand, but she’s there, inside, trying to make me feel the way I used to feel and I can’t, Johnny, I am terrified of being there again.’ Betty cried and cried and Johnny held her.

  Johnny makes tea after the phone call.

  ‘I’m never drinking again.’ Betty utters the over familiar statement that no one ever truly means.

  ‘Of course you’re not.’ He pats her bottom, and hands her a cup.

  ‘Did you enjoy the party?’ Despite the hangover, she is relieved. Yesterday she believed her career was over, due to Grace, which is why she drank so much, but now there might be a chance to save it. She hates Grace even more for making her wait.

  ‘Yeah, it was good to catch up with everyone. We should make more of an effort.’

  ‘But time is a commodity in short supply.’

  ‘Blimey, hung over and still able to utter wise words.’

  ‘Shut up. You know what I mean. There is no way that we could see everyone, even if we wanted to.’

  ‘Not all the time.’

  ‘Anyway, are you so unhappy with our lives?’

  ‘No. I just think it’s a shame that we don’t see people we used to be close to. I know it’s inevitable, but it’s sad.’

  ‘Being a grown up isn’t easy.’

  ‘Well, maybe that’s why you weren’t one last night.’

  Betty swipes at Johnny. ‘For that, you can take me out for pizza.’

  ‘My God, all you’ve done today is eat.’

  ‘Well, I need it. Besides, I need to keep my strength up for tomorrow’s breakfast meeting with the bitch.’

  ‘Are you sure? I mean, if she gets to you that much is it really worth it?’

  ‘You know how I feel about my job.'

  ‘Yes, but you know how I feel about you. I’m worried.’

  ‘Don’t be. I won’t let her in any more. The marriage wrecking whore will not hurt me, will not make me feel bad about myself.’ Betty smiles. She will not tell Johnny how threatened she feels by her. That is one piece of information she will keep to herself.

  ‘What I love about you is that you have to grovel to her but you’re still slagging her off.’

  ‘Oh, darling, you have to be willing to be two-faced in my business.’ She kisses him on the cheek, determined to show him that she can handle it, that she will not take it seriously, and she leads him out of the house.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Grace tries to push her reservations away. After all, this is part of her revenge. It makes perfect sense. It’s a long time since she has felt so strongly about anything. The rage from her past, she thought she had buried. But it must have been simmering and now has resurfaced. Betty was the trigger, that much she is certain of. That is why she must do this, although at times she feels ashamed; she thought she was bigger than she is. It’s not often that someone like Grace is given the opportunity to get one over on someone like Betty. That is how she justifies it, so she is determined to be in control, and she is determined that this will be fun, although she knows it probably won’t be. She is caught up in her contradictions, but there is no going back. Whatever the outcome of the bet, this will restore her belief in her self-worth. The same self-worth that Betty is trying to steal. Despite her feelings, she is trying hard to believe that she is doing the right thing.

  She wears a pair of jeans and a plain white shirt for her breakfast meeting. She is smiling like a clown as she makes her way there. She giggles aloud on the bus, prompting strange looks, but she feels better than she has in ages. For once she is taking control, and defending what is important to her. She is no longer scared of the bullies.

  If Betty’s husband is as devoted as she makes out, then the bet will be one hell of a challenge. Grace gives herself a fifty per cent chance of success, which is an evaluation based on her general experience of men and what Betty has told her about him. Although if she fails, Betty will be even smugger, she will definitely have experienced doubts and insecurity, and therefore will not be so quick to judge in future. The other point is that if he turns her down she will have met a man who doesn’t cheat because he loves his wife, and that will restore her faith in men. It may even remove the figurative block she has that prevents her from falling in love. Which is why the fifty per cent chance of failure makes her just as happy as the fifty per cent chance of winning.

  Either way she will win. Betty does not need to know that. That information belongs to Grace. All she has to do now is to get Betty to agree to it.

  They face each other in the café, waiting. Betty looks nervous; her face is twitching. Grace orders coffee and then takes her time choosing breakfast, even though she ends up ordering just toast. Betty is trying to smile but her face feels as if it is going to crack from the effort. She can see how much Grace is enjoying herself and all Betty wants to do is to jump across the table and smack her in the mouth (a very un-Betty thing to do). But instead she tries to break through the pain that her smile is causing her and she sits on her hands, just in case.

  ‘How was your weekend?’ Grace asks.

  ‘Great, thanks. Yours?’ Betty has entered a world where small talk happens only to mask the real reason behind such false conversation. A world where the anticipation of the pain gives pleasure to the administer of the pain. When Betty was younger she always believed that dentists were sadists who would make everything last longer to prolong the pain. As she grew older she switched the accusation to the beautician who waxes her bikini line. Now it is Grace.

  ‘Oh, it was all right. I had a row with my lover.’ Now Betty is stunned. Grace is offering her personal information. She needs to tread carefully. If she lets her defences down then she will be in trouble.

  ‘The one I met?’ Polite, but wary.

  ‘No, another one. Anyway, I won’t bore you with the details.’ The coffee and toast arrive and both women stare at each other as it is placed on the table in front of them. When the waitress leaves Grace waits for Betty to take a bite of her toast before she speaks.

  ‘I’ll do your profile, but I do have a condition.’ Betty stares at her with her mouth full. She cannot speak, which was Grace’s intention. ‘Because you hurt my feelings, really. You tried to make me out to be cheap and I’m not. So, in order to do your little story, you have to agree to a bet.’

  ‘A bet?’ Betty has discarded the rest of her toast, she can see that it is being used to keep her at a disadvantage. She begins to hate the toast. She glances longingly at her mug of coffee but doesn’t dare to take a sip. Just in case.

  ‘Yes, you know, a wager.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Betty is confused and Grace is playing with her.

  ‘A gamble, Betty.’

  ‘Gambling what?’

  It is time to put her out of her misery. Grace smiles. ‘You give me three months to seduce your husband. Of course, if he’s as devoted as you make out, he won’t be interested, but if he isn’t, then you will perhaps look differently at me before you judge me.’

  Betty laughs. She laughs loudly. She has never heard anything more ridiculous in her life. Her fake smile and politeness have fled in disgust.

  ‘You have to be joking. You’re mad, mental, completely insane. There is no way, in a zillion years, that I will even consider anything like that.’ She laughs again, loudly. She has never heard anything more ludicrous
in her life.

  ‘I accept your bet,’ Betty says.

  She is in the office, on the phone to Grace a few days after the breakfast: She has tried everything to avoid agreeing, bar speaking to Johnny about it, and she can barely believe the words she hears herself saying. It has been nothing short of agonising, and her hatred of Grace and what Grace stands for has intensified. She has swung between deciding to quit her job, to crying because she doesn’t want to. She is officially in hell.

  She left the café in disgust and went straight to work. There, she requested an urgent meeting with Fiona and was kept waiting for an agonising half-hour.

  ‘So?’ Fiona started as soon as Betty walked through the door.

  ‘Fi, we’ve had loads of stories go wrong – why is this so important?’ Betty sat down, when she was eventually granted an audience.

  ‘I love this story. It’s like women taking control of the cheating bastard husbands or boyfriends. I think the idea of being a honey trapper is fascinating, the job, everything. I think this Grace woman is interesting and I want this as a lead story.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I’ve booked it in for three months.’

  ‘Three months,’ Betty repeated, remembering the last time she heard those words.

  ‘Look, we work hard to get good features, you know that, and I want something different from the “how to give good head” stories that we seem to have had rather too many of lately. Fucking hell, Betty, we’re not struggling with our circulation but we will be if we don’t keep on top of it. So I want really interesting features about real people who do unusual things. Grace Regan is one of them. The first and, in my view, the most important.’

  ‘So there is no way I can convince you to drop this story?’ Betty felt desperation creeping into her whole being.

  ‘Nope. Unless you can get me a feature on something so amazing that I’ll replace it.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Can’t think of anything, can you?’

  ‘No.’ Betty had felt a flicker of hope, but it died. ‘There is no way I can do this profile.’

  ‘Of course you can.’

  ‘Fiona, I’ve just been with her, with Grace. She said the only way she will agree to it is if I let her try to seduce Johnny.’

  ‘What?’ Fiona looked stunned. She betrayed no sign of knowing anything about the situation.

  ‘Exactly. She wants a bet whereby she gets three months to try to seduce my husband and that is her condition. Fiona, surely you can see that I can’t agree to that.’

  ‘Well, I suppose so. Would you like some coffee?’ Fiona only offers coffee to people visiting her office if she wants something from them. Betty felt her heart sink. She nodded and tried to think, but she couldn’t. She felt as if her hangover had returned. Fiona called her PA and asked for the coffee, then she smiled. Betty prepared herself for the worst.

  ‘Betty, I would never force you to put your personal life at risk for your job, I hope you know that.’ Betty nodded with a sinking feeling. ‘But you and Grace, it’s more of a hate relationship, isn’t it?’ Again, Betty nodded. ‘Well, I think this is your perfect opportunity to get your own back on her and get a great story.’

  ‘I don’t follow.’ Betty didn’t want to be there, and she didn’t want to hear what Fiona was going to say.

  ‘Well, you know that Johnny wouldn’t look at another woman, even Grace, and therefore you agree to her bet, although I’m not sure that three months is a bit much. Anyway, you agree, and then when she fails miserably, you will win.’ Fiona smiled as if she had discovered the meaning of life.

  ‘Or I could agree to the bet and tell Johnny about it, so he’d know all along.’

  ‘I don’t think that is such a good idea.’ Fiona hadn’t thought about that barrier.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you have to prove to Grace that she cannot wreck marriages, and the only way to prove that would be to let her see, genuinely, that she cannot wreck yours.’ Fiona prayed that this logic would work.

  ‘Fiona, it would mean me lying to Johnny.’ Betty felt sick.

  ‘Oh well, yes, I can see how difficult that would be. Did you tell him how much your Prada shoes cost?’

  ‘No, I said they were in the sale.’

  ‘Exactly.’ The triumphant smile had reappeared.

  ‘Fiona, no offence, but this is a bit more serious.’ Betty rolled her eyes. It was getting ridiculous.

  ‘Well, yes, I suppose it is, but what I am saying is that Johnny need never know, and the only people who do are me, you, Grace, and, I assume, her boss. Betty, you know as well as I do how much this job means to you, and you also know that if you told Johnny he’d refuse to go along with it. If the only option is keeping this from him, then I think we might have to do that.’

  ‘I really don’t want to do this.’ Fiona was a control freak and a bitch and Betty wanted to cry, even though she isn’t the crying type.

  ‘Why not? You trust Johnny, you have no doubts, and you said yourself that this woman needs to be taught that she can’t just wreck any marriage she wants.’

  ‘So you mean that I win this and I get to destroy her.’

  ‘Something like that. Maybe you could have a condition, take back control. Oh, this will be such fun. You tell her that if she loses (and we know she will) then she will agree to give up her job.’ This was Fiona’s trump card.

  ‘You think she would do that?’ Seeds of doubt began to plant themselves in Betty’s head, along with thoughts of revenge.

  ‘She’ll have to if she wants her little bet. Think about it.’ Before Betty even got her coffee Fiona ushered her out. Betty could see in Fiona’s face the determination of a woman who was sure that she would get what she wanted. Betty’s heart told her to say no at all costs. To refuse and face the consequences. To tell Grace where to stick her bet and tell Fiona to stick her feature up her arse. But her head knew she would do neither; Fiona and Grace had won. She would accept the bet.

  Albeit reluctantly. This is the first real secret that Betty has ever kept from Johnny (apart from the shoes). She has always been completely honest with him, always totally open, never even wanting to keep anything important from him. Yet here she is with a situation (she refers to it as a situation) that she would do anything to keep from him. She feels guilty, she feels as if she is betraying him, she feels that she is a rotten wife and, most of all, she is scared to the quick that perhaps her job is more important to her than her marriage. She can’t believe that. She has always known that Johnny is the most important person in her world; he is her world.

  Her head was whirring after her meeting with Fiona, so she quickly called on Alison for an emergency meeting. She went to Alison’s office and told her very surprised-looking best friend that there was a crisis.

  After she told her the story, Alison looked at her in total surprise. Finally she found her voice.

  ‘Johnny adores you. He’d never cheat, even with this supermodel woman going after him. But you know that; you don’t need to test that.’

  ‘What about my job?’

  ‘I know, but I just don’t think it’s fair to put temptation in front of him like this. And the fact that I know she’s trying to seduce him, I know she’s going to fail – I know it, but it feels wrong. Most of all you’d be lying to him. Betty, you can’t lie to him.’

  ‘Well, ordinarily I would say it is wrong, but I love my job and I’ve worked hard to get where I am, so this is the only way, and we all know that she’s the one who’ll lose.’

  ‘That would be satisfying, but still definitely not worth it.’

  ‘Ali, Fiona made it clear that I have little choice.’

  ‘It sounds to me that you’ve already made up your mind.’ Alison clearly disapproved.

  ‘No. Yes. I feel rotten, really I do, but I’m not sure I can walk away from my job.’

  ‘She won’t sack you, you’re too good.’

  ‘But I can’t risk that.’
r />   ‘Can you risk your marriage?’

  ‘But it’s not at risk.’ They were in danger of going round in circles.

  ‘Is it just one night?’ Ali asked.

  ‘She wants three months.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘It’s ridiculous.’ Alison had never been angry with Betty before, but she was now.

  ‘Alison, I need your support.’

  ‘I’ll try, but don’t think I agree with you.’

  ‘Fair enough. I’m not sure I agree with me either.’

  ‘It’s not just your job at stake, it’s your pride.’

  ‘It’s not that simple. I trust Johnny. That’s the one thing that isn’t at risk in all this. My marriage is rock solid and I will have the last laugh. Please say you’ll be there for me.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Ali, it’s a big ask, but do you think you might be able to keep this from Matt?’

  ‘Only because if I tell him then your marriage will be over.’

  ‘So you don’t mind not telling him this.’

  ‘I didn’t say I didn’t mind, but it wouldn’t be fair because he’s Johnny’s friend and would probably feel he had to tell Johnny. I think it’s best we keep this just between us.’

  ‘You’re a good friend.’

  ‘I know. But then so are you.’ Alison wasn’t happy, but she was resigned to the fact that she couldn’t get Betty to change her mind.