Hustle Sweet Love

by Davis, Maggie;

  Lacy took a quick, in-drawn breath. He could shake her to her shoes when he spoke to her so caringly, so tenderly in his low, vibrant voice like that. “Michael—” she began. There were so many things she had to tell him. Perhaps they weren’t finished after all, she thought with a surge of joy that surprised her.

  “I’m sorry, I am in an urgent meeting,” he went on. “I haven’t got time to discuss all this now. The Rolls will pick you up Friday, regular time. You don’t have a problem with that, do you?”

  “Oh, no, not at all,” Lacy cried eagerly. “Yes, I really want to talk to you, I want to explain—”

  “Friday,” he said tersely. And hung up.

  Lacy gathered up her purse and coins and got ready to turn the telephone booth over to the restless crowd that had gathered outside. It seemed she hadn’t told Michael about Bobby Sullivan after all. Or there surely would have been some massive devastation on the eastern end of Long Island by now.

  On Friday morning, early, Lacy was called into managing editor Gloria Farnham’s office, where a large group of Fad staffers, mostly editors, were standing around drinking champagne, even though it was barely ten.

  It must be somebody’s birthday, Lacy thought, glad to be a part of the crowd for a change.

  “Congratulations, sweetie, you’ve just been promoted! Darlings,” Gloria Farnham cried, seizing Lacy’s hand and holding it up in the manner of a fight referee announcing a new Golden Gloves champion, “meet our new assistant editor, Stacy Kingsley!”

  Everyone lifted champagne glasses in Lacy’s direction, and there were a few weak cheers.

  “Who?” Lacy said, trying to get out of the managing editor’s grip. She searched through the crowd and found Jamie Hatworth standing by the window with Mike. The layout artist’s arm was around the editor’s shoulder, but she looked rather pale.

  “You’ll work in tandem with Jamie, love,” Gloria went on, “she’s dying to show you everything she knows. But you’ll keep your convenient little office out here, lambie pie—there’s a man coming in to fix the air conditioning today.”

  “I can’t be an assistant editor,” Lacy burst out, dismayed. “I’ve only been here six weeks!”

  “Oh, yes you can, dear,” the managing editor said. “They loved your ‘Tacky-Max’ article upstairs. It just blew them away—didn’t it, gang? So here we are, and here you are—our new assistant editor!”

  There were a few louder cheers at that.

  “But that was only one article,” Lacy protested. “And I haven’t even finished Tiny Lady Training Bras. Not to mention Princess Di Maternity Sportswear and Hanes body stockings.”

  “Don’t say that, sweetie,” the managing editor said loudly. “They’ve been tracking all your stuff upstairs, management’s read every word you’ve written. The big brass loves your enormous talent!”

  “Yeah,” someone in the back said, sourly. “You’re loaded.”

  “Oh, no,” Lacy whispered, the awful truth finally dawning. She was feeling as though she could drop through the floor of Fad Publishing Group’s Madison Avenue office building, right down into the lobby, and not even feel it. Her work had been read upstairs? Every word of it? First what had happened to Peter Dorsey. Now this!

  “Well, anyway,” one of the associate editors in a striped Ship ‘n Shore shirt said rather grudgingly, “you can write, if that’s any consolation.”

  “I’m not going to take it,” Lacy protested. No one appeared to be listening. “For the very good reason,” she said, raising her voice, “that I’m still in training as a junior fashion writer, remember?” She could see Jamie Hatworth coming to her through the crowd. “I don’t know the first thing about being an assistant editor!”

  “Shhhh,” Jamie Hatworth soothed, “that’s show biz, honey. We’ll work it out—you’re assigned to me, remember?”

  “I’m humiliated, that’s what I am,” Lacy groaned. “What happened to ‘senior fashion writer,’ anyway? Did I just jump over that? What happened to ‘editorial assistant’—or have they abolished that, too? Oh, this is really mortifying.”

  The close-packed members of Fad’s editorial staff all appeared to be pleasantly ignoring her. The associate editor in the Ship ‘n Shore shirtwaist got the plastic stopper out of another bottle of Andre champagne.

  “You’ve got plenty of talent, kid,” the layout artist said, his arm still around Jamie Hatworth’s shoulders. “It just came on pretty fast, that’s all.”

  “Shut up, Mike,” Jamie told him. “I’m assigned to show you the ropes, Lacy. You’ll make out all right.”

  “I refuse to be an assistant editor,” Lacy told her in a trembling voice. “That’s your job. I’m not going to take it! I’ll only fall flat on my face!”

  “You heard what Gloria said,” Jamie told her. “We both have the same job. For a while.”

  That was the whole point. “I’ll refuse to accept it,” Lacy cried. “I’ll only be making a fool of myself, don’t you see?”

  “They’re not only going to fix the air conditioning in your office,” the layout artist said, passing Lacy a plastic glass of Andre Very Dry, “but some Sutton Place decorator is coming in to give it the works. They were bringing in some black and chrome Finnish stuff this morning. It was on the freight elevator. And I hear you’re getting brown hand-woven drapes and a smoked-glass partition to block out the view of the air shaft.”

  Lacy froze. Why had she been so stupid as to think that everything was going to be all right? It took a little time, but when you examined the complicated scheme involved, it was truly masterful.

  “Excuse me,” Lacy said, suddenly subdued. “I have something I have to do.”

  Two minutes later she was in her office. When Irving Fishman picked up the other end of the line, Lacy took a moment so that she could try to speak in a fairly normal voice. She didn’t want to yell at Mr. Fishman. He was an innocent bystander.

  “Darling girl,” Mr. Fishman boomed cordially. “How are you this morning? Your friend Mr. Alexander van Renssalaer called yesterday to ask if perhaps you would consider the Knickerbocker Club for his invitation to lunch, and I told him, ‘Why not?’ I understand the Knickerbocker is even a more cultivated place than the Yale Club and has better food, although personally I don’t know it.”

  “Mr. Fishman, please,” Lacy told him, trying not to yell. “I have a very important favor to ask you. Do you still have that Disco Flame Queen number with Michael Jackson in bugle beads on the front? In poison blue and in a size eight?”

  Fourteen

  When the elevator doors rolled back at 8:00 p.m. that evening at Michael Echevarria’s apartment on Sutton Place, Lacy was wearing Fishman Brothers’ fabulous Disco Flame Queen best seller in acrylic mega-blue satin. The effect, Lacy could see instantly in the black panther’s eyes, was totally paralyzing.

  Lacy’s tall, five-foot nine-inch figure was once again a perfect foil for the outrageous blue satin disco dress with the pensive head of Michael Jackson emblazoned across the chest in glittering multicolored glass beads. Although labeled a size 8, the dress actually looked a full size smaller because of its skimpy cut. The hem ended an inch above Lacy’s knees, and the side slits were slashed to midthigh. Puffy cantaloupe sleeves in blue satin reached to Lacy’s elbows and would have given a top-heavy look except for the exposed expanse of Lacy’s truly glorious legs—legs with strappy Roman sandals laced to above the calf and with four-inch heels, all in black patent leather. A little disco hat, covered with midnight sequins, was cocked over Lacy’s right eye. Her long blond hair had been teased into a thousand ringlets that stood out from her face in a six-inch-deep cloud. Lacy’s delicately carved eyelids glittered with iridescent purple eye shadow. Her wide mouth was a sensuously pouting deep-red gash. Overall, Lacy Kingston was a triumph of tacky-max raised to high art. In contrast, the president and chairman of the board was magnificent in white tie and tails.

  They stared at each other.

  “Good grief,�
� Lacy murmured.

  “My God,” he exclaimed.

  In that instant it appeared they had checkmated each other.

  Lacy knew she’d gotten under his skin this time with the gaudy Disco Flame Queen extravaganza. It took her a minute to recover from his absolute perfection in white tie and tails.

  “Where are you going?” Lacy cried, aghast.

  “Where have you been,” he snarled, “dressed like that?”

  Lacy gave a smothered yelp as he dragged her from the elevator and into his apartment foyer.

  “Have you been sitting in bars again?” he grated, propelling her through the Sutton Place contemporary living room with its black leather and chrome and the lighted étagères that held his collectibles. “I’ll strangle you if you go back to doing that!”

  “What’s the matter with you?” Lacy cried, trying to drag her hand out of his grip. “You sound like I’ve got some sort of hang-up. You’re the one with the bar-sitting fetish, not me!”

  “Lacy,” he said, breathing hard.

  “It’s Fishman Brothers’ Tacky-Max,” she yelled, still struggling. “You ought to recognize it—you’ve been reading all my stuff, checking up on my work so you’d have an excuse to fire me, right? Oh, don’t deny, Michael Echevarria, that you’ve been reading everything I’ve written at Fad magazine, that you’ve had it sent to your office so you could catch me in something!”

  “I’ve read your work, yes,” he admitted stonily.

  “Of course you have! Don’t bother to deny, either, that you tried to get me promoted so I could fall on my face!” In a frenzy of hurt and frustration, Lacy grabbed the little disco hat from its bobby-pin moorings in her cloud of curls and tore it loose and flung it on the floor. “Assistant editor—oh, really! You’re really into rotten power games when you want something. And you want me, right?”

  “I don’t deny that,” he said.

  “You’re playing dirty again,” she accused. “Promoting me to a job I know absolutely nothing about is a great way to have me blow everything, isn’t it? Then, when I mess up, you can fire me and set me up as your mistress! I’m just another corporate maneuver, admit it! I’m just another profitable acquisition!”

  Lacy kicked at the little disco hat lying on the floor, then decided to stamp on it viciously. He took a step back, eyes narrowed.

  “You got promoted because you have talent. Which is more than I can say for most of the Fad editorial staff.”

  “I’m not listening to you,” Lacy cried, putting her hands over her ears. “I always get into trouble that way!”

  “It’s my impression,” he said evenly, “that you could catch onto the assistant editor’s job fast enough if you wanted to. If you worked as hard at it as you’ve been working since you started at Fad.”

  She stared at him wildly. “It’s a trick,” she panted.

  “No trick.” His expression was icy. “The magazine’s full of dead wood; that’s why every staff member is currently being evaluated. You were at the employees’ meeting—you heard what I said.”

  Lacy stared at him, confused.

  “The ‘Tacky-Max’ story was fresh and original. If you can write like that, the magazine needs you.

  “And if,” he continued, his eyes deliberately raking her from the soles of her Roman-sandaled feet to the top of her puffed hair, “you can demonstrate you’re serious by giving up your compulsion to be—humorous.”

  “You don’t mean that,” Lacy said shakily. “You don’t really think I ought to be an assistant editor.”

  He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Suit yourself. But you’re not going out tonight dressed in that—dressed in that damned thing. Go get changed.”

  “No, don’t cut me off like that,” she protested. “I want to discuss this with you.”

  “Later,” he said, taking her by the arm to steer her toward the bedroom. “I want to get you into something more presentable.”

  “No,” Lacy said, trying to hang back. “Listen—I can choose my own clothes! I’m wearing what I want to wear!

  “In spite of your nasty mind, I haven’t been sitting in a bar somewhere,” she cried rebelliously.

  “You’re not going to the opera with—Michael Jackson all over your chest,” he said with clenched teeth.

  “The opera?” She tried to resist as he pushed her through the bedroom door and toward the bed. “You mean we’re doing the opera scene now? Like, last week dinner on the back porch at Lutece, tonight the opera? Where are you going to hide me this time—in the ladies’ room? Throw a blanket over me and prop me against the wall?”

  He held her firmly by the shoulder with one strong, tanned hand. “I’m not going to hide you anywhere, you’re being ridiculous. Although, believe me, Lacy,” he growled, “considering your lack of ... restraint in these matters, it’s a temptation.” His other hand worked to find the zipper on the back of the blue satin Disco Flame Queen number.

  “Restraint?” she shot back, wriggling in his grasp. “Lack or restraint? Just because I won’t let you bully me—treat me like a—a—thing?”

  “I’m taking you to the Metropolitan,” he said calmly as he unzipped the satin disco dress and slid it from her shoulders. “We’re going to see La Bohème by Puccini, with Placido Domingo. The tickets cost me a fortune, getting them at the last minute like this.”

  Lacy stared at him in disbelief. “What, out there in New York City with all those people?” she said, grabbing her suddenly bared bra with both her hands. The Fishman Brothers’ Michael Jackson special slid down around her knees and fell in a crumpled pile at her feet. “You mean you trust me not to jump in the orchestra and start molesting the violin section? You mean you think I can control myself?”

  “I never accused you of anything like that,” he said somewhat distractedly as his eyes followed the dress.

  “Not directly, no,” she cried, “but it’s all you’ve been saying since we first met!”

  He seemed not to be listening. He was staring at her suddenly revealed willowy body in a scrap of lace brassiere and midnight-blue bikini panties.

  “You’re going to be Professor Higgins to my Eliza Doolittle, that’s what you have in mind, isn’t it?” Lacy cried. “We’re going to play your version of My Fair Lady with good restaurants, fine wines, couturier clothes and now grand opera? Tell me, is this for the assistant editor’s job at Fad? Or is it your idea of a training program on how to be your high-class mistress? That is, after you fire me!”

  “Lacy.” He was clenching and unclenching his jaw so that a small muscle contracted spasmodically. “You’re wearing a black garter belt again,” he said in an unsteady voice.

  “The garter belt goes with the disco look,” Lacy snapped. “Look, there’s one thing we need to get strai—”

  He abruptly pulled her to him, the Antarctic ice breaking up under a warm, rushing spring flood. “Lacy,” he murmured with a strained reluctance, “you drive me crazy.” Both his hands were on her hips, pulling her against the hard, muscled length of his legs and his hips. “No other woman—” He lowered his dark head to her. “No other woman has ever had this effect on me,” he growled as his lips touched hers.

  By now, Lacy knew, shutting her eyes, kissing Michael Echevarria should be reasonably predictable. All the zap! bam! powie! should be a foregone conclusion. But actually she never knew what was going to happen. It was different every time. There was certainly nothing predictable in this new, stunning electricity that was more intense than anything that had ever happened before, as it leaped from his mouth and shot through her body into her very bones.

  “Oh, Michael,” Lacy murmured breathlessly.

  She felt his teeth nibbling at her lower lip, then his tongue seeking the warm, sweet recesses of her mouth. Passionate waves of excitement shook her. He was shaking, too, as his strong body clasped her to him so possessively it left her gasping. His hands explored her, stroking and caressing the small of her back, then sliding up her bare shoulder blades
, moving quickly under her arms to seize the heavy curve of her lace-covered breasts. She shuddered, throwing herself into those big, warm hands. A long hard finger hooked into the top of her garter belt and circled it, strong and firm against her fevered skin.

  Garter belts turned him on, she thought dizzily. Everything seemed to turn him on. No other woman had ever done this to him, that’s what he’d said. She’d reduced the president and chairman of the board to a hot, surging thrust of molten lava.

  “Lacy—beautiful Lacy,” he growled against her mouth. “This is madness.”

  Lacy could have melted for pure joy in his arms right then. The room reeled about them as she tried to burrow closer to that big, magnificent body. She heard the answering rasp of desire deep in his throat.

  Suddenly he stiffened. “We can’t do this.” She felt him trying to pry himself away. He pulled her clutching hands down. “You have to get dressed.”

  Lacy closed her eyes, drunk on the moment. “Forget it,” she murmured, reaching for him again. “Let’s just put an opera record on the stereo, and let’s say we went.”

  He bent and picked up a long dark-red length of evening gown from the bed. Before Lacy knew what was happening, ruby-colored velvet folds descended over her head.

  “Hey!” she protested. Then, as her head emerged, “Listen, I hate Puccini. I don’t want whatever it is you’ve got for me to wear this time. Are you listening? Can we do that kiss over again?”

  He definitely wasn’t listening. He had stepped back to view the effect.

  “Oh, my,” Lacy whispered as she saw her reflection in the mirrors on the far side of the room.

  If this was another custom-made gown, it even surpassed what had been done last time. A reasonably sane, normal woman could be excused if she had a nervous breakdown wanting to wear it. The ruby-red velvet was cut to a deep, revealing décolletage held up by thin velvet-cord straps that dazzlingly displayed Lacy’s creamy-gold shoulders and breasts. The deep-red folds of the gown clasped her body in a Renaissance bodice and then dropped away to fall in heavy, regal folds that swept the floor. It was almost a costume. The opera was going to have a bad time competing.