Facets. Part 14

"I miss it like h.e.l.l."

"You'll get over that. You're looking good." In a more professional tone, she asked, "How've you been?"

He shrugged. "Pretty good." He glanced at the ma.n.u.script he had been reading. "Busy." After a few seconds he rocked forward and put his elbows hard on the desk. "Bored. I've been doing all kinds of fascinating stuff-a biography of the guy who invented sneaker deodorants, a collection of short stories written by gays about their mothers, a how-to book on keeping racc.o.o.ns away from bird feeders, and self-help books on everything from peace of mind to gas pains. We're talking dry, here. Real dry." He widened his eyes. "I need something good, Hillie. My mind is shriveling. I need something with meat, something I can sink my teeth into. When are you going to give it to me?"

Smugly, she patted the briefcase that hung from her shoulder.

His eyes widened even more. "Are you serious?"

"Very."

"You've done something more than those c.r.a.p magazine pieces?"

She didn't take offense. He was too good a friend, and besides, the excitement in his voice was what she had come for. "Those c.r.a.p magazine pieces have been my bread and b.u.t.ter for the past few years, since nothing I've written for you has set the world on fire yet. But this could do it." She took a breath. "I only have the first few chapters, and they're in pretty raw form, but they're yours to see."

Arlan s.n.a.t.c.hed up his pencil and jabbed it toward the chair. "And close the door. No one hears this but me."

Hillary closed the door and, in a cloud of composure, took a seat. "In March, there was a 20/20 piece on John St. George. Did you catch it?"

Arlan shook his head.

"It was interesting," she told him. "Highly favorable. Glowing, actually. It portrayed John as a pillar of the community, a philanthropist, an entrepreneurial genius."

Arlan rolled the pencil back and forth. "From what I hear, the genius part might fit. His stores are hot. How many are there now?"

"Five. The newest are in L.A. and London."

"Some pretty heavy names buy his stuff."

"Heavy names have heavy money, and what better way to spend it than on jewels? They're the ultimate luxury. Not that John buys jewels with the money he makes. He buys plaques on the sides of buildings, recognition for his name, and goodwill. He buys favors."

"Sounds political. Next thing you know, he'll be running for office."

Hillary went very still. "Not if I have any say in it. I know him, Arlan. I know the man; I know his family. I know his fears and his obsessions, and I know of things he's done over the years that would put that 20/20 piece to shame. There's a whole other side to John that no one knows, a whole other story. You want a hot book, that's it. And I can write it."

Arlan sat just as still as she for a minute. Then, in a flurry of movement, he opened a drawer, took a handful of something, and palmed it into his mouth. "Sunflower seeds," he mumbled, brus.h.i.+ng several from his s.h.i.+rt. As an afterthought, he raised his brows and lifted the bag from the drawer.

She shook her head.

He helped himself to a few more, then closed the drawer. "You've been personally involved with the man."

"Some of the best things are done by writers who are personally involved. The bestseller lists are loaded with books by a son or a daughter or a spouse, ex-spouse, or mistress."

"That makes for pretty strong biases."

"And pretty strong reading. For years you've been telling me that my work lacks fire. This won't. Believe me."

Arlan hesitated. He was rolling the pencil again. "I believe you. But this smells commercial. Your other work has been intellectual."

She tossed a glance at the ceiling. "So you say."

"The critics said it too."

"And what good did it do me? How many copies did we sell?"

"It takes time to build a reputation. Those books were a beginning. They were intellectually exciting."

"This one will be, too." She leaned forward, bracing her elbows on the arms of the chair. "Don't you see? That's my skill-to pull deeper meaning out of something seemingly shallow. That was what my biography of Dorothea DeBlois was all about. Her name meant nothing. She was a newspaper colunmist whose work had been buried. But she wrote things before 1910 that are right on the mark today. And there were good reasons why she saw things the way she did, reasons that had to do with the times and her family and where she lived. That was what I was able to bring out in the book. That was where the excitement came from."

Recomposing herself, she looked Arlan in the eye. "I can make the same kind of excitement with this one. The book will sell because of who it's about. The 20/20 segment is proof of that. John is a marketable commodity now, only I have a unique angle. I can offer insight into the man and his mind. I can a.n.a.lyze him in ways that no therapist could because John would never open up to a therapist. But he's opened to me. I'm the one to do it, Arlan."

He was interested. She could see it in his eyes. Still he held back. "How long have you known John St. George?"

"The first time I set eyes on him, I was twelve. The first time I talked with him, I was fifteen. I was seventeen when we became friends. I'm forty-four now. You figure it out."

Arlan arched a brow. "Friends all that time?"

"Enemies on occasion. All friends are."

"And lovers?"

"I didn't say we were lovers."

"But you were. Did you have a falling out?"

"Why do you ask that?"

"Because writing a book like the one you're talking about won't please him. He may hate you."

"Making The New York Times list will be ample compensation for that."

"There are no guarantees. If you write the book and it doesn't make the lists, you'll still have made an enemy. What then?"

"Life goes on." The words came blithely. Lord knew she'd said them enough times in the last few days.

"Without John?"

"My G.o.d, Arlan, you have a one-track mind. Yes, life goes on without John! He isn't the be-all and end-all of my world! Why are you making such an issue of this?"

"Because I don't understand your relations.h.i.+p with him. It's another piece of the puzzle you are, and, dammit, you are a puzzle. Your life before New York is a big blank to me. Each time I ask, you evade."

"My life is New York."

"Baloney. You didn't just grow like Topsy in a corner of Central Park. You spent six years in Boston before you came here, and eighteen before that in Tammany Hall-"

"Timiny Cove," she corrected, smiling in spite of herself. "Why do you always do that?"

"Because the place has no meaning to me. You won't say a thing about it. There are times when I wonder whether it isn't fict.i.tious."

"It isn't."

"Then it must be some kind of evil little town that you had to flee on threat of death."

"Not quite." Her smile went flat. "But we all move on. You did it when you left Poughkeepsie. Do I ask you what it was like as a little boy growing up there?"

"You already know it was boring as sin." He tapped a pen against his chin. "And anyway, maybe you're not into understanding my mind the way I'm into understanding yours. I adore you."

Hillary sighed and looked at the ceiling.

"I do," he insisted. "If I didn't have a perfectly good wife at home-"

"How is she, by the way?"

He settled back in his seat. "p.i.s.sed off that I won't take her to Puerto Vallarta next month, but otherwise fine."

"Why won't you take her to Puerto Vallarta?"

"Because every time I set foot in Mexico, I get sick. I told her to find a place in Florida, maybe one of the Keys. But she wants Puerto Vallarta. What's so special about Puerto Vallarta?"

"The person you're there with," Hillary replied, then paused, stricken. She'd spent her fortieth birthday in Puerto Vallarta with John. It was one of the few times they'd traveled together. John rarely took vacations. He was a workaholic in the truest sense of the word. His initial motivation had been building the business, but it had been a long time since the business had demanded the hours he still put in. To him, work was both an excuse and an escape. It was one way to keep people at a comfortable distance. For all his success, he had never come to feel totally accepted by, and therefore at ease with, society's creme de la creme.

Of course, that hadn't come out on 20/20.

Spurred by that thought, Hillary took a breath. "I have to write this book, Arlan. It's something in me that's aching to be done."

"All of a sudden?"

"No. I've thought of doing it before." More than once over the years, as she'd watched John transform St. George Mining from a small-scale gem enterprise into the sophisticated parent of Facets, she had thought to doc.u.ment the change. Corporate reports told only half the story. "But I was never quite sure before now that John was a big enough somebody to make the book a success. And I want a success. I need one. I'm forty-four and growing older every day. I've had two books published, neither with much hoopla, and dozens of magazine articles that may or may not have been read. I've reached a plateau. My career is stagnating. If I don't hit it big soon, I'll run out of time. Or strength. Or sanity." She scowled. "Dammit, I want my turn on Donahue. I want to be written up in People. I want to go to parties and have people know what I do for a living. I want to be someone."

"Like John St. George?"

His words stopped her cold. "Yes, like John St. George." She didn't hide her pique. "I can't take away from what he's achieved. No one can do that. John took over St. George Mining after his father died and built it into something his father hadn't begun to dream of. Professionally, the man deserves kudos. As a person, he stinks."

She went to look out the window. The view was concrete and bleak. "John St. George is a totally self-centered man. At an early age he decided what he wanted in life and set out to get it. The real shrewdness hasn't been so much in how he built Facets as in how he used people along the way. No one steps in his path and stays there for long. He sweeps them away-threatens them, bribes them, manipulates them so cleverly that some don't even know it's happened. He may have done enough work to earn his place in the limelight, but there are a h.e.l.l of a lot of people who should be right up there with him."

"Like who?"

"Like Pam. His sister, stepsister, actually."

"The jewelry designer?"

Hillary sent a wry grin toward Arlan's reflection in the dirty gla.s.s. The fact that he knew who Pam was made her point about the family's prominence. "That's right. Her work is what makes Facets so special. And successful. But John pretends not to see that. He concentrates on the ledger's bottom line. G.o.d forbid he should acknowledge that Pam contributes something crucial to that bottom line." She turned. "And then there's Patricia, John's stepmother. I won't begin to tell you what he did to her. Suffice it to say that she lives in a private inst.i.tution on the outskirts of Boston. And Cutter, who should have been Pam's husband-what John has done to Cutter is unconscionable."

Those three were the most obvious examples. Angry and tense at the thought, she said, "The h.e.l.l of it is that he got away with it. He hasn't been called to account for half of what he's done in his life, and he blithely goes on as though he hasn't a thing to regret. We're talking warped values here. The man doesn't have a conscience."

"So what do you see in him?"

She should have known Arlan would ask. But how could she answer? How did one explain a case of idol wors.h.i.+p that had turned into an obsession? She had been aware of John's faults for years, but they hadn't diminished her attraction to him. Even now, after he'd dumped her so cruelly, she wasn't sure that if she were face to face with him she'd be able to spit in his eye.

"You've been friends a long time," Arlan prodded. "What's the basis for the friends.h.i.+p?"

"Time, history, mutual appreciation of slow dancing-I don't know, Arlan." She wished he wouldn't push. The issue was too sensitive. "You reach a point where the relations.h.i.+p is a basis in itself. Maybe it's habit."

"Or compulsion."

"Maybe." She faced him head-on. "But if that's so, it'll make for d.a.m.n good reading. Now, are you interested in this book, or aren't you, because if you're not, I'm taking it elsewhere." She felt in control again and filled with resolve. There was solace in knowing that John's betrayal was being put to good use. "I don't want to have to go elsewhere. We work well together, you and I. We both know this is your kind of story. It involves a smooth, good-looking, wealthy guy." She arched a luring brow. "Wouldn't you love to see him smeared?"

She'd pressed the right b.u.t.ton. Arlan McGregor was a pleasant-looking man, only minimally stocky, with wonderful long dark hair that showed no sign of thinning. There was something of the teddy bear about him, which was one of the reasons why Hillary liked him. Even without the girth, he had a cuddly quality, and though she'd never actually cuddled against him, she'd taken full advantage of his kindness. She respected his editorial expertise; she understood his need to ask pointed questions; but through it all he was gentle, which meant a lot more to her than das.h.i.+ng good looks.

He was not suave. He'd been known to mistakenly introduce a to-be-wooed reviewer as an art a.s.sistant, and at more than one publicity event he'd dripped c.o.c.ktail sauce on his s.h.i.+rt.

Nor was he wealthy. He had risen from Poughkeepsie's working cla.s.s, gone through college on scholars.h.i.+p, and held numerous jobs working with words before settling down in his present office. At forty-six, he was a senior editor with some status, and though he complained at times, he liked his job. But it would never make him rich.

That didn't mean he couldn't poke fun at those who were, or feel a certain satisfaction when one of the high and mighty took a fall. John St. George was one of the high and mighty. The look on Arlan's face told Hillary that if she could make John stumble, Arlan would be the first to tout her book.

Motioning toward her briefcase, he held out his hand.

One week later, she was back in his office, wearing the same calm look, though she felt anything but calm. The first part of her book lay on the desk. Arlan was leaning back, his hands linked over his stomach, fingers clenched more tightly than they should have been. She wasn't sure if that was because he didn't like what she'd done and didn't want to tell her, or because he wanted a cigarette.

"Well?" she asked when she could bear the suspense no longer.

"You didn't tell me St. George was engaged."

That wasn't what she had expected to hear. She had to work harder at looking calm. "Is that supposed to be relevant?"

"Could be," he said and smirked. "Do we bill the author as the woman scorned?"

The operative phrase was "bill the author." Her eyes lit up. "You liked it?"

"I liked it. You knew I would," he chided. "But you didn't answer my question. Are you the woman scorned?"

"Of course not. John and I never had any kind of formal arrangement. We're just old friends who go back a long way." Pleased with that explanation and the cool way she'd offered it, she asked, "Why? Would it matter if that weren't so?"

Arlan picked up a paper clip and began tapping. "I like this book. I want it done. But if your motivation for writing it isn't entirely professional-"

"I've been thinking of writing it for years. I told you that. If anything, it was the 20/20 piece that got me going. And the going's good, Arlan. This story flows." Her excitement grew as she spoke. "I've spent most of my adult life as a writer, and I've done my share of struggling with words and phrases. This book is different. It's the one I was born to write." She barely paused. "Couldn't you tell?"

He tossed the paper clip aside and squirmed in his seat. "I could tell."

She frowned. "So why are you fidgeting?"

"I'm fidgeting because I'm dying."

She tried to be sympathetic. "Still want one?"

The look in his eyes said he'd kill for a puff just then. "Your ma.n.u.script took my mind off it for a while."

She grinned. "I knew you'd like it. I could feel it. The words came so easily. Something connected."