“When…how long…I’m so glad you’re home,” Nellie blurted out as she struggled to her feet. She drew in her breath. “How handsome you look! Are those aviator wings? That explains it! We all thought you’d joined the army. Lieutenant, yet. However did you manage it? You must know some very important people in high places.” What was he doing here? she thought wildly. Calm—she had to remain calm, not let him upset her, no matter what he said. Everything was taken care of, she’d done it all legally. What could he do?
“I’ve been here awhile,” Philippe said, watching her with narrowed eyes. “You might say I’ve been getting the lay of the land. I understand you’ve been guarding”—he waited a moment before he dragged out the words—“my fortune.”
“Yes, I’ve made some excellent investments,” she replied nervously. “I think you’ll be…satisfied.”
“In both our names?” he asked with a grim smile.
“No, yes…well, not exactly. Actually, they’re in Little Philly’s trust.”
He nodded. “Little Philly. Your son?”
“Our son, Philippe Reuben Tarz. Not just mine, ours,” she emphasized. “My attorney said it was the right thing to do since none of us had heard from you. Oh, Philippe, I wrote you every day, twelve thousand letters, and had nowhere to mail them. Why didn’t you write or call?” she asked tearfully.
He ignored her. “I don’t have a son. You have a son. I never touched you, so let’s not have any lies. I’m back now, and this is all going to get straightened out.”
“Philippe, you weren’t yourself then,” Nellie said desperately. “How could you forget something so important? How can you say you never touched me? Little Philly is the living proof. He even has your nose and chin. Ask anyone.
“You drank too much that second night, that’s why you don’t remember,” she continued when he didn’t respond. “We have a son, and you don’t even remember making love to me. I remember, I remember every little detail, and what do you do? You run off like a little boy and join the navy and lie about everything. You’re lying about Little Philly now because you don’t want the responsibility of being a husband and father. How could you do this to me?” she wailed. “How?”
“I never touched you,” Philippe said stonily. “I’m going to petition the courts and have all that crap you took care of rescinded. You’re not going to get away with this. I’m having the marriage annulled.”
Nellie shook her head, eyes glittering. “That’s going to be hard to do with a baby in evidence and your past record. And I’m not giving you a divorce, either! When you come to your senses we can talk about your loss of memory. Your convenient loss of memory,” she spat out. “You wait right here.” She was gone in a flash of running legs, returning a minute later with a pink-cheeked toddler in her arms. “This, Philippe, is our son!”
Philippe stepped back and almost fell into the pool. He drew in his breath in a sharp hiss. “He’s not mine, he’s yours. I don’t care what you say or how you say it, he isn’t mine!”
“Let’s hold on a minute,” Daniel shouted from the terrace.
Philippe and Nellie turned in surprise. Daniel’s heart hammered in his chest as he approached them. Lord, if Reuben could only see his son now.
“Sir,” Philippe said respectfully.
Daniel grimaced. “How…Are those aviator wings you’re wearing?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes, sir.”
“How?”
Philippe allowed himself a small smile. “The same way you got to Harvard, sir. Mr. Sugar helped me.”
Daniel nodded. “I can see that you two young people are pretty hotheaded right now, so I’ll mediate this. Philippe, I want to hear from you what the hell happened. I’ve already heard Nellie’s version.”
“As you know, we got married. However, we never…consummated the marriage.” Philippe looked Daniel straight in the eye. “It was my decision—I wanted it that way. And afterward…well, I knew I never should have done it, gone off like that, and I regretted it immediately. I just turned tail and ran, that’s the beginning and end of it. I stopped by my mother’s to say good-bye and gave her a new power of attorney. Now I understand that all my money has been turned over to Nellie’s son. But this is not my child. I never touched Nellie—not before we were married or after we were married. I swear to you, I did not touch her. I don’t know whose baby this is, but it isn’t mine!”
For the first time in his life Daniel was truly at a loss for words. Philippe sounded truthful. What was worse, he believed the boy. Finally he found his voice. “Those are very serious statements, Philippe.”
“I know that, sir, and I’m not making them lightly. When I left here I was a fabulously wealthy man by American standards, thanks to my mother. I go off, fight for your country, and when I come back I find out that your daughter has used the time to misrepresent my wishes and then question my very existence—all in order to help herself to my fortune. I’m not proud of the way I went off, but I feel I redeemed myself and I want what’s mine. I’m willing to make a settlement with Nellie for all the aggravation I’ve put her through. Whatever you think is fair, sir.”
“What?” shrieked Nellie. “How dare you! How dare you deny this is your child! You’re insane! Settle with me? I already have it all—you can’t settle with me!” Little Philly started to cry, his chin trembling at the harsh, strident words.
“Now look what you’ve done, you’ve made him cry!” Nellie ran into the house, gave him over to the nanny and was back at poolside in less than two minutes, her eyes shooting sparks.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this to me,” she cried. “This should be the happiest moment in our lives, and you’re standing there in that handsome uniform lying to my face!
“You’ve fallen in love with someone else, haven’t you?” she continued, groping wildly for a plausible diversion. At her husband’s startled expression she realized her shot in the dark had hit home. Daniel saw it, too. “And now you don’t want me anymore or Little Philly. You found someone else, and you think you can get rid of us. Well, it isn’t going to work, Philippe. I don’t care about myself, but we have a son to consider. I stayed home, was faithful, I wrote you every single day, and I had the baby alone while you were falling in love with someone else.”
She turned to her father. “Now do you believe me?” she demanded. At Daniel’s obvious distress and uncertainty, she shrieked in frustration and flailed her fists in the air. “All right! I don’t care if you do or not! You can go to hell!” She whirled on Philippe. “Get out of here, husband dear, and don’t come back. Or I’ll get a restraining order from the police!”
Daniel’s stomach churned as he watched his daughter run into the house. The vicious pounding in his head was making him nauseated. He turned to Philippe. “Is it true? Have you fallen in love with someone else?”
“Yes, sir, that’s true,” Philippe replied soberly, “but it just happened. It has nothing to do with why I left Nellie. I am not that child’s father. I never touched your daughter!”
“I think we better leave. And I wouldn’t come back here, Philippe,” Daniel advised. “Nellie will get a restraining order. Everything is on her side, and I have to be honest, you don’t have a chance in court. The baby makes all the difference, and if I’m called as a witness, I’ll have to testify that you admitted you’re in love with someone else. Think very carefully, Philippe. Whoever it is you’re in love with is innocent in all of this, and you don’t want to drag her through a mud-slinging divorce. You don’t want to ruin her name. This is what your father would tell you.”
Philippe seethed. “That’s not what my father would tell me, and you damn well know it. He’d tell me to fight for what’s right. I told you the truth—Nellie is the one who’s lying. Jesus, can’t you see it? She’s sick, Mr. Bishop!”
“I don’t want to hear any more, Philippe,” Daniel snapped. “Believe it or not, I am not involved in all of this. However, there is one thing you should know. Bebe came to
my office a little while ago and I gave her my two voting certificates. I believe she intends to turn them over to you. I agreed to the transfer only because I felt, as she did, that Mickey—and Reuben—would have wanted it that way. But I absolutely refuse to take sides between you and Nellie. You’ll have to straighten out this mess yourselves. I suggest you do it legally….”
Philippe smarted over Daniel’s words all the way back to his mother’s house. This couldn’t be happening to him, it just couldn’t. How could a young woman so pretty and innocent-looking be so evil? The baby was…whose? The fact that he now held the controlling interest in Fairmont didn’t fully register until he reached Bebe’s house and saw the stock certificates on the table, where his mother sat waiting for him.
He was angrier than he’d ever been in his life. He was also scared. “More than anything,” he told his mother, “I feel guilty. All those years when my…other mother tried to safeguard her fortune for me, I took it for granted. Now it’s gone, in trust for a child I don’t even know.”
“But Nellie has control of that trust,” she pointed out. “She made sure of that. You’re going to have to see an attorney first thing tomorrow. If nothing else, the wheels will be in motion. How did Daniel take it?”
Philippe grinned wryly. “He talked more like a lawyer than a father. I had the feeling there was a lot of strain between him and Nellie. Also, I think those two certificates were a thousand-pound weight on his shoulders. If you want my opinion, I think he was relieved to part with them.”
Philippe’s gaze was far away as he idly stirred a fresh cup of coffee. “I won’t win any court contest. Nellie…Nellie homed in on the fact that I’m in love with someone else. She said I wanted to be rid of her and the baby so I could be with my new love…made a big deal about being loyal and waiting, having the baby alone and writing me all these letters…. Mr. Bishop asked me how I got into flight school, and I told him about Mr. Sugar. Nellie will probably use that, too. I’ll be painted as a bogus war hero trying to steal a child’s trust fund so I can go off with my girlfriend.”
Mother and son stared across the table at each other. From outside came the happy sounds of the children frolicking in the pool. “Cut my losses and go on from here, right?” Philippe said at last. Bebe nodded. “I never wanted the studio. I still don’t want it. I made no plans for the future, and I don’t know why. I guess I didn’t want to think that I might eventually end up here. Mike knows what he wants to do. He was born to fly, and that’s what he does best. He’s going to take out a loan and open up a flying school. I was going to surprise him and give him the money. Now I can’t do that. It looks like I have no other choice but to come back to the studio. There’s nothing I can do about Lizzie, either. If I file for divorce, Nellie will contest it, and I know they’ll paint Lizzie as some kind of…I can’t do that to her,” he said miserably.
“You’re standing on a very rocky road, Philippe. It’s a terrible feeling, I know because I’ve been over that road.” Bebe sighed. “It’s definite, then, you aren’t going to fight Nellie?”
“I’ll talk to a lawyer, but for every reason I can come up with to fight her, there are three more why I shouldn’t.” He shook his head. “I don’t want to hurt Lizzie or have her family dragged into something because of my stupidity. The baby…that’s her ace in the hole and she knows it. Whoever would have thought she’d be that devious, that evil?”
Bebe grimaced. “Jane knew. She saw it first. In my heart I know Daniel agrees, but unless he sees Nellie take an ax and kill someone, he isn’t going to do anything. He is so incredibly loyal. In the end, if it comes down to the wire and he has to choose, really has to choose between what you say and what Nellie says, he’d go with you. At least the old Daniel would. What strange paths we’ve all taken,” she said sadly.
“Well, you’re on the right road now,” Philippe said, reaching across the table to squeeze her hand.
“All I can tell you, Philippe, is if I can do it so can you. Believe in yourself and you can do anything.” She rose and began to pace the kitchen floor. “Look, why don’t you go to Jane and ask her to come back to the studio. Listen to her. You’ll be starting out fresh, from the bottom, just the way your father did when he began working at the studio. Fairmont was a low-grade sleaze operation when my father had it. He was no businessman, but Reuben was. And you’re your father’s son, Philippe. This is just a suggestion, but while you were gone I’ve been thinking. Your friend, Mike, you said, loves to fly. How about some pictures with stunt flying? War hero turned stunt pilot…publicity could get a lot of mileage out of that. It’s worth a thought if you seriously plan on taking over the studio.”
He shrugged. “I don’t have any other choice. There’s no way I’m going to let Nellie get her money-grubbing hands on it.”
“Good for you! The studio is open for business. You should take Mike down and show him around when he wakes up.” Bebe smiled at her son. “I have the impression—correct me if I’m wrong—that you two are friends, the way Daniel and your father are friends.”
“I’d say so.” Philippe finished his coffee, his eyes on the children through the kitchen window. “Great bunch of kids. Jesus, what they’ve been through, and they can still laugh.”
“At night they cry,” Bebe said softly. “All of them.”
“I’ve learned that each of us has to make our own happiness. My mother used to tell me that, but I didn’t understand. She made me happy. I wanted to cry, to grieve, but I can’t. Maybe I never will.” He turned to Bebe, his eyes deep with memory. “She’s still with me. In my mind I can see her, see her so clearly. My mother and cantankerous Yvette.”
“Life goes on, Philippe,” Bebe said, leading him to the stairway. “Get some sleep and we’ll talk later. I…I’m very proud of you, as proud as your mother would be if she were here. You’re going to make it, even if you think things are…at their lowest ebb. You’re my son, mine and Reuben’s, and if there’s one thing both of us learned, each in our own way, it’s how to survive. Someday Nellie will be nothing but a bad memory.” She patted his hand. “If you aren’t up by dinnertime, I’ll wake you.”
Philippe leaned over and kissed his mother lightly on the cheek. He grinned then, his eyes sparkling with sudden confidence. Bebe’s hand flew to her mouth. “You look so much like your father,” she said, “it’s uncanny. If only he could see you now. When you first arrived you were a young boy, and now you’re a young man. You bring back so many memories….”
At the top of the stairs Philippe turned, smiled Reuben’s smile, and saluted his mother smartly. She smiled back and nodded.
After all this time she had another son, she thought, a bittersweet ache in her heart. Oh, Reuben, if only you were here. If only you could see him now the way I see him. But do fathers ever view their sons the way mothers do?
This was her time now, hers and the little ones’.
She walked out into the sunshine that filled her life and waved to the children. “I’m coming,” she called. “I’m coming.”
Nellie raced through the kitchen, stopping only when the swinging door into the dining room closed behind her. Dropping to her haunches, she took huge, gut-wrenching breaths to ward off her dizziness.
He was back. All the praying, all the wishing, had been in vain. He should be dead, she wanted him to be dead. Why wasn’t he dead? Everything was ruined now. She choked back a sob of anger.
Get up, she urged herself. Get up and go upstairs, where you can close the door and think. Plan.
Her legs were rubbery as she planted one foot in front of the other up the stairs. He was in love with someone else. That she hadn’t counted on; how could she, when she’d been so sure he was dead and never coming back? Men in love did stupid things, unpredictable things. Besides that, Philippe was too emotional, and emotional people often acted irrationally. Bebe would orchestrate his actions, she was sure of it, just as she was sure that in the end her father would side with Philippe against her.
Nellie paced the frilly bedroom, smacking one clenched fist into the other. How, she asked herself. How could she best them at their own game? As it stood now, she had all of Philippe’s money and 49 percent of Fairmont Studios—and in case of a legal contest, she had Little Philly, who had already influenced the courts to her advantage. Philippe, on the other hand, had little more than a story that could never be proved…and the combined wiles of Bebe, Jane Perkins, and—perhaps—her own father.
She was pacing faster and faster now, her movements frenzied, her eyes narrow and mean. The scales might be weighted on her side, she conceded, but that wasn’t enough. She wanted to be sure that nothing of hers could be taken away—and she wanted more.
Full, 100 percent control of Fairmont Studios. Nobody was going to destroy her dream of sweeping down that circular stairway in her sparkling gown with all of Hollywood at her feet. Least of all, a husband she despised.
The phone on her nightstand buzzed to life. Philippe, she wondered. Or her father? Although she didn’t want to talk to either of them, she knew she couldn’t hide. Her hands were shaking as she picked up the receiver and pressed it to her ear.
It was Bebe.
“Good afternoon, Nellie,” she said in a polite, noncommittal tone. “I called to say there will be a board meeting tomorrow morning. I wanted to give you the courtesy of hearing what I have to say in private, so you don’t repeat the performance you gave the last time. I signed over my shares of stock to Philippe this morning.”
Nellie digested the information. “Then that makes us equal partners, doesn’t it?” she said. When she heard Bebe chuckle, her heart began to pound.
“Not quite. Your father signed over his two shares to me this morning, and I am transferring those two shares to Philippe. By the close of business today, he will have controlling interest in Fairmont. Have a nice day, Nellie, and I’ll see you tomorrow at the board meeting.”
“You’re lying!” Nellie snapped. “My father would never give you his shares.” But she knew Bebe was telling the truth. Sold out by her own father!
Sins of the Flesh Page 49
