Naked Angel

by Logan Belle

  He nodded slowly.

  “Oh, Justin,” she said, shaking her head.

  “What? What did I miss?” said Alec.

  “I don’t want to get into it right now,” said Justin. “I just wanted to tell you guys as soon as possible so you could either talk to Martha or start thinking about your exit strategy.”

  “I don’t want an exit strategy!” said Mallory. “I love this place. We haven’t financed it, but we’ve put everything we have into it—all of our time, all of our creative energy, and a lot of emotional investment, too.”

  “I’m sorry I let you down,” said Justin. He pushed his chair back, stood, and walked slowly out to the club exit.

  “I cannot believe this,” said Mallory. “If we had six months or a year, we could maybe build a strong enough reputation to find another investor. But we just opened.”

  “You’re right. We need to buy time.”

  “We can’t buy anything!”

  “Mal, don’t freak out. I just need to correct my earlier statement about the Vegas Burlesque Fest.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s no longer just a fun little competition. It’s going to be how we finance the club for the next six months.”

  24

  Gemma climbed the narrow, winding stairs to the second floor of Agnes’s studio. It was dark and quiet. Where was the old bat?

  She couldn’t wait to quit. Five months of indentured servitude was quite enough, thank you. It was onward and upward.

  Way up.

  It still made her wet just thinking about the other night at the crazy fetish club. Finally, she had felt that thing that had eluded her all her life: sexual gratification. She’d thought she was forever doomed to wonder what on earth all these people were so worked up over when it came to sex. She had been so tired of feeling nothing. But how could she have imagined what it would take for her to get off? And even if she had imagined it, she never would have had the nerve to seek it out. But thanks to Violet, the riddle of her own pussy had been solved.

  She descended the stairs and looked around the cutting room. The costumes she’d started working on for Justin’s dancers were in various stages of completion. She wished she could use parts of them for Violet’s “Tank Girl” costumes, but there was nothing in the “Ballet Russes” collection that was even remotely salvageable. There was absolutely no sartorial overlap between ballet and steampunk. She would have to just abandon them. Perhaps Agnes would be able to complete them in time for Mallory to use the costumes. Gemma couldn’t care less—it wasn’t her problem anymore.

  It was exciting to imagine the new costumes. Gemma wasn’t a comic book fan, but she’d already starting researching images of Tank Girl online, and the character kicked ass—literally and visually. She would barely consider it work to create the costumes if it weren’t for the ridiculously tight deadline.

  The front door opened, startling her out of her thoughts.

  “What are you doing here?” she said as Justin Baxter walked in with an armful of white roses.

  “I wanted to apologize,” he said, handing her the flowers with a smile. She took the bundle and dropped them on her desk as if they were on fire.

  “Look, this really isn’t a good time for me,” she said, walking back to the front door and opening it for him.

  “Can you just hear me out?”

  She saw that he had no intention of leaving until she did, so she sighed and closed the door. She hadn’t planned on telling him that she was quitting—she’d thought she would leave that little bit of news to Agnes to break. As far as she was concerned, she and Justin Baxter had nothing left to talk about. Ever.

  “Fine. Speak. You have two minutes. Agnes will be here soon, and I need to talk to her.”

  “I’m sorry about the money I promised you for the Vegas costumes. I didn’t think Martha would give me a hard time about it. She never has before. I think she realized you and I have been seeing each other.”

  Gemma looked at him like he was out of his mind.

  “We are not seeing each other,” said Gemma.

  “Did I make you feel that way? It was more than just sex to me, Gemma. I can’t stop thinking about you—I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since opening night of The Painted Lady. And now I don’t have to sneak around anymore. Martha and I are getting divorced.”

  “Are you out of your mind?” said Gemma. “How are you going to pay for the club? And the costumes?”

  “I don’t know. But what does that matter to you?”

  “That’s the only thing that ever mattered to me! It was business, Justin.”

  The expression on his face could not have been more shocked if she had slapped him.

  “So now that we can’t do business together, we really have nothing left to talk about.”

  “You don’t want to see me anymore?”

  “Um … no.”

  “What about the Vegas costumes?”

  She shrugged. “Not my problem. I’m not working at Agnes’s sweatshop any more.”

  “I don’t understand. What are you going to do?”

  “I’m the new costume designer for Violet’s Blue Angel.”

  Nadia couldn’t stop thinking about Max. She knew that she had, in theory, done the right thing by not letting him dissuade her from working at The Painted Lady. But now, sitting in the empty club, she felt she had traded a real relationship for the idea of burlesque. And she had to wonder if she had just used burlesque as an excuse to avoid getting hurt again. After all, it was easier to let the argument over burlesque become a deal breaker than to actually have a relationship and see it end six months or a year down the line.

  “Hello—Earth to Nadia,” Mallory said.

  Nadia looked across the table. “Sorry.”

  They were working on choreography for Vegas. For some reason, Mallory’s confidence in the Ballet Russes idea was shaken.

  “I’m just afraid it’s not specific enough,” she had said.

  “So let’s focus on one particular production from that time period,” Nadia had said. And then Mallory had asked her to suggest one, and Nadia had started thinking about Balanchine’s staging of Apollo in 1928, and then she thought of his School of American Ballet, which led her to think about Ballet Arts and Max … and then she zoned out.

  “Where did I lose you?” Mallory said.

  “I was just thinking about Max.”

  “Have you spoken to him since the party?”

  “I saw him later that night. He said he was sorry for what he did, but he still wants me to quit burlesque and find some way to work in ballet.”

  “He’ll come around,” Mallory said.

  Nadia shook her head. “No. It’s over.”

  “That’s ridiculous, Nadia. You two will just have to agree to disagree on whatever he’s being so stubborn about, and move on.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I’m done thinking about him; he’s out of my life—it’s fine. Let’s just focus on Vegas. If you want a specific ballet from the Ballet Russes period, my favorite is Apollo. And thematically, it’s perfect for this moment in burlesque because Apollo was very much about the reinvention of tradition. Its artistic execution was post-baroque.”

  She remembered the time her mother took her to see Apollo when she was in seventh grade. It was the first ballet she’d seen in New York.

  “What’s the story?” Mallory said.

  “It’s about the Greek god Apollo and three Muses, which is perfect for the Vegas show because you need three dancers. Okay, so most people think of Apollo as the god of the sun, but actually he represents the arts and music, in particular. In the story, Apollo helps the Muses in their arts and ultimately ascends as a god to the home of the Muses, Parnassus.”

  “I don’t know. The idea of ancient Greek costumes sounds very high school musical.”

  “Coco Chanel didn’t think so.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “S
he did the costumes in 1929. You don’t even know—the most brilliant artists have worked on this production. Baryshnikov did a revival in the 1970s. Suzanne Farrell did it in 2001. It’s significant, Mallory.”

  “I’d have to talk to Agnes and Gemma about tailoring the costumes for this. What are the Muses?”

  “They’re the Muses of dance, mime, and poetry.”

  “I have to talk to Poppy and Bette and see who they want to be.” She wrote on her notepad, then looked up at Nadia. “I really want you to come to Vegas with us just to experience the festival.”

  “Of course I’m going with you.” Nadia was looking forward to it.

  Justin walked in, and Nadia’s first thought was that he looked as if someone had died.

  “What’s wrong?” Mallory asked, clearly sharing Nadia’s assessment that Justin did not look happy.

  “I need to talk to you and Alec.”

  “Alec’s not here. He’s working on a piece for New York magazine. What’s going on?”

  Justin sat down, his face pale.

  “It’s about the costumes.”

  25

  Max watched the rehearsal from outside the glass.

  His assistant choreographer, Pauline, was leading the group through their paces. He knew the dancers were aware of his observation. Anna, in particular, was showboating for him.

  He had not slept with Anna since before the night he’d brought her to The Painted Lady. And since becoming involved with Nadia, he had not been with anyone else.

  Was he wrong to put an end to things before he repeated the mistakes of the past? True, they were not his mistakes. But he had suffered because of them all the same.

  Pauline glanced over at him, and he gave her the thumbs up. Satisfied that she had things under control, he left the studio for his office.

  The paperwork for his budget was spread over his desk. As precise and ordered as he was in the studio, his desk and office tended toward chaos. What was that called? Entropy. He could stand the inclination toward disorder in his business, but not in his emotional life.

  He logged onto his computer. The payroll program was still on the screen from early that morning. He minimized it and, though he knew he shouldn’t, he logged onto the Internet. He brought up Google Images and typed her name, “Janine Jasper.”

  Always, he hoped the images were gone. But of course, nothing disappeared from the Internet. And sure enough, the blocks of photographs filled the screen, some grainy, some as clear as if they’d been taken yesterday. He didn’t click on any to enlarge, of course. He’d never looked at any of them closely. And yet, collectively, they were more disturbing than any single one alone.

  They were what had driven his father to leave.

  Max understood, in theory, that opposites attracted. But why had his father, the golden boy from Greenwich, Connecticut, a Yalie, and a superstar banker, thought he could make a life with a fetish model turned soft-core porn actress? Max certainly wasn’t going to make the same mistake.

  Devla, his costume designer, knocked lightly on the door frame.

  “Are we still meeting at ten thirty?” she asked, her voice soft. Her long, thick black hair was pleated in a single braid that fell over her left shoulder. Devla had been a twenty-year-old undergrad at Parsons when one of his girlfriends took him to a fashion show and he spotted her work. Immediately, he’d known she was a mega talent. He had invited her to intern with his costume designer, a guy named Brad Mead. When Brad defected to a rival company, Max asked Devla to replace him. He considered the hire one of his best decisions since founding Ballet Arts.

  “I’ll be there. Just give me five minutes,” he said, shutting down his browser.

  He couldn’t undo the sins of the father. But he could avoid repeating them.

  “Is something wrong with the costumes? You’re freaking me out,” Mallory said.

  Justin turned to Nadia. “Can you excuse us for a minute?”

  Nadia shot Mallory a questioning look and left them alone.

  “Okay, what the hell is going on?”

  Justin took a deep breath.

  “Remember I told you that I was in love with someone else—that I was cheating on Martha?”

  “Of course,” Mallory said. “And that’s why you guys split.”

  He nodded. “There’s more to it, though. The woman was Gemma Kole.”

  Mallory gasped. “When did that start?”

  “Opening night of the club. At my party.”

  “Okay,” she said slowly. “Why are you telling me this now?”

  “She ended things. And now she won’t do the costumes for Vegas.”

  “She’s not doing the costumes for Vegas. Agnes is doing them.”

  He shook his head. “No. I asked Gemma to do them. Haven’t you noticed she’s been doing the fittings?”

  “Yes—because she’s Agnes’s assistant. I told you I was talking to Agnes about doing the costumes, remember?”

  “I know. But I wanted Gemma to do them. And Gemma said she was too busy—Agnes had her working on everything. Gemma didn’t want more work. I said I would pay her on the side. And I intended to. She’s so talented, Mallory. I wanted her to be our exclusive costumer.”

  “No,” Mallory said. “You wanted her to be your mistress. How could you put us in this position? Vegas is less than a month away.”

  “I’m sorry. I really fucked up.”

  This was a disaster. “I’ve got to talk to Agnes. I don’t understand—she’s been so busy these past few weeks. What the hell is she working on if not the Vegas costumes?”

  Mallory grabbed her bag and headed for the door.

  *

  Gemma followed Violet into a luxurious apartment building on Park Avenue. A white-gloved attendant held the door for them, and Violet breezed past the front desk to gold elevator banks. Gemma’s favorite shoes, pink Celine heels, made a loud clacking noise on the marble floor.

  “This is where I’m going to work on the costumes?”

  “Yes. It’s a pied-à-terre owned by one of my customers. He’s in Amsterdam until Thanksgiving.”

  “Does he know you’re using it?”

  “I have a key. He’s a busy man: No need to bother him with petty details.”

  They rode the elevator with an older woman leading a very tiny dog on a leash. The leash was covered with what Gemma guessed were hundreds of Swarovski crystals. Even in that building, it was hard to imagine an actual diamond leash.

  The woman got off on the nineteenth floor. The doors opened for them on twenty-two.

  Gemma followed Violet wordlessly down the carpeted hallway. The lighting was austere, the lives behind each of the doors quiet. No dogs barking, no sounds of children playing.

  Violet slipped a key into the door of apartment 22B. The door opened to darkness. Heavy drapes were drawn against the afternoon sun.

  “This place has northern and southern exposure, and the guy never opens the drapes,” Violet said, immediately pulling them open. Sure enough, light poured into the room, revealing gorgeous moldings on the ceiling, a spare and eclectic collection of antique furniture, and a large zebra-skin rug that covered the living room floor. “The guest bedroom is virtually empty. I figure you can set up shop in there.” Gemma followed her down a short, cream-colored hallway lined with black-and-white prints in identical black frames. All of the photos were of a blond child actress Gemma recognized from a spate of recent blockbuster films.

  “His niece,” Violet said, by way of explanation. She opened a door to a room that was surprisingly large. And it was, as Violet had predicted, empty. “You can keep all the fabric, sewing machines, cutting boards—whatever you need—here. I’ll make you a key. And then as soon as I have money we’ll get a real studio for you.”

  “What do you mean, when you have money? You told me your investor bankrolls whatever you need. Those were your exact words.” Gemma tried to ignore the rise of panic in her chest. She’d already quit her job with Agnes. She’d act
ually been nervous to tell the old lady she was leaving, but the woman had barely blinked twice before simply wishing her luck and turning back to the white corset she was working on.

  “Yes, well, there’s been a slight change in my funding arrangement,” said Violet. “But it’s just temporary. I have a lot of wealthy former clients. It’s just a matter of finding one to bring on board.”

  “So you can’t … pay me anything?” Gemma felt faint. She sat down on the hardwood floor. Violet sat directly in front of her. Gemma looked into her eyes, which truly were cat-like, so very green with pupils narrowed into slits.

  “Keep it together, London. I told you, this is temporary. And to make up for the inconvenience of this little bump in the road, I’m prepared to sweeten your deal: When I find someone to pump some cash into the club, I’ll get them to set you up so you can start your clothing line.”

  “Is that possible?”

  “Of course it is. People either have a ton of money, or they don’t. Now, I can’t guarantee that they won’t ask for a partnership in the clothing line—you’re going to have to negotiate your own deal with them. But I’ll get you the money, for sure.”

  “How long do you think this will take?”

  “I don’t know! Jesus, you’re such a nervous Nellie.”

  “What will I do for money until then? And how are you going to pay for the material for the costumes? You still want me to do the costumes for Vegas, right?”

  “Of course. It’s even more important now than before. I need to win that prize money, and I need to win to make the club attractive to investors. That competition gets tons of press. Hell, the guy who sponsors it might be interested in buying into us, for all I know. I have the money for the costumes if you don’t go too crazy with expenses. It will be fine.”

  “Fine for the club, maybe—but I don’t have any income. I quit my job with Agnes for you! You don’t understand how fucked I am.”

  “Pull it together! This is America. You don’t have to work in a factory or live on the dole. It’s the land of free enterprise. Isn’t that why you came here?”

  “I came here because New York is the fashion capitol of the world.”