by Bridie Clark
I’d been working for about an hour when my eyelids started to get heavy. With the engine whirring gently and the soft cashmere blanket wrapped around me, it wasn’t long before I’d nodded off.
The next thing I knew, Randall was nudging me awake. “I think we’re about to land,” he said, rubbing his fingers gently on my wrist. I wiggled my toes. Painful. It had been such a deep, luxurious sleep, and now there was just a quick car ride separating us from Lucille and her gaggle of girlfriends.
I threw Luke’s manuscript back in my bag and slid on my shoes. “You might want to put that on, dear,” advised the stewardess, pointing to the balled-up winter coat I’d stashed in the storage compartment. “It’s less than thirty degrees out there, and the wind is fierce on the tarmac.”
“Did you hear that?” I asked Randall, who was busy gathering his stuff. “There must be a terrible storm hitting Palm Beach.”
“Mmm.” He nodded.
It wasn’t until I walked down the stairs that I realized we weren’t in Palm Beach.
“Bonjour, mademoiselle,” said a young man in a spiffy blue-and-red uniform. “Bienvenue à Paris. Puis-je prendre votre baggage?”
“We’re in Paris?” Stunned, I turned to look at Randall. He had a smirk on his face.
“Surprise! I figured that we’ve both been working so hard, it’d be good for us to have a romantic weekend alone. And what better city to do that in than Paris?”
“Randall! I can’t believe you! What an amazing surprise!”
I, Claire Truman, had been whisked away for a weekend in Paris? I was stunned. Speechless, in fact. Not only had Randall tuned in to the fact that we needed to spend more time alone … he’d planned an incredibly romantic weekend to show his commitment.
“I found your passport, and Svetlana packed your bag,” he explained proudly. “We’re staying at the finest suite at the Ritz. Only the best, Claire. We don’t have much time here, so everything will be perfect. I promise. All you have to do is sit back and enjoy.”
“I can do that,” I murmured, my head swimming with excitement. Paris. The city that inspired Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Henry James. The most romantic city in the world. And I was here with Randall. It was all so perfect.
“So you enjoyed your massage? I’m glad, darling.” Randall smiled, stirring his café au lait. We were having lunch at Le Deux Magots in the seventh arrondissement, a café where Sartre and George Sand used to eat croissants when they were taking a break from philosophizing. The café was a bit fussy and overpriced, but the tourist in me loved it.
“It was the best massage I’ve ever had,” I told him, still a little dreamy from the experience. That morning, I’d been awakened gently by a chambermaid who’d led me to the downstairs spa, where I was attended to by two masseuses. It was a level of relaxation I’d never before experienced. “I can’t imagine a nicer way to start the day.” I reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “Well, maybe I can imagine one nicer way … but that’s it.”
Randall grinned at me. After my decadent massage, I’d pulled him off his laptop and back into bed.
“I thought after lunch we might do a bit of shopping on Faubourg St.-Honoré,” he said. “It’s just a short walk from the hotel and the best shopping in the world—Hermès, Christian Lacroix, Yves St. Laurent. And then I’ve got a very special evening planned for us. The perfect occasion to wear your new dress.”
The dress! Now it made more sense. Randall had really thought of everything—even a Paris-appropriate wardrobe for me.
The day flew by. I could spend a lifetime in Paris and not get enough of it. We had a lovely, arm-in-arm stroll down St.-Honoré (it felt expensive just to walk down that street), and then we did a quick tour of the Musée Rodin before it was time to head back to the Ritz and get ready for dinner.
Back in the room, Randall and I dressed in silence. He carefully shaved and ran pomade through his hair, while I put on some makeup and tied my hair back in a loose twist. Standing in front of the mirror in a slip, I noticed for the first time just how much weight I’d lost since starting at Grant Books. Mom was right—I was downright gaunt. How had I not registered it before? My arms looked long and lanky, my stomach was flat as a drum, and my hipbones jutted out in a way I hadn’t seen since I was twelve. The stomach-in-knots, too-stressed-to-eat, no-time-for-meals diet had caught up with me: I looked malnourished.
“Put on the dress, darling,” Randall suggested.
I slipped it on, and Randall zipped up the back. It’s hard for a five-foot-ten-inch Iowa girl to channel dainty Audrey Hepburn, but the dress had some sort of magical properties. I didn’t look like myself at all. I looked … like a girl who should be dating Randall Cox.
“You look beautiful, Claire,” Randall whispered, slipping up behind me as I stood before the mirror, fixing my hair. He pulled something out of his pocket—the string of Mikimoto pearls we’d seen in the store window last week.
“Randall! I told you not to—”
“Just say thank you,” he murmured into my ear. “Let’s go, we’ve got a nine o’clock reservation at Alain Ducasse. We’re on a schedule, sweetheart!”
Dinner was another over-the-top feast of the senses—the surprisingly cozy rococo salons were draped in metallic organza, the large clock on the wall had been symbolically stopped, and our table overlooked the loveliest courtyard. And the food was indescribably delicious—I ordered bisque de homard and Bresse chicken with white truffles, and for once even Randall was tempted to indulge a little.
“When in Rome …” He chuckled, scanning the menu. “I’ll just run a few extra miles tomorrow.”
When we’d finished our meal, Randall cleared his throat loudly. Then he cleared it again. He folded and unfolded his napkin and ran a hand through his hair.
I’ve never seen him fidget so much, I thought, and then it hit me—
Even before he was down on one knee, on the ground right next to me—asking me, with a plaintive, sweet, vulnerable look on his face, if I would do him the honor of being his wife—
His wife?!
Because he knew—he just knew—that we’d be so happy together. He’d flown out to Iowa yesterday to ask for Mom’s blessing, and she’d given it. He loved me. Would I marry him?
Would I marry him?!
Half the restaurant had turned to face us now, watching the gorgeous, so-well-dressed-he-could-be-European man—with a ring in his outstretched hand that you could see from a block away—propose.
Would I marry him?!
The question hung in the air. I couldn’t breathe. A proposal? I hadn’t been expecting—it felt so out of the blue, and too soon—
“Claire,” Randall whispered, “please say yes.”
I looked into his eyes. I loved Randall. I did. I had since I was eighteen.
“Yes,” I answered, and the next thing I knew there was a gigantic ring on my finger.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
THIS SIDE OF PARADISE
Black Monday,” said David, stepping into my office with a copy of the New York Post hidden under his jacket. “Vivian’s on a major warpath. She already fired an assistant and made two publicists cry, and it’s not even nine yet. Did you see this?”
I gasped when he held up the front page. Stanley Prizbecki—dressed in the horrible teddy, wearing the screaming red lipstick—stared back at me from the front page. It was the photo I’d discovered in Vivian’s file. “big drag for dep mayor!” blasted the headline.
“Apparently they broke up last week,” David explained. “Prizbecki’s wife found out that he and Vivian were having an affair, so he ended it to save his marriage. Can you believe this picture? The papers are all saying his career is completely over. He’s a laughingstock. Even the mayor can’t back him up, it’d be political suicide.”
Hell hath no fury, I thought. So that was why she’d kept that photo on file. Of course.
“It’s going to be such a savage week,” I noted wearily. Not to mention the w
orst possible week to break the news of my engagement at the office: Even during the best of times, nothing irritated Vivian more than the obvious happiness of her underlings. After an ugly break-up, my big news could unleash her very worst. I wiggled my finger out of my ring, slipping it stealthily into my top drawer while David read the article.
“Vivian is quoted as saying that she broke up with Prizbecki when she caught him wearing one of her evening dresses!”
“She’s loyal to a fault.”
“His poor kids, is all I can think. Anyway, how was your weekend? Good times with Randall’s parents?”
“Oh, it was fine,” I answered quickly. “How was yours?”
“Good, I burrowed through a lot of the submissions pile. I have a bunch of reader’s reports coming your way. You were in Florida, right? You missed a huge snowstorm. The most snow we’ve had in late March for ten years, apparently.”
I nodded. Actually, the snowstorm had played a big role in shaping our last twenty-four hours. For one thing, it had prevented us from landing until nearly 2:00 a.m. Randall had been up in arms, pacing around the plane, agitated at not getting a better night’s sleep at the start of a hectic workweek. We’d decided to come back early from Paris to avoid the risk of getting stuck outside New York. Randall had the CEO and board of one of his major clients coming in early this morning. A few extra hours in Paris, he’d explained, just wasn’t worth the possibility of not making it to that meeting.
I understood his anxiety, really. It wasn’t as though a person got engaged and stopped caring about the rest of his or her life. Work still mattered, responsibilities still existed. I couldn’t expect everything to be perfect and glossy and romantic all the time. Besides, I had a full workweek, too, and getting back and at it was the sensible course of action.
Still, I’ll admit it: Part of me wished that the afterglow of getting engaged could’ve lasted longer than a few hours.
But it really had been euphoric at first. At the restaurant, we’d immediately called everyone we knew from Randall’s phone, laughing with each other over the table as our friends and family screamed their congratulations. Randall had ordered a second bottle of champagne. One of the waiters brought me roses. I’d felt as though I were hovering at thirty thousand feet: Had I really just gotten engaged to Randall Cox? “It’s like a dream come true!” Bea squealed into the phone, and I couldn’t have agreed more. Finally, at 3:00 in the morning, we collapsed in a drunken heap on our enormous bed at the Ritz.
“Let me help you take off your dress,” Randall slurred, popping up.
“Randall!” I laughed as he fumbled with the zipper. I’d never seen him drunk before, nor had he ever been so uninhibited. He slipped the dress off me, gently but purposefully, working it slowly over my now slender hips and down the length of my legs. He pulled it carefully over my feet. I lay back on the bed and closed my eyes—waiting to feel his body on mine, his lips …
But Randall seemed to be moving away from the bed. I sat up and watched as he carried my dress gingerly to the closet. He held it in his arms as if it were his bride. “There we go,” he said to the dress, finding a satin hanger.
I lay down again in a pose I hoped was seductive… .
“I think I drank too much champagne,” Randall groaned, flopping down lifelessly on top of me. I stayed pinned, motionless. In less than five seconds, he was snoring—and I rolled him gently off of me.
When I woke up the next morning, he was gone. The covers on his side were tucked in neatly. A maid was silently packing my things into my suitcase.
“Ze gym,” she told me, pointing to the empty half of the bed. I’d expected that a champagne hangover—not to mention a fresh engagement—might’ve kept Randall in bed, but I was mistaken: Nothing got between him and the treadmill. “Monsieur Cox asked me to pack for you, since you will be leaving shortly,” the maid explained. I nodded, bewildered.
Then I rolled over and ordered room service, staring at the enormous rock on my left hand as I dialed.
It was the strangest thing. Having never been engaged before, I couldn’t say for sure how it was supposed to feel—but for Randall and me, it was like throwing a stone in a glassy pond: There was the initial plop, a few ripples … but then the water got smooth and flat again, very quickly. When Randall charged in from the gym—kissing me lightly on the top of my head, frowning at the eggs and sausage I’d been happily inhaling—it was as if nothing had really happened the night before. Two hours later, we were back on the plane, back to real life, back to The Wall Street Journal and work and barely exchanging words.
Really, if it wasn’t for the diamond, I might’ve thought I’d dreamed the whole thing. And maybe that was why I didn’t actually mind not sharing the news at work. I still needed to absorb it myself.
“David, do you have time this morning to go over the art log for the 1950s pinup book?” I asked, snapping out of my engagement analysis. “I’d like to get that transmitted by Wednesday at the latest.”
“Sure. Can I show it to you in an hour? I’ll finish it up now.”
“That’d be perfect, thanks.” Lately, I’d been delegating more and more to David. I knew he could handle it, and frankly it was the only way to stay afloat.
“Okay, I’ll be at the copy machine if you need me. Do you want me to find someone to handle your phone?”
I told David I’d screen my calls myself. Then I sat back in my chair and took a sip of my coffee, which was piping hot and scalded the roof of my mouth.
It’ll just take a few days to sink in. By the weekend, I’ll be giddy over Martha Stewart’s Weddings. I’ll be flashing my ring to anyone who comes within a ten-block radius. I’ll have to hold myself back from telling every person I meet that I’ve found the One, and wasn’t it romantic, and okay, fine, I’ll tell the Paris story one more time if you insist on hearing it from the top.
Plenty of time for flying off the handle with excitement once the news sank in a little more.
I plopped Luke’s manuscript on the desk. I’d gotten through almost the entire thing on our plane ride back to New York and decided I’d ease into the day by finishing it up.
“Claire, my office,” the dreadful intercom screeched before I could read the first word. “NOW.” So I wouldn’t be easing into the day. The always present anger in Vivian’s voice had been ratcheted up a few notches.
I trudged down the hallway, too jet-lagged to be scared of the massacre that lay in store. “Hi, Vivian,” I said quietly, stepping into her office. “What’s going on?”
“What’s going on?” she screamed back, already at full tilt. “Why don’t you fucking tell me what’s going on? Do I fucking report to you now?”
Oh boy. This was not going to be pretty. Had I really screwed up, or were the wheels just coming off the wagon? I sat down and waited to find out, feeling an odd inner calm that reminded me of that first meeting with Dawn and Graham. Maybe, after enduring enough rage, one’s nervous system hit a satiation point—and Vivian no longer registered.
“Where are we on the proposal I asked you to look at on Friday?” she demanded.
“Well, I read about a hundred pages, and it’s looking good—the agent said we could have it exclusively through the week, so—”
“Oh?! Oh?! Is that what he said?” Vivian scoffed, her lip curling in disgust. “My God, Claire, do yourself a favor and grow the fuck up! Do you think the nice agent man might have been lying? That he might be, as we speak, shopping it around to other publishers to see who else is interested? Men lie, Claire. They’ll tell you anything they think you want to hear, if it’ll get them what they want. Give me an answer on the proposal by noon. We’re not playing that motherfucker’s game. We’re not letting him court a bunch of other publishers—”
The door cracked open, and Lulu slithered inside. “Sorry to interrupt,” she lied, “I just wanted to drop off the mock-ups of Around the Pole: A Stripper’s Story.” She flopped down covers on Vivian’s desk and then paused,
clearly hoping to watch me get taken down.
“You’re not interrupting, Lulu,” Vivian said, her voice full of manufactured sweetness. “I’m glad you’re here. Claire, unlike you, Lulu gets back to me immediately when I ask her to do something. She’s a team player. Watch her! You could learn a lot!”
Learn how to be a groveling, backbiting, gutless lose-bag? No thanks.
“She’s got more on her plate than I could ever expect you to handle,” Vivian continued, looking me up and down with stark derision in her eyes. “All you do is dillydally over Luke Mayville’s stupid manuscript like some love-drunk schoolgirl!” This thought seemed to light her fuse again, and her eyes bulged with renewed fury. “You know, I should drop that book, just to teach you a fucking lesson! Spending so much time on something that what, five people will ever read? It’s absurd! Even I can’t be bothered to read that boring thing, and I’m the goddamn publisher!”
I gulped, feeling truly panicked. This had been my greatest fear for months: Vivian would blow her stack with me and take retribution on Luke’s book. I couldn’t let it happen. “Please, Vivian,” I begged, “I’ll work 24/7 to stay on top of my other projects. I’m sorry, I—I’ll do whatever you need me to do.” I didn’t care if I sounded shameless—preserving my dignity wasn’t worth screwing up Luke’s publication.
Vivian sat back. “You know, I could basically pull the plug on his little—”
“I know.” I nodded, feeling the lump in my throat. “Just tell me what you want and I’ll do it.”
“Oh, I will,” said Vivian, smiling like the Cheshire cat. “Don’t worry, I will.”
“So? So?” Bea screamed into my ear when I finally returned her fifth phone call. “I’m dying here, Claire! Give me every detail! I can’t believe he flew you to Paris! How romantic!” She was practically jumping through the phone. “I mean, can you believe you’re actually going to marry Randall Cox? Think of how many nights we lay on my old futon, daydreaming about this!”
