“But you promised! It’s been more than a year.”
“Once again I have failed you. If only…” She knew what he was going to say. “If only your mother would let you come to Paris. But we both know she will forbid it, and I won’t go against her wishes. Hélas, she uses you to hurt me.”
Fleur wouldn’t betray Belinda by agreeing. As she tried to swallow her disappointment, she heard high heels tapping down the hallway. A moment later, Belinda’s bedroom door clicked shut.
Belinda settled on the edge of her bed and closed her eyes. He was canceling on Fleur again, just as he’d done twice before. Fleur would be heartbroken and resentful, not at Alexi but at her. His strategy was brilliant. Make it Belinda’s fault that father and daughter couldn’t be together.
Fleur had held out against Alexi’s charms longer than Belinda had expected, and even now, she maintained at least a trace of reserve with him. Alexi didn’t like that, which was why he called her several times a week, why he sent lavish gifts calculated to make her feel his presence, and why he’d stayed away for the past year. Any moment now, Fleur would knock on her bedroom door and beg for permission to fly to Paris to see him. Belinda would refuse. Fleur would be resentful and withdraw into herself. Although she wouldn’t say it out loud, she saw her mother as neurotic and jealous. But Belinda had to keep Fleur in New York where she could protect her. If only she could explain why it was so necessary without offering up the truth.
Your father-who, by the way, isn’t your father-is seducing you.
Fleur would never believe it.
“Further to the right, sweetheart.”
Fleur tipped her head and smiled into the camera. Her neck hurt, and she had cramps, but Cinderella hadn’t whined at the ball just because her glass slippers pinched.
“That’s beautiful, honey. Perfect. A little more teeth. Amazing.”
She sat on a stool in front of a small table with a mirrored top, which was elevated like an easel to reflect the light. The open neck of her champagne silk blouse revealed a magnificent string of square-cut emeralds. Summer had arrived, and it was a blistering hot New York afternoon. Out of camera range, she wore cutoffs and pink rubber shower thongs.
“Fix her eyebrows,” the photographer said.
The makeup man handed her a tiny comb, then dabbed at her nose with a small, clean sponge. She leaned over her reflection and combed her thick brows back into place. She used to regard things like eyebrow combs as weird, but she no longer thought about it.
Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Chris Malino, the photographer’s assistant. With his shaggy, sandy hair and open, friendly face, he wasn’t nearly as good-looking as the male models she worked with, but she liked him a lot better. He was taking filmmaking classes at NYU, and the last time they’d worked together, he’d talked to her about Russian films. She wished he’d ask her out, but none of the guys she liked ever got up the nerve. Her only dates were with older men, celebrities in their twenties that Belinda and Gretchen wanted her to be seen with at some important event. She was eighteen years old, and she’d never had a real date.
Nancy, the stylist on the shoot, adjusted one of the clothespins on the back of Fleur’s blouse so it better fit her smaller breasts. Then she checked the piece of Scotch Tape she’d stuck to Fleur’s neck to raise the height of the emerald necklace. Fleur had come to think of the beautiful clothes on magazine pages as false-fronted buildings on a movie set.
“I’ve got three rolls on the emeralds,” the photographer said not long after. “Let’s take a break.”
Fleur stepped around Nancy’s ironing board and changed into her own open-necked gauze shirt. Chris was shifting the backdrop. She poured a cup of coffee and wandered over to Belinda, who was studying a magazine ad.
Her mother had changed so much since they’d come to New York a little over two and a half years ago. The quiet, nervous gestures had disappeared. She was more confident. Prettier, too-tan and healthy from weekends at the Long Island beach house they rented. Today she wore a Gatsby white tank top and matching skirt with mulberry kid sandals and a slim gold ankle bracelet.
“Look at her skin.” Belinda tapped her fingernail against the page. “She doesn’t have pores. Photos like this make me feel forty breathing hard down my neck.”
Fleur gazed more closely at model in the ad for an expensive cosmetics line. “That’s Annie Holman. Remember the Bill Blass layout Annie and I did together a couple of months ago?”
Belinda had trouble remembering anyone who wasn’t already famous, and she shook her head.
“Mother, Annie Holman is thirteen years old!”
Belinda gave a weak laugh. “It’s no wonder every woman in this country over thirty is depressed. We’re competing with children.”
Fleur hoped women didn’t feel that way when they looked at her photographs. She hated the idea that she was earning eight hundred dollars an hour making people feel bad.
Belinda went off to the bathroom. Fleur got up her nerve and approached Chris, who’d just finished hanging the backdrop. “So…How’s school going?” Smile, stupid. And don’t be so big.
“Same old stuff.”
She could tell he was trying to act casual, as if she were just another girl in one of his classes and not the Glitter Baby. She liked that.
“I’m working on a new film, though,” he said.
“Really? Tell me about it.” She eased herself into a folding chair. It creaked as she sat.
He started to talk, and before long, he got so caught up in what he was saying that he forgot to be intimidated by her.
“It’s so interesting,” she said.
He stuck his thumb into the pocket of his jeans, then pulled it back out again. His Adam’s apple bobbed a couple of times. “Do you want to…I mean, I’ll understand if you’ve got other things going on. I know you have a lot of guys asking you out, and-”
“I don’t.” She hopped up from the chair. “I know everybody thinks I do-that everybody’s asking me out. But it’s not true.”
He picked up a light meter and toyed with it. “I see your picture in the paper with movie stars and Kennedys and everybody.”
“Those aren’t real dates. They’re…sort of for publicity.”
“Does that mean you’d like to go out with me? Maybe Saturday night. We could go down to the Village.”
Fleur grinned. “I’d love to.”
He beamed at her.
“You’d love to what, baby?” Belinda came up behind her.
“I asked Fleur to go to the Village with me on Saturday night, Mrs. Savagar,” Chris said, looking nervous again. “There’s this restaurant where they have Middle Eastern food.”
Fleur curled her toes in her shower thongs. “I said I’d go.”
“Did you, baby?” Belinda’s forehead puckered. “I’m afraid that won’t work. You already have plans, remember? The premiere of the new Altman picture. You’re going with Shawn Howell.”
Fleur had forgotten about the premiere, and she definitely wanted to forget about Shawn Howell, who was a twenty-two-year-old film star with an IQ that matched his age. On their first date he’d spent the evening complaining that everybody was “out to screw him,” and he’d told her he’d dropped out of high school because all the teachers were creeps and faggots. She’d begged Gretchen not to arrange any more dates with him, but Gretchen said Shawn was hot now, and business was business. When she’d tried to talk to her mother about it, Belinda had been incredulous.
“But, baby, Shawn Howell’s a star. Being seen with him makes you twice as important.” When Fleur complained that he kept trying to put his hand under her skirt, Belinda had pinched her cheek. “Celebrities are different from ordinary people. They don’t follow the same rules. I know you can handle him.”