“Good-bye, Mother.”
Wendy put the phone back in its cradle. All she could think about was how Magda had said she couldn’t wait for her to see her pony, not that she couldn’t wait to see her.
She eased herself carefully down onto the bed. Her children were fine and they hated her . . . Nice! Must call lawyer. And her hand moved slowly back toward the phone and wrestled the receiver from its holster. She hit the talk button and imagined herself dialing the phone . . . but who to call? . . . Of course, the head of counsel for Splatch-Verner . . . and she imagined getting up and finding his number in the small blue book containing the important phone numbers for important executives . . . but would his home number be listed?
. . . And she was dialing the phone, but she couldn’t get the numbers right and she kept having to start over again . . .
She woke up an hour later, whimpering like a beaten dog. Shane! The kids! Divorce! Anger pulsed through her, gaining momentum like an out-of-control train.
She dialed the phone then, not making a mistake. “The Breakers Hotel. In Palm Beach.” Pause. Please press one for an additional charge of sixty cents . . . “Shane Healy, please.”
“Hello?” That tone—as if he knew another call would come, and was dreading its arrival.
“How could you lock me out, Shane?”
“I had to.” He was more prepared this time.
“Why?”
“Tyler’s asleep!” Accusingly, as if she were deliberately trying to hurt her own child.
“And serving me with divorce papers too.”
“We’ll talk about it tomorrow. When we get back.”
“We’ll talk about it now.”
“Go to sleep.” Wearily.
“You can’t do this. It won’t work. It’s illegal . . .”
“Go to sleep. Please.”
“Don’t you care that I was out of my mind with fear? That I had to come to the Mercer? Do you care about me at all?”
“You’re not the first person it’s ever happened to.” What the hell did that mean? “And you can handle it.”
“I can’t . . .”
“Go to sleep.” Hiss, click.
And then lying awake praying for morning, until some kind of jagged sleep came, and then the five a.m. phone call, and now, and now, and now . . .
Wendy looked out the window of the taxi.
Early morning highway under an orange-white sky. From across the river, the sun lit the tips of Manhattan’s skyscrapers, brushing them with gold. She shuddered. It was going to be a nice day.
Chapter 11
IN A BANNER ACROSS THE TOP OF THE NEW YORK Post that Sunday was the headline, “New York’s 50 Most Powerful Women.” Sitting in Victory Ford’s office with her feet up on the glass coffee table, her face hidden behind this newspaper, was the comedienne and actress Glynnis Rourke.
“Hey, whaddya think about that?” she said, lowering the paper to reveal a face that resembled a cherub’s, which stood in stark contrast to her personality, which was often compared to a pit bull’s. “They got Hillary at number one, of course, you can’t beat the future president of the United States when it comes to power, I guess, and me at number six, ’cause I’m supposedly worth so much money—fifty-two million—which isn’t exactly true, and they got your friend Nico at number eight, and good old Wendy at twelve . . . and you, kid, at number seventeen. What the hell are we doing sittin’ here? We oughta be out there takin’ over the world.”
“Oh, we are,” Victory said, looking up from her drawing. Glynnis was a darling old friend (an old friend she saw only three or four times a year, but they were always thrilled to see each other), who had come to her first show and, in typical fashion, had demanded to “congratulate the chef” afterward. Glynnis had been a stand-up comic back then, but in the last ten years, her career had skyrocketed with her own television show, magazine, and now, an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress in Wendy’s movie The Spotted Pig. “Just as soon as we get you dressed for the Academy Awards,” Victory added.
“Clothes! Ha. I hate ’em,” Glynnis said dismissively, and continued reading. “ ‘Victory Ford, forty-three’—d’ya mind that they put your age in there? I think lying about your age stinks—like a woman who lies about her age would lie about anything, huh? ‘The fashion darling who’s every New York woman’s best friend is poised to take over Europe when she merges her twenty-five-million-dollar company with B et C. Look for even chic-er accessories to go with the clothes we love.’ Nice.”
“Very nice. But not entirely correct.”