Career Girls (12 page)

At noon the internal phone buzzed on Topaz Rossi’s desk.

‘Yeah,’ she said absently, hunched over mortgage calculations.

‘Topaz? This is Oriole,’ said Nathan’s assistant, sympathetically. ‘Could you come over to the editor’s office right away, please? He wants to talk to you.’

‘Sure,’ Topaz said, feeling her palms begin to sweat. God, she hoped she’d done the right thing. Not that she should worry. She’d made herself rich. Or at least richer. Seventy thousand pounds is $Ioo, ooo, Topaz told herself firmly, trying to calm her nerves, to control the ball of anxiety in her stomach. She got up, tugging her skirt round her hips, futilely trying to make it a little longer, pulling back her snaking red curls into a neat ponytail. It was no use. Her reflection stared back at her from Elise’s glass door, the long, well-turned legs stretching up for miles, the smart black leather hugging her ass provocatively, the tiny waist emphasized by a leather belt, and the full breasts, tilting youthfully upwards from her ribcage, blossoming under the tight pull of her crisp white shirt. In fact, the ponytail somehow added sex appeal - it made her look like an overripe schoolgirl.

Blushing, she unfastened the blue velvet scrunch that held it iri place, grabbed her story and her tape and marched across the corridor to Nathan Rosen’s office.

Why should I care if he fires me? Topaz. thought

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rcbelliously. I can get another job in a second. I don’t need Westside.

But she knew that she did care. Very much. Because Nate Rosen worked at l, Vestside.

‘Hi, Topaz,’ Oriole said. ‘You can just go right in.’

She sauntered into Rosen’s office, looking over the spectacular city view. Nathan, jabbering furiously into the phone in Yiddish, motioned to her to take a seat. Topaz sat gratefully down in a black leather chair opposite his desk, trying to look like someone who knew how to bargain. Someone who sold a major story to two papers every day of the week. And not someone who was terrified she’d just blown her career.

Nathan growled into the phone and hung up, then sat down heavily, glaring at her. ‘So you remember our last conversation,’ he said.

Topaz summoned up her courage. ‘Yes I do,’ she said. ‘And I got 3ou the interview.’

Her editor raised an eyebrow.

‘I taped it,’ Topaz blurted. ‘I mean, I disguised myself and I taped it secretly. I hid the Dictaphone… on me, and he admitted everything, so I transcribed it in a story and I have copies of the tape and.., and it’s all there,’ she finished breathlessly, shoving her typescript and the tape towards him.

Nathan looked at his prot6g6e for a long moment, then glanced at the top page of the interview, not bothering to

flick through it. Then he looked slowly at Topaz again. ‘OK, kid,’ he said coldly. ‘What have you done?’ ‘Wh-what do you mean?’ she stammered.

Rosen sighed. ‘Ms Rossi,’ he said, ‘I’ve been editing this magazine for two years. I’ve been a journalist for eighteen years. I think I can read a case of guilty nerves pretty well. I’m sure you did get this story, like you say. Now that ought to be a coup, am I right? But you walk in here like you’ve been summoned to the principal’s office, not like you wanna tell me you’re up for the Pulitzer. So please don’t insult my intelligence. Just save us both some time and tell

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me what you’ve done.’

Topaz swallowed, hard. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘I - I’ve sold the European rights on the story to the Sunday Times and they’re running it next week. But they think I’m still in England. They don’t know I’m here, so they didn’t ask for world rights. Which means that we can lead Wednesday’s edition with it and still be first with the story.’

‘Let me get this straight,’ Nathan said slowly. ‘You have

sold this story to another publication, a major international paper, and you are proposing to doublecross them by having us print the story in America first. Where it will, of course, make the news around the world, thus making it almost useless to them.’

‘Yes,’ Topaz admitted weakly.

Rosen’s voice was calm. ‘How much did you get for it?’

‘A hundred thousand dollars,’ she mumbled.

‘One hundred thousand dollars,’ he repeated. ‘I see. And

what did you want from me? A chunk of the stock, perhaps?’

‘No, no,’ Topaz protested. ‘I swear. I just wanted you to make me a reporter… ‘ Her voice trailed off miserably ahd she stared at her skirt.

‘Sit there,’ Nathan ordered. ‘While I read this lucrative

piece of investigative journalism. ‘

Topaz waited for five minutes that seemed like five hours, squirming on her seat in embarrassment as Rosen worked through the article, his face impassive. She was obviously about to get fired. Nathan seemed to think she’d torn up the rule book of news ethics. Santa Maria, and she only wanted to please the guy! He was so gorgeous! And yet he never seemed to notice she was alive, unless it was to yell at her or reprimand her for some little thing. The shorter her skirts, the more figure-hugging her blouse, the less interest Nathan showed. She couldn’t understand it. She’d never come across a man that didn’t at least look at her appreciatively. And Nathan Rosen was definitely not gay - according to the other girls in the office, outside of Westside he was a goddamn womanizer. So what the hell, Topaz.thought

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angrily, is wrong with me?

Finally, Rosen looked up, and to her astonishment she saw he was smiling.

‘What kind of a reporter did you want to be?’

‘Excuse me?’ she said, bewildered.

‘Come on, Rossi,’ Nathan said. ‘Pitch me. Tell me what you want to do. Tell me how you can sell more magazines

for me. ‘

‘I could write a column,’ Topaz said. It was the first thing that came into her head. ‘About New York. As an out-oftowner who’s new here. Things most people wouldn’t notice - it’d make them look at Manhattan with a fresh eye. I’d call it “NY Scene”.’ ‘What about your salary?’ asked Rosen, still smiling. ‘Thirty-five thousand dollars,’ Topaz said boldly.

Nathan shrugged. ‘That’s ten thousand more than new reporters get.’

‘But I’d’be a columnist. And like I told you before, I’m better than they are.’

‘Don’t push it,’ Nathan said. He extended one hand across his desk and Topaz grabbed it eagerly, feeling a little

electric shock of sexuality as his flesh touched hers. ‘Congratulations, kid,’ he said. ‘You scored.’

‘You’re not mad at me for selling it to an English paper?’

Nathan chuckled. ‘Rossi, that was the first piece of real initiative you’ve shown since you got here.’

‘And thirty-five thousand a year!’ she breathed.

Nathan smiled at her again. ‘With a story like this, you could have asked for fifty thousand. But you wouldn’t welsh on a handshake, right?’

‘You sonofabitch,’ Topaz said, ngri[y.

Nathan laughed. ‘Relax. Consider it valuable vocational training. You’re not the only one who can pull a fast trick, kid. Just remember - I’m still better at this than you are.’

For a second she glared at him, and theh broke down under the warmth of his teasing and smiled. Damn, damn, damn, he was attractive.

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‘Want to grab a beer with me to celebrate?’ she asked, tentatively. Nathan Rosen looked her over, the thrusting breasts, the handspan waist, the round ass and long, beautiful legs, and felt himself sorely tempted. Her desire was written in a bright glow on her face, on those delicious half-stiffened nipples.

‘No, I have to work,’ he said. ‘Unlike some people I could mention.’

She turned away, trying not to show her disappointment. ‘Topaz,’ Nathan said. ‘You can take the day off. Go find a

new apartment. You did good.’

‘Thanks, boss,’ she said lightly, and walked out of his office, closing the door behind her.

After she’d gone, Nathan Rosen stared at the typescript

on his desk for a long moment. He’d have to watch this girl carefully. Because unless all his instincts were mistaken, the pushy little Italian was a force to be reckoned with.

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It wasu’t a promising start. Of all the places Rowena least liked having to trek to see bauds, working men’s clubs in the north of England rated amongst the worst. Usually she had to argue for forty minutes with some surly bloke who blew smoke in her face before he’d even let her in, and then stand at the back and do her best to blend into the chipped paint or peeling wallpaper. Not easy, when drunk fifty-year-olds were wandering up to you and making breathtakiugly obscene comments every five minutes. The only women welcome in those dives were strippers, and the punters made sure Rowena knew it.

So some bunch of talentless Northerners called Atomic Mass are playing Crookes Working Men’s Club in Sheffield, Rowena thought as she parked her battered mini down the road. Terrific. Great. And Musica Records, right on the cutting edge as usual, is here to check them out.

Once she got inside, she bought two triple Jack Daniels and Diet Cokes, and fiuished one offbefore the band even hit the stage. She was obviously going to need them. The place was mercifully half-empty, but the barman had taken great pleasure in informing her that Atomic Mass were a bunch of young kids who’d got t6gethr at college, with an American from the university on lead guitar. Bound to be strictly amateur-hour stuff. By the time they wandered onstage, Rowena was seething with resentment at Matthew Stevenson for making her waste an evening like this.

And then they started to play.

Barbara Lincoln, elegantly dressed in an Armani pantsuit in

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cream linen that set off her slim figure and soft chocolate skin, was trying to figure something out. Her secretary had brought in her mail that morning - the usual stuff every Business Affairs executive had to deal with in a record company-and one memo. Not that she didn’t normally get memos. But this one was different: hand-delivered early in the morning, and from a talent scout in A&R, Rowena

Gordon, some new girl whom Barbara had never met.

It was so weird.

She glanced at it again. Dear Ms Lincoln, I would be grateful if you could allow me ten minutes for a meeting with you today. My extension is 435. Regards, Rowena Gordon, Artists and Repertoire.

Why on earth did one of Stevenson’s scouts want to meet with her? Why not Matthew himself?. He was the one who handled contract negotiations. Barbara was twenty-five and the number two in Musica’s Legal and Business Affairs Department, and she’d never met a scout in her career. There was just no reason for it.

Intrigued, she dialled Rowena’s extension.

‘I.wanted some advice,’ Rowena said nervously, shutting the door behind her. Maybe this hadn’t been such a good idea. Barbara Lincoln’s secretary had shot her a strange look when she’d turned up for her appointment, dressed in her normal office clothes ofjeans and trainers. Over in Business Affairs, the look was obviously more formal. Christ, Lincoln dressed the way she had at Oxford, in the old days when money was no object. That seemed several lifetimes ago now.

Barbara eyed her up. She looked intelligent, a well spoken young girl for a talent scount. There was something about this one she couldn’t pin down.

‘I don’t mind at all,’ she said. Tmjust curious as to why you wouldn’t tell me what this was about.’

Rowena nodded. ‘I understand,’ she said, ‘but I couldn’t say in front of Matthew Stevenson. You see, I’ve found a band I think the company should sign, and I don’t think

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Matthew will listen to them with an open mind if I play them for him.’

‘Why not?’ Barbara enquired calmly.

‘Because Josh Oberman hired me himself,’ Rowena said.

Barbara smiled. ‘Did you know that’s how 1 got hired?’ she asked.

‘That’s why I’m here,’ Rowena said simply. ‘You’ve obviously survived. I hoped you might be able to help me to.’

Barbara laughed. ‘Very inventive. Did you bring a tape with you? I’ll put the headphones on.’

The older girl listened in silence for several minutes, then slid the headpiece offand looked at Rowena with somethiug approaching respect. ‘Well, I’m into business, not music,’ she said, ‘but it seems to me like you have something here. If

I were you I’d go to see Oberman direct.’

‘How would I get an appointment?’

Barbara picked up her phone and tapped in some uumbers. “Josh?’ she asked. ‘Hi, it’s Barbara Lincoln. Fine, thanks. Look, Josh, I was just wondering if you could see Rowena Gordon sonae time today.’

Rowena, her face flaming red, made a lunge for the phone, but Barbara stood up, grinning, and held it out of reach. ‘She’s found a good act and she wants you to hear it. Doesn’t think Matthew will give a rock band a chance, and she’s too shy to tell you herself. Ycah, OK. OK. I understand. Thanks, boss.’

She hung up and turned to a mortificd Rowena. ‘He wants to see you in his office in five minutes,’ Barbara told her. ‘And don’t look like that. He’s not gonna fire you. I’ve becn working with Josh for a couple of years, and I tell you, that guy knows the scorc. He’s bccu doing this since before either of us were born. He’ll undcrstaud Matthcw’s problena. He’ll only think well of you for coming to me.’

‘Are you sure?’ Rowcna asked, anxiously.

Barbara gave a self-assured nod. ‘I ana. And come and see me when you’re through. We should go out for a drink.’

Rowena smilcd. ‘I’d like that,’ she said.

r

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Joshua Oberman sat hunched in his chair, listening to the tape. The soundquality was dreadful, the production nonexistent, and Gordon didn’t have so much as a picture to show him.

They were awesome.

Excitement rippled through his withered veins. Seventy years old, and good music could still turn him on. He couldn’t get an erection any more but he still felt like a teenager when he heard stuff like this. It was the old Guns n’ Roses syndrome. The thrill of heai’ing an act nobody else had heard of, and knowing, just knowing that in a couple of years they’d be packing stadiums and making thousands of teenage chicks cream their pants. Fat bass. Fresh guitar. Great vocals. Cool songs.