Folly's Child (37 page)

‘Goodnight, Paula, it's been a pleasure to meet you.' He took her hand again and bent to kiss her cheek. Her pulses raced.

When he had gone Hugo put his arm around her, drawing her close.

‘Shall I tell you something, honey? Greg's little black book might be full of glamour girls but not one of them is as lovely as you. And stud that he is, he doesn't know what he's missing. Come to bed, huh?'

Paula, too weak with longing to protest, let him lead her up to the elegantly decorated master bedroom and undress her. But as she lay in the huge four-poster bed with its silk drapes, submitting to Hugo's fevered embraces, it was Greg's face she seemed to see in the darkness and when she reached her shuddering climax it was as a result of imagining Greg's lips tugging and teasing her, Greg's arms around her, Greg's body upon and within her, not Hugo's at all.

For three whole days Paula could neither eat nor sleep. That first night while Hugo snored gently beside her she lay rigid, quite unrelaxed by their lovemaking, her whole body aching and quivering as she thought of Greg. Eventually she got up and wandered around the house, picking up the beautiful pieces she had bought to adorn it and putting them down again, afraid they would fall from her trembling fingers and be broken.

At breakfast, toying with a piece of toast while Hugo ate a huge, pile of sunnyside eggs and ham, she asked him about Greg. ‘What exactly does he do?'

Hugo smiled good-humouredly. ‘Good question. He calls himself a financier but that covers a multitude of sins. He started, in real estate, I believe, and used that as a basis from which to branch out into mortgage securities and investment consultancy. He's got a finger in more pies than you could name – and to be honest the only thing that has ever concerned me is that he was rich enough and interested enough to put up the money that set me on the road to success. When I needed a backer, Greg was there. I'll never stop being grateful to him for that.'

‘As he said, if he hadn't been someone else probably would have.'

‘Perhaps, but it so happens that Greg was the one,' Hugo said, washing down his ham and eggs with scalding coffee. ‘ He's a character, though, make no mistake of it and I think he sometimes sails closer to the wind that he should. But that's how he's made his fortune – by taking chances – and I'm sure when you get to know him you'll like him as much as I do. In fact, I don't know anyone who doesn't like Greg. He's a charmer.'

‘Yes,' Paula said, pressing her knees tightly together and thinking how shocked Hugo would be if he guessed just how well she hoped she would get to know Greg Martin.

So obsessed with him was she that she went to the showroom that day and the next with Hugo, barely giving a thought to the conversation they had been having when Greg had arrived. Pettifogging jealousy and bitchiness seemed supremely unimportant set against the possibility of seeing him again. But though she almost jumped in anticipation each time she heard the elevator purr to a stop on their floor he did not come. Always it was someone else – a buyer or a press attaché, a house model or a pattern cutter, or simply one of the porters wheeling a rail of samples, carefully concealed beneath the plastic sample bags, on their way back from the Puerto Rican workshops just around the block in the sidestreets between 8th and 9th Avenues.

‘Have you made a definite date for our dinner party with Greg Martin?' she asked Hugo on the third day, unable to contain herself any longer.

‘Oh honey, I forgot to tell you,' Hugo said. ‘I'm afraid that's had to be postponed.'

Paula's heart missed a beat. ‘Why?' she asked, trembling and hating herself for it.

‘He's out of town again – off to Texas, of all places. He swears it's business but personally I think the very lovely daughter of a certain oil magnate is behind it. He's been seeing her lately, I know, and it could be that Daddy is giving him the once-over.'

Paula could have wept with disappointment and rage. She had so been looking forward to seeing him again and it was bruising to think he had chosen to rush off to Texas with some woman, no matter how rich her daddy might be, when she was horribly sure that he had suspected her motives in inviting him to dinner might be rather more than friendly.

Dammit, he's probably laughing at me! she thought, remembering the way he had looked at her when she had issued the invitation – eyes very dark, very knowing, lips curving away from very white teeth in a way that was almost vulpine. But in spite of the feeling of humiliation and the sudden wave of something close to fleeting hatred for the man who had inspired it, the attraction was as strong as ever, perhaps stronger: Paula was not used to rejection. It added a new dimension to her desire and made her more determined than ever – one of these days she would possess Greg Martin just as she had possessed every other man she had ever wanted.

Whilst Greg was away from New York and she could do nothing to advance her plans to capture him, Paula turned her thoughts to another matter. Ever since she had learned that Laddie had talked to Hugo about her she had been determined to find a way to get back at him and now, in her spare moments (which were many since Hugo was very busy with the new season's collection) she considered various methods of revenge before rejecting them all. It would be too easy – and too crude – to sabotage his sketches or his samples, and to simply get him fired would not hold any long-term satisfaction. No, Paula thought, what she would really like would be some hold over him, for to her power was still the greatest thrill she could imagine.

Sex, she realised now, was only the beginning of it, for when the boys had flocked around begging for her favours it had been the sense of power which had been the aphrodisiac. But it had not been long before she had realised there were other ways to be in control. There was emotional blackmail – very powerful, that, and best used on those closest to one, and there was the game of making others indebted and then calling in favours – or constantly threatening to, as she had done with Gary. Now, in her position as Hugo's wife, there was straightforward supremacy, the power that position could bring. But none of these had worked on Laddie. He was Hugo's friend as well as his assistant, he had Hugo's ear – and she knew that he did not like her. There has to be a way, thought Paula. He has to have a weakness. And I am going to find out what it is.

Her determination kept her going to the showroom though she had begun to hate the atmosphere there. Now that it had been pointed out to her how unpopular she was with the work force the sudden silence that descended the moment she entered a room became more obvious to her than ever and she could feel the eyes that followed her with dislike when she left. Worse, she had to bite her tongue and refrain from telling the workers what to do, or risk another lecture from Hugo and knowing they must know, every last one of them, why she had changed her ways made her feel angry and humiliated and fuelled her determination to find a way to get even with Laddie.

It was one stiflingly hot afternoon in July when her opportunity came and when it did it happened by the sheerest chance. Paula was in the showroom when she saw Laddie come hurrying out of his office and she thought there was something oddly furtive about the way he looked around to see if he had been observed. Paula experienced a small thrill of anticipation which owed more to some sixth sense than to anything she had yet seen. As Laddie started down the stairs (he suffered from claustrophobia and had a terror of elevators) she slipped into the lift, then waited until he appeared, panting a little, at the bottom of the stairs and followed him outside into the street. There was a car drawn up at the kerb and at the wheel was a boy, very clean cut, very good looking – and with a face that was familiar to Paula because of the circles she moved in. As she watched unseen from the doorway Laddie hurried around to the passenger side and climbed into the car. The boy turned eagerly toward him, Laddie leaned over, put an arm around the slim shoulders and kissed him on the cheek. After a moment when they appeared to simply sit looking at one another the boy put the car into drive and it took off into the honking hustling traffic.

Paula stood in the doorway, a smile playing around her mouth, as she savoured the implications of what she had just seen.

She had known, of course, from the moment she had met him that Laddie was homosexual and she had scarcely given it a second thought. The fashion world was riddled with gays and Gary, perhaps the best friend she had ever had, had been one. But what she had just witnessed was something else again, for the boy in the car had been Chris Connelly, son of the senator Jimmy Connelly who might, it was rumoured, run for President next time around.

Tingling with excitement Paula watched the car disappear in the heavy afternoon traffic. So – Chris Connelly was Laddie's lover – no wonder he had been so discreet! A whisper of scandal like that would do the Senator no good at all – he was always portrayed as a regular family man with a regular wholesome family. If it ever got out that his son was gay the news media would have a field day.

Chris must have phoned Laddie and asked him to meet him urgently or the designer would never have left his office in the middle of the day and perhaps they had thought one moment of carelessness would not matter. How wrong they had been!

Paula returned to the showroom, her mind busy with plans to make the best use of her knowledge. Laddie was out for over an hour and when she heard sounds of movement in his office Paula decided to act.

‘Is everything all right, Laddie?' she asked in mock solicitude, knocking on his door and looking in.

‘Yes, of course – why shouldn't it be?' he replied, but she could tell he was not being entirely truthful.

‘I was concerned when I saw you rushing out like that,' Paula said. ‘And then when I realised it was Chris who had called, wanting to see you urgently, I thought there might be something dreadfully wrong in your private life …' Her tone was ingenuous, her expression concerned, but her eyes were sharp and eager. She was guessing, of course, that it had been a phone call that had sent Laddie scurrying out of his office and down to the street but the moment she said it she knew she was absolutely right. Laddie's boyish face had turned pale and he was quite unable to hide his expression of utter horror.

‘Oh Laddie – I'm sorry – is it a secret?' she asked in mock concern. ‘ Of course – I can see that whatever it is it must be terribly sensitive with Chris being who he is. It could be so embarrassing for everyone concerned, couldn't it, if word got out. But you need not worry. I won't breathe a word. Your secret is quite safe with me.'

She saw high spots of colour begin to stain Laddie's ashen cheeks and the feeling of power she so enjoyed began to surge through her. How he must be cursing himself for his carelessness! Well, she had him now. He would never dare to talk about her to Hugo – or anyone else – again.

Paula smiled to herself. He wasn't to know she meant it when she said his secret was safe with her. She wouldn't tell it because once she did she would no longer have any hold over him and it was that that was making her feel so good, as if she had just had the biggest orgasm of her life.

‘If there is anything I can do to help just let me know, won't you Laddie?' she said sweetly.

He was still staring after her in horror as she left the room.

The discovery that she was pregnant came as an even bigger shock to Paula than had the news from England that her young sister Sally had given birth to an illegitimate son whom she intended to keep and bring up alone. Paula had been surprised but not dumbfounded when the letter had arrived – wasn't it always the quiet ones who ended up in what her mother would refer to as ‘trouble'? The fast ones were too streetwise to find themselves in such a predicament and if they did they would get out of it, fast. But it was quite in keeping with Sally's nature that she should have refused both an abortion and adoption. ‘ Silly idiot, she's ruined things for herself now', Paula thought, and promptly forgot all about her sister.

When her own pregnancy was confirmed however she was shocked beyond belief. She had had no intention of starting a family yet – if at all! – and had been meticulous in the use of her diaphragm. Except … yes, there had been one occasion, a lazy Sunday morning when she had felt too languorous to get out of bed and visit the bathroom. And just that once had been enough seemingly.

Her first thought was dismay at how drastically her social life would be curtailed for the best part of a year, her second was anxiety for her looks. What would having a baby do to her body? Her breasts weren't big enough to sag much but if they lost their firmness they'd turn into a couple of fried eggs and slim as she was any thickening of her waist would destroy the balance of her figure so she would end up looking like a plank, straight up and down. Lax tummy muscles and varicose veins were just two more horrors to be feared and the fact that millions of women cope with such problems and emerge virtually unscathed was of little comfort. It wasn't enough for her that she would still be a very attractive woman no matter how many children she bore; Paula could not be satisfied with less than perfection. She knew she would look in the mirror and hate every inch of bulge and she dreaded the discomforts of early morning sickness, indigestion, the clumsiness, the indignity of it all.

Hugo, on the other hand, was as excited as a child on Christmas Eve when she told him the news.

‘Don't kid me, Paula,' he said, gazing at her with an expression of wonder that said he half-believed her already.

‘I'm not kidding. Would I, about something like that? People do have babies you know, especially when they make love as often as we do.'

‘I guess they do!' he said, still sounding amazed. Unable to contain his delight a moment longer he picked her up and whirled her round, then just as suddenly set her down again, terrified he might hurt her. ‘I'm sorry, honey, but it's such wonderful news.'