Made For Sex (24 page)

“I'll be there by five,” Jenny had said. “Be a good guy.” And the phone had gone dead.

“One of these days,” she had muttered, but she knew that she'd probably never say anything. She had sighed and worked until Jenny had arrived at almost five-thirty.

Fran turned off her computer and walked into her bedroom. Why was she lamenting the passing of an evening? It wasn't as if she had anywhere to go or anything to do except look forward to
Designing Women
reruns. She should call her mother or her sister, but, as she stretched out on the bed, she couldn't work up the enthusiasm. It wasn't as if she could tell them what she had just accomplished. They'd be horrified.

She was startled when the phone rang. “Hello,” she said into the receiver, hoping it was a wrong number so she could click on the TV and become a vegetable.

“Hi, Fran. It's Eileen.”

Fran grinned. She was always glad to hear from Eileen Brent, her literary agent and friend. “Hi. I haven't heard from you in weeks. What's up?”

“What's up is something really great. I didn't want to call you at work because I know how secretive you are and your whooping and yelling would have led to questions.”

“Whooping and yelling?”

“You've been nominated for the Madison Prize.”

“You're kidding.” The Madison Prize was one of the most prestigious awards for writers of romance novels. Although there was no actual money involved, receiving the Madison Prize meant increased sales plus better up-front money, promotion and placement for ensuing books.

“I'm not kidding, babe.
The Love Flower
is up for novel of the year.”

“You're for real?”

“For real. You've got some stiff competition, but I think you've got a shot. You know I've loved that book from the beginning.”

“But how can they even consider it? It's much too spicy for those eggheads up there. It's erotica. Pure and simple.”

“It's a good novel and it's a love story so it's considered a romance novel, erotic or not. I think the publisher pushed for it, too. Sandy told me, in confidence, that they really wanted to see this book do well, and this is one very good way.” Sandy McFadden was Fran's editor at Majestic Books. “I understand that she's got some pull with one of the judges.”

“Is this fixed?” Fran said, horrified.

“Of course not,” Eileen said quickly. “Sandy only got your book noticed. The judges read it and the book did the rest. It's not only good publicity for you, it's good for Majestic to have a nominee as well.”

“Wow,” Fran said, sitting down, then flopping back onto her pillows and propping her feet on the patchwork quilt on her bed. “Wow!”

“Yes. Wow and double wow. You'll have to be in New York for the dinner, you know. And because it's hooked up with the Madison Romance Writers' Conference, there will be a cocktail party Friday evening, some ‘meet the authors' things and general being-seen beforehand.”

“I'll have to be there?” How could she? She was Fran Caputo. It was Nichole St. Michelle who was nominated. Sophisticated, worldly Nicki. Not small-town Fran. And how could she face people who had read the erotica she had written. She flushed at the thought.

“Yes, my dear. You and Sandy can have quite an effect on the book's sales. People get all excited about buying a book written by someone they've actually met ‘up close and personal.' And you'll have a book signing, too.”

“But I can't,” Fran said quickly.

“You can and you really should. No one can force you, but you really can't let Sandy go through all this and not cooperate. Take a couple of weeks off, come to the city and we'll get you all set up. And it's a great opportunity to get known at Majestic.”

“Look, Eileen, this isn't the Oscars, after all. It's only the Madison Prize.” She giggled. “Did you hear what I just said?
Only the Madison Prize
.”

Eileen's rich laughter filled the phone. “That's like saying it's
only
a bestseller. This could do that, you know.”

Fran scrubbed her hands over her unmade-up face. “But Eileen, really. I can't take that time off from work. And what if anyone found out?”

Fran had worked for Manhattan Videos for almost seven years, ever since she moved to Omaha after she and Eric split. Almost four years ago she had, for a lark, written an explicitly sexy short story and submitted it to a pulp magazine. Buoyed by the magazine's rapid acceptance of the manuscript and the small check that came with it, she wrote more and more erotic short stories until finally she had written
The Love Flower
, a full-length erotic novel. Through a series of query letters, she had become connected with Eileen Brent's agency and, over the last year and a half, they had become fast friends, despite the fact that they had never met face-to-face.

No one knew that she was Nichole St. Michelle. Not her parents in Colorado or her sister and brother-in-law in Southern California. No one. And she wanted to keep it that way. After all, her mother hadn't brought her up to write slutty stuff like
The Love Flower
.

As Fran thought about going to New York, she had very mixed feelings. She would love to see the book do well, maybe make enough money for her to leave her job and write full-time. An author. A real author. It had always sounded like such a dream, but now, with this nomination and the recognition that she really could write, it just might be possible.

But it wasn't really Fran Caputo who was nominated, she reminded herself. It was Nichole St. Michelle.

“You can do this, Fran,” Eileen said. “I mean Nichole can do this.”

Eileen knew more about Fran's life than anyone, and Fran was tempted. She lifted her head and pulled the scrunchy from her ponytail, allowing her gray-streaked brown hair to fly free. Rubbing her scalp, she said, “Maybe Nichole can, but where she goes I go, and
I
can't.”

“Fran, look,” Eileen said. “You have vacation time coming to you. You've told me over and over that you haven't taken time off since Eric. At two weeks per year, you should have about fourteen weeks saved up.”

“Actually you can only keep three weeks from previous years.”

“Okay, so you have this year's two and three from past years. That's a lot of weeks.”

“But Nichole's bio says she's a free-living swinging divorcée. That's nowhere near what I am.”

“So come here and take a week or two to become used to living as Nichole.”

“Living as Nichole? As a swinger? Not on your life.”

“Why not? You're over thirty, single and smart enough to know which chances to take and which not. We'll get you out of those sneakers and jeans and into some real city clothes. A few dinners and whathaveyou and you're set.”

Fran giggled. “It's not the dinners, it's the whathaveyous that scare the shit out of me.”

“And well they should. But isn't it about time you practiced what you write about? I can't understand how you can be as naive as you claim to be and still write the steamy sex scenes you write.”

“I am not naive.”

“You told me you have a hard time just going into the back room and rearranging the XXX-rated videos. Ever watch one?”

“No.”

“So where do you get the ideas for those hot love scenes. Are there men in your past I don't know about?”

“Not even one besides Eric, and sex with him wasn't the stuff steamy sex is made of. Actually, it's just a good imagination, lots of reading and midnight masturbation.” Fran swallowed hard. Had she really just said that? To Eileen, whom she had never really met?

Through the phone Fran could hear Eileen's sudden burst of laughter. “You're a riot. Listen. Think about it and call me in a day or two. The dinner is the first Saturday in May so you have a few weeks to consider it.”

Fran looked out of her window at the black March sky and her snow-covered windowsill. She would think about it, she realized. She really would. But she couldn't. She really couldn't.

In the living room of her five-bedroom colonial in Commack, Long Island, Diane Barklay was stretched out on the bed beside her husband Zack. “Being nominated is a great honor,” Zack was saying.

“Honor, shmonor,” Diane replied. “I was nominated once already. This time I have to win.” She knew Zack could feel her whole body stiffen, but he must understand how important this was. “No one's ever been nominated a second time and not won.”

Diane gazed at the framed covers of her six romance novels. From
Magic Love
to
Addie's Travels
, they traced her last five years. She also had a framed copy of the certificate that
Lovers in the Spring
had earned when it had been nominated for the Madison Prize two years earlier. “It's an honor just to be nominated,” her editor had said at the time. “There are tens of thousands of romances published each year and only the top five get nominated for novel of the year.” But she had lost. Nominated isn't winning and despite what all her friends had said at the time winning had been, and still was, the only thing that mattered.

Diane stared at the spectacular cover the art department had come up with for
Addie's Travels
. A great cover. Violets that symbolized Addle's search for the perfect lover. And a perfect diamond, from the mine that Trask owned, the diamond that brought them together. It was a great story, Diane knew, but that wonderful cover was part of the reason that
Addie's Travels
had been nominated for the Madison Prize this year.

“Then I'm sure it's in the bag for you,” Zack said, his hand slowly stroking his wife's arm. “Who else was nominated?”

“Well, there's Virginia Cortez for
Come to Papa
, Mary Kate Allonzo for
Miranda
, Paul Ng for
The Joys of Paris
and Nichole St. Michelle for
The Love Flower
.”

“Well, I'm sure those are all worthy competitors, but
Addie's Travels
will win hands down. It's got everything a good romance needs.”

Diane smiled and willed her body to relax. “It's really a good book, isn't it?”

“Of course it is,” Zack said, still stroking Diane's upper arm. “You've probably read the other nominees. Is there any real competition?”

Diane grinned. “I guess I do read a lot of romances and yes, I have read them all. They are all good books, of course, except for
The Love Flower
. It's just a sexy piece of trash. Lots of steamy love scenes and very little story.”

“Who's the writer?”

“Her name's Nichole St. Michelle and this is her first novel.” She frowned. “Her first novel and she gets nominated.”

“Nichole St. Michelle. Have I ever heard of her?”

“Probably not. She's supposed to be very French for an American. There was an article about her in one of my romance magazines. Wait a minute.”

Diane knelt beside a bookshelf filled with magazines and rummaged through the stack. “November. I think it was in November. Why can't I find November?” She located the missing issue and crawled back onto the bed. She thumbed through the magazine until she found the full-page photo of the cover of
The Love Flower
. Grudgingly she had to admit that it was an adequate cover. The love flower was a blood-red orchid and the outlines of the graceful hands of the hero and heroine reached for the flower from opposite sides, their fingers not quite touching.

She turned her attention to the biography of Nichole St. Michelle on the lower half of the facing page and read aloud. “‘Nichole St. Michelle, brilliant new author of
The Love Flower
, is a free spirit. At thirty-two she is eight years divorced and, with no children and few encumbrances, Nicki, as her friends call her, lives a life of freedom and indulgence. Left a substantial sum by wealthy relatives, Nicki is free to travel the world, being wined and dined by the influential and the infamous. This writer has it on good authority that Nichole hasn't done
all
the naughty, sexy things she writes about in her hot first novel, but I'm told she has experienced most of the erotic games that her characters play. When I tried to get an interview, I was told that Ms. St. Michelle was traveling in southern France and was unavailable for comment.'”

Diane closed the magazine. “She's a personality and I'm just a housewife. She'll come to New York, dazzle all the judges and I won't stand a chance.” Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes.

Zack enfolded his wife in his arms. “It's all right. I know you'll win. We'll do whatever it takes to make sure you win. It'll be fine.”

“Don't patronize me, Zack. It won't necessarily be fine. She might win. Any of the others might, too. And I can't lose again. I just can't.”