Never Too Rich (58 page)

“
Does that mean you’re turning me
down?”

She held his gaze. “No,” she said with a thoughtful
frown. “I’m not turning you down. Nor am I trying to kill a
romantic evening. It’s just far too early in our relationship to
consider taking such a plunge. I got married much too quickly once.
If I go to the altar again, I want to be sure it’s for keeps.”

“
I love you,” he whispered. “And I
love you for keeps.”

Suddenly she needed a jolt of reality. Too much was
happening, and much too fast. She needed time to think.

“
Why don’t you take me up to see
the sculpture garden now?” she suggested.

“
All right. But let me get your
coat. It’ll be very cold out, this high up. And you’d better take
your shoes off. The stairs are treacherous.”

She nodded and kicked off her heels.

The see-through spiral stairs weren’t only
treacherous—they were downright frightening. And it wasn’t just
cold out—it was
ice
cold. And the wind was savage. It tore
at her.

She pulled her fur tightly around her.

The sculpture garden was enormous—the entire roof of
the building. Underfoot, it was a sea of smooth, water-rounded
pebbles. And, dotted all around, were the sculptures.

Maillots and Rodins and Henry Moores and Arps, each
carefully lit so that they appeared to be floating mysteriously
above the darkness. And beyond, the glittering towers of Manhattan
rose up into the velvety night, the bridges over the East River
strung with swagged necklaces of light.

“
It’s beautiful, Leo!” she
breathed. “My God! You’ve got a museum up here! And the view! Oh,
my God!” Suddenly she clutched him for dear life.

“
What is it?”

She pointed. They were standing near the edge of the
roof, and she’d suddenly realized that there was no brick wall or
metal railing. There was . . .
nothing!
The roof just
dropped off.

“
Leo . . .” she said
weakly.

“
If you look closer, you’ll see
that there
is
a railing.”

She looked. So there was—not that it helped much.
The waist-high clear glass wall gave the impression that there was
no barrier at all.

“
Don’t worry,” he told her. “It’s
quite safe. They used a specially processed glass. See?” He shook
it, and it didn’t so much as quiver.

She leaned forward, found herself swaying, and
jerked abruptly back.

He caught her. “Are you all right?” he asked with
immediate concern.

She threw her arms around his neck. “I’m getting
sick!” she whispered. “I hate heights!”

It was as if he hadn’t heard. He was staring
transfixed out at the city. “Look at all the lights, Eds!” He
gestured with his hand at the jewel box of buildings spread out on
all sides. “Do you know what all that is?”

“
Yes,” she croaked, burying her
face in the safety and warmth of his chest. She didn’t want to
look, couldn’t look.

“
It’s Manhattan, Eds! The center of
the universe!”

She nodded.

“
Just stick with me, Eds, and all
that can be yours.”

Despite her dizziness, she opened her eyes and
stared up at him. “You sound as if you’re the devil tempting
me!”

He threw back his head and roared laughter into the
wind.

“
Can we . . . can we go back in
now? It’s awfully cold out.”

“
Sure. I didn’t realize you were
frightened of heights.” He embraced her gently and kissed
her.

Suddenly she no longer felt cold. It was as if the
icy wind had turned deliciously warm.

“
Let’s make love, Leo!” she said
huskily. “Let’s go downstairs and celebrate life!”

Slowly he pulled away from her. “No,” he said
quietly, shaking his head. “Not yet. You see, I’m a great believer
in sex
after
marriage.”

Chapter 60

“
The bitches!” Anouk de Riscal
screamed. She flung the copy of
Women’s Wear Daily
across
the breakfast room in an uncharacteristic fit of rage. “The
ungrateful, miserable, plague-ridden bitches! Of all the low-down,
dirty stabs in the back—and to have to learn about it by reading it
in
Women’s Wear
Daily
They couldn’t tell me! Oh, the
humiliation, Antonio! And to think that
I’m
the chairperson
of the Showhouse Committee and they voted on this behind my
back!”

“
Calm down, darling, what is done
is done,” Antonio said soothingly, sipping his morning coffee while
running his eyes down the stock-market quotations in his
folded-over
Wall Street Journal.
“If you hadn’t gone to
Switzerland for those sheep-cell injections, you would have had a
say in the matter. Anyway, it really is not worth getting so worked
up over.”

“
Not worth . . .” Anouk nearly
choked. She leaned across the table, her eyes huge and black and
furious. “They’ve humiliated us, Antonio! They’ve humiliated
you!
Not only have we lost hundreds of thousands in free
advertising ...” She slammed her palm down on the table with such
force that the crockery and cutlery jumped. “But think of the lost
prestige! I really do not know how I can face anyone after this, I
really truly do not.”

“
Anouk, you know you can. You are
not so easily defeated, not by anything.”

“
May I remind you, dear heart, that
the Southampton Showhouse is
not
just anything?” She sat
there fuming. “To think that those twits on the committee actually
chose that painted monkey Edwina over
you
for the
opening-night fashion show! That is the last, the very last straw.”
She sat back and glowered. “I have a good mind to resign my
chairmanship—after wringing the scrawny necks of those mummified
committee members!”

“
And languish in some
lesbian-infested prison?” Antonio laughed. “Darling, that’s as
close to heaven as you’d ever get.”

“
This is not a joking matter!” She
drummed her magenta nails on the tabletop. “I tell you, Antonio, I
shall not go to that opening, and neither will you. We’ll refuse.
Yes! In fact, I’ll tell everyone we know to boycott it!”

“
I’m afraid they won’t listen to
you, darling. You know the showhouse opening is always the social
event of the Southampton season. Besides, even we can’t refuse to
go. Every woman who will be there buys tens of thousands of
dollars’ worth of my gowns and dresses every year. You know as well
as I that we can’t afford to make enemies of them.”

“
As if they were friends!” Anouk
snapped. “I am telling you, Antonio, we will never be able to live
this down. Make no mistake about it: those hags on the committee
have done this quite intentionally to embarrass us.”

“
Whether they did it deliberately
or not, it is done,” he said pacifically, “so it’s water under the
bridge. At any rate, I don’t have a monopoly on giving charity
fashion shows. Who knows? Perhaps Edwina really does have
talent.”

“
Edwina!” Anouk scoffed derisively.
“Ha!”

Antonio shrugged. “You have to admit she must be
doing something right. Maybe it was a mistake not to give her
Rubio’s job.”

Anouk’s eyes narrowed to slits. “And whose fault was
that, may I ask?” she hissed. “Did Doris Bucklin walk in on
me
getting screwed?”

Blushing guiltily, Antonio quickly poked his nose
back into the newspaper.

Anouk reached for the sterling Georgian coffeepot
and with quivering hands poured herself half a cup. “Maybe Ms. E.
G. Robinson has scored a coup
this
time,” she said tightly,
setting the pot back down with a decided bang, “but she’ll soon
learn that no matter how much talent she
thinks
she has, in
this city there was, is, and
will be
room for only one
Antonio de Riscal!”

Antonio lowered the newspaper and smiled across the
table. “You always were my most loyal supporter, Anouk,” he said
gently.

It was as if she didn’t hear him. “It wouldn’t have
been half so bad if they had chosen Adolfo or Pauline Trigère or
Oscar de la Renta,” she went on, unable to drop the subject. “But
Edwina!
That hurts, Antonio. That hurts immensely. And to
think that she probably learned all there is to know from you.
That
is the single worst blow of all. No, Antonio, I am
adamant. We will
not
go to that showhouse opening.” She
lifted the coffee cup to her lips.

Banstead appeared at the door and cleared his throat
discreetly. “Excuse me, madam,” he intoned gravely, looking
carefully into space.

Anouk put her cup down crossly. “What is it,
Banstead?” she asked testily.

“
Mr. Leo Flood is on the telephone,
madam.”

Anouk froze into a statue of incredulous disbelief.
Leo Flood was calling? Leo Flood, who was backing Edwina? The
nerve! The unmitigated gall!

Abruptly she came out of her state of suspended
animation. Glowering, she jumped to her feet, grabbed the telephone
off the sideboard, and snatched up the receiver. And suddenly,
miraculously, her wrathful face smoothed. “Leo!
Chéri,”
she
cooed sweetly. “How lovely to hear from you. To what do I owe the
honor . . . Me—the master of ceremonies! But I thought surely you
or Edwina . . . Oh, of course there’s no conflict of interest!
Antonio’s and Edwina’s clothes are for entirely different markets!
. . . I see. . . . Why, I’d love to, my sweet! I’d be truly
honored! . . . Of course! And Antonio introducing her collection?
He would adore it! I tell you what, darling! I promise to dress in
my simplest—
Wh-what?
I’m to wear one of
hers?
. . .
Y-yes . . . yes, I . . . I understand. You’re right, of course, the
master of ceremonies should be an extension of the . . . the
fashion show.” Anouk’s voice cracked on those last words. “No, I’m
not upset, darling . . . yes, yes, Leo. . . . Ciao.” Anouk slammed
the phone down and then stood there, her clenched fists blurring in
the air.

Antonio was alarmed. She looked as though she was
going into a seizure. What escaped from her lips sounded very much
like, “Rrrrrrrr . . .”

“
So I take it we are going to the
showhouse opening after all,” he said calmly.

“
Oh
darling!”
Anouk moaned,
dramatically knocking her clenched fists against her forehead.
“What am I going to do?”

“
Darling! What’s wrong
now?”

“
Insult’s been added to injury! Oh,
Antonio, Antonio!” Anouk wailed. “I’m going to have to
wear
one of that bitch Edwina’s outfits! I’ll die, Antonio!”

“
Then refuse, darling.”

She turned on him. “Refuse! Antonio, are you out of
your mind? You know I can’t. Not with Leo Flood contributing tens
of millions of dollars to charity every year. Charities on whose
boards I sit. Charities for which I have to approach
him
for
contributions. Oh, Antonio! I’ll die! I’ll simply
die!”

Chapter 61

Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will.

It did.

In spades.

The night before, April 14, the pipes on the floor
above had burst, and the ceiling of Lydia Claussen Zehme’s
Southampton Showhouse room was buckling—not to mention what the
flood had done to the walls. The paint on the blue-painted
paneling, completed just three days prior, was blistering and
peeling.

And it hadn’t been a two-coat paint job, either. It
had required eight different layers of specially mixed colors, each
one carefully sanded down before the next one had been applied.

It had taken three weeks to complete.

Now it was ruined.

“
I’ll have to get it stripped and
make them do it all over again from scratch!” Lydia moaned. “This
is the end! The last, the final straw!”

“
Calm down, darling,” Anouk said,
sweeping in to survey the damage, cordless telephone in hand. “They
have turned off the water, and the plumbers will be here
mañana”

“
That’s
not going to keep
the paint on the walls!” Lydia wailed.

Anouk turned her head and frowned. From out in the
hall, heated voices were suddenly raised in anger.

“
Your people banged the hell out of
my doorways!” a man was screeching. “Look at those chips! I think
I’m going to
faint!”

“
Stop!” another man
replied.

“
I’ll kill you, you fruit! I’ll
kill you with my goddamn bare hands!”

“
Oh, dear,” Anouk sighed. “Tempers
are
flaring.” She reached out and patted Lydia’s hand.
“Excuse me a moment, darling. If I don’t intercede, our decorating
friends will be stabbing one another with their curtain
rods.”

Boo Boo Lippincott came in just as Anouk went out.
She made a face as a nearby marble saw screamed through stone. It
really was enough to drive one crazy. Inside and out, workmen
crawled all over the mansion like industrious ants on an anthill.
The ear-splitting whirs of sanders, the screeches of saws, and the
relentless pounding of hammers were unnerving. Worse were the
noxious, nauseating smells of urethanes and oil paints.

“
Never again!” Lydia swore heatedly
under her breath. “I’ve reached my limit! Boo Boo, the next time
anyone mentions the words ‘designer showhouse,’ I’m taking off!”
She tossed herself into a plastic-protected Regency chair and
glowered. “For the
hills!”