The First Wives Club (24 page)

Leo Gilman licked his lips.

”Balls!” Morty shouted. “A deal’s a deal.” Diana smiled at him.

Leo Gilman straightened up in his chair. “Let me handle this, Morty.

“Ms. La Gravenesse, I don’t like your innuendo. This firm has a spotless reputation, and you should know better than to make baseless accusations.

Anyway, the burden of proof is on you. One thing has nothing to do with the other. Mrs. Cushman acted on her own free will as an informed adult. She retained him, and then came to an agreement with benefit of counsel. We subsequently hired Mr. Marlowe because we were impressed with his work. It’s too late to change her mind. It’s unjust to try to take advantage of Mr. Cushman’s success since the time of their divorce. It had nothing to do with her marriage. And we’re prepared to enter a long, expensive court case in the interest of justice. As Mr. Cushman so aptly says, a deal is a deal.”

”We are quite prepared to dispute that,” Diana said. “We have information and proof that the business was established by Mrs. Cushman and her parents. That Mr. Cushman actually played a minor role. ‘ Leo smiled. “Ms. La Gravenesse, the world knows Morty the Madman. He is the firm. I’d hate to see you spend your time and Mrs. Cushman’s resources trying to prove otherwise.”

Brenda’s stomach lurched. She could feel a film of sweat developing on her upper lip and forehead. It was so unfair! She knew that Diana was bluffing on this shit—she and her father had kept no records, and she could prove nothing. If she sued, what would happen? How would Angela and Tony feel to see their grandfather’s name in the papers again? Who didn’t like and believe in Morty the Madman? The guy with the deal for you?

Diana took off her glasses and cocked her head. Then she sighed. Is she giving up? Brenda thought, panicking. Maybe it’s too late now to do anything. God, why was I so stupid, so scared then? Why did I settle for so little, why did I sign that damn thing anyway? Her disappointment was so intense that she actually felt dizzy for a moment. I should have known not to get my hopes up, she told herself bitterly. And there was all that paperwork I did, rooting through our old receipts and the time I wasted with Diana. And now there would be her bill. Oh, Christ.

Diana remained silent, however. Then she reached her long arm across her flat chest and into the attache case on the floor next to her chair, snapping the latches open and taking out a thick file, which she noisily smacked on the table. Morty recognized it immediately. His stomach lurched. The bold letters across the front read, “PHOTOCOPIES.

Tax returns for Mr. and Mrs. Morton Cushman, tax years 1980,1981, and

1982.”

Morty blinked.

The implication was clear to everyone in the room. Leo and Morty locked eyes.

‘What the fuck is this?”’ Leo telegraphed to Morty, who looked for the moment like a wounded bull elephant, unsure whether to charge or die.

This was clearly a mortal blow.

Before Morty recovered, Leo spoke directly to Diana. ‘Ms. La Gravenesse, I’d like to consult privately with my client. I may have been mistaken. Perhaps we do have the basis for a more up-to-date agreement.”

“I can’t believe it!” Brenda laughed again, her deep voice trembling as the Asian masseuse hit her flesh. Brenda heard Diana’s deepthroated moan. She opened her eyes and smiled.

On the massage table next to her, Diana turned her head, looked at Brenda, and grinned back. Their eyes locked, and then together they shrieked with glee, like two kids who just found out they had a snow day. As the giggles died down, Brenda continued to look at Diana.

With her glasses off and her hair mussed, she was surprised at how attractive Diana was. Not pretty exactly, more like handsome.

Brenda had found out more about Diana from Duarto. She was a crusader, a fighter. She’d worked for seven years as assistant DA in charge of sex crimes prosecution. After that burnout, she’d moved into her private practice and now only handled cases involving women’s and children’s rights. She had sued the city on behalf of a foster child placed in a home where the child was being molested and had won a settlement for her. She’d just defended a woman who’d murdered her abusive father and had gotten her off. Now she was working on another divorce where the husband had stolen his wife’s idea and patented it under his own name.

Brenda admired Diana’s mixture of coolness, caring, and activism. But most of all, she admired how Diana handled Leo and Morty.

“We rattled their cage,” Diana agreed.

“Rattled? Jesus! Leo Gilman nearly took a dump in his pants. His seven-hundred dollar pants. I couldn’t believe that look he shot Morty. God, it was delicious. Hey, Diana, some suit!”

“Well, let’s not eat out on it until the agreement is signed and the checks clear. You know what they say—‘It ain’t over till it’s over.”

Or isn’t it, It ain’t over till the fat lady sings’?” Diana continued.

“Well, Brenda, we’ll have you singing before too long.”

Brenda, somewhat taken aback, paused to see if she was offended by the “fat lady” remark. But Diana was looking at her with such warmth that she knew in an instant Diana would never hurt her. After all, I am fat, she thought. She threw back her head and laughed.

It was a good idea to come here, to the Salon de Tokyo. It was an Asian massage house, a no-nonsense, no-frills place on West Fiftyseventh Street, where Brenda would sometimes stop on her way back from a visit with Angela, who had a tiny summer-sublet apartment on Fifty-third and Ninth Avenue.

The little Japanese woman who was working on Brenda grunted and climbed onto the massage table. Overhead was a pole suspended from the ceiling, which she clung to, monkeylike, as she began to walk on Brenda’s back. Now it was Brenda who grunted.

Diana laughed. She had a nice laugh, Brenda thought, throaty and warm.

‘Well, if anyone was going to walk all over you today, thank God it was a woman,” Diana said.

”No, thank you, Diana,” Brenda parried. “Are you sure he’ll sign the agreement? Two checks, a million each? One now, one before Thanksgiving? ” ”There are no guarantees, but I think he will. We got them on the run. It was a dirty trick, but an effective one. Let the IRS be your enforcer if he doesn’t come through. I’ll draw up the papers and get them over to him tomorrow, before he changes his mind.”’ She paused. ‘You know, Brenda, we could have gotten more. A lot more.

I’m certain of it.”’ ”Maybe. But a bird in the hand, you know. And I’ve never been a vulture. Two million bucks, tax free, and some stock is all that I’ll ever need. And my kids don’t need more, either. I might be a cow, but I’m not a pig.”’ She laughed. “Two million dollars! I can’t believe it. It’s like winning Lotto. I feel good!” Diana smiled across at her. ‘I’d feel better if this woman would get off my back,” she said, wincing. “To show your true appreciation, how about telling her to stop?”

“Only if I can take you out for dinner.”

”It’s a deal.”

Brenda motioned for the masseuses to finish, which they did. Then, bowing, they quietly left the room. Diana sat up, and the towel fell from her. Before she picked it up, Brenda saw that Diana’s chest was almost as flat as a boy’s, her shoulders as broad. Goodness, she’s as handsome as a man, Brenda thought.

Then she blushed and turned away. How odd, she thought. How very odd.

The Frog Pond.

Elise was showing a hell of a lot of character. ‘It’s outrageous!”

she said as she stared at the column Brenda had torn from the Post.

“How can a man announce his engagement when he is still legally married?” she asked, more exasperated than upset. Two decades of respectability and discretion, of living well but unostentatiously, of practicing noblesse oblige and trying to be appropriate, were now being blown away by her future former husband, who was making a fool of them both. She wouldn’t just stop him personally from handling her business, she was going to pull it out of Cromwell Reed altogether, even though they’d been handling her family since her grandfather’s time. That ought to put Bill in bad odor with his partners. And maybe that would hurry the divorce as well.

”It must be male menopause,” she said. “Otherwise, how could he say it?”

”Well, he didn’t exactly,” Brenda pointed out. ‘It says there that Phoebe announced that it would be announced, which is different, I think, isn’t it, Annie?”

Annie would have smiled, but her concern for Elise prevented her.

“Well,” she admitted, “it’s not the form they taught at Miss Porter’s.”

”She was probably stoned—Duarto says she’s usually flying.”

Elise seemed not to hear. ‘Bill knows I have a horror of the tabloids.

Next the Enquirer will headline how Phoebe is having my baby by Elvis.”

Then she smiled in spite of herself. “Well, as a lawyer, he has to realize that this is not the smartest move toward a financial settlement. Not to mention that it is in the worst possible taste.”

Elise thought of her mother. Those words were her mother’s harshest criticism. Small blessing, Elise thought, but at least Mother, wrapped in her cocoon of Alzheimer’s, won’t know about this.

”By the way, I saw your picture in People, Elise,” Brenda said. “You looked pretty good, considering.” Brenda pulled out another clipping.

Elise stared at the photo, then shuddered to herself. She was rarely in the news, her press agent saw to that. This picture wasn’t authorized. She read the credit. Larry Cochran. My God. She remembered Room 705. What other pictures had he taken?

“You look good, considering,” Brenda repeated.

”Considering what?” Elise said, a bit defensively.

“Considering you just came from a funeral, Elise,” Brenda snapped back.

Elise caught herself and smiled back. ‘Of course. I guess publicity just upsets me.”

”So, speaking of taste, let’s have lunch,” Brenda suggested brightly.

If Elise feared the papers, Brenda was at least as frightened of the courts. And Diana La Gravenesse still hadn’t gotten the signed agreements or the first of the checks from Morty. She hoped nothing would go wrong. She was counting on that money now. She’d be independent at last. The whole thing made her ravenous.

Today they had met at La Grenouille, the only place Brenda knew of where the food was as good as the flowers. And for a $36.50 prix fixe lunch she could have almost anything she wanted. She’d been worried about that. Until things were straightened out with Morty, she couldn’t afford to blow a hundred bucks for lunch. The big menu cheered her up. Here they were, the three of them, set in the middle of the choicest frog pond in the city.

Brenda enjoyed baiting Elise, and she always enjoyed Annie. Even if nothing came of this, if they got no justice for Cynthia, it was pleasant to have a reason to get dressed up and eat out. Of course, Brenda was happy just staying involved with her children. In fact, she’d called Anthony only this morning, offering to come up to his school and pick up his laundry. It was no trouble.

But Tony said no. He was at that age now when parents embarrassed him.

Brenda still longed to spend time with him. She liked to clean, and it kept her mind off food for a while.

She didn’t know how Annie was coping, being separated from Sylvie, and with both her boys so busy with their own lives.

he was worried about Annie. Since Sylvie had left, Annie was down, real down.

It was that bastard Aaron.

For Brenda, her children were everything. Unlike Annie, Brenda wasn’t busy with the Special Olympics Committee or volunteering at Beckstein Burn Center.

She had never been a real part of the social world, never wanted to be, but she was enjoying the look she was getting at it now. Secretly, Brenda devoured the columns, and she loved society gossip. She’d die, however, before admitting it. And when Morty had tried to push into this world, Brenda had dug in her heels. She knew the picture they would paint. Unattractive parvenus trying for the big time. Feh!

Well, at least she knew her limitations.

Annie was real class, and Elise, she had to admit, was real class and big-time bucks. She wondered whether Elise followed the columns .

”I think what we should do,” Elise was saying, “is prepare a brief, a sort of report on Gil and each of the others. Include their work life, and their social life. And the trophies, of course. And then, after we know them better, we’ll be able to spot their vulnerabilities.

”What we need is a dossier. Anything and everything. The stuff from Advertising Age, or the American Bar Association Journal, their high school yearbook or whatever. Their horoscope sign. Their favorite color. Their stockbroker, banker, tailor. How they take their coffee.

‘ ”Sure, you know,” Brenda continued, ‘dental records, scars, tattoos, favorite sex positions, worst nightmare.”’ She paused. “My ambition is to be Mort’s worst nightmare.”’ ”That’s what I want to hear,” Elise said, nodding her approval.

“Except I can’t. I still haven’t gotten my money from him, so I’m skating on thin ice,” Brenda said.

She saw Elise’s face tighten. Brenda knew that like other Greenwich WASPs, Elise got icy when she was angry, and she was angry now. She stared coldly down at her. ‘Don’t be a pussy, Brenda,” Elise said, echoing Brenda’s own taunt at Annie.

Brenda felt stung by the barb. I’m fighting to stay alive and this rich bitch calls me a pussy?

Brenda felt her skin grow hot as she leaned forward. her face very close to Elise’s. “What the fuck do you know about being a woman at the mercy of a man, fighting for her survival? Everything you have has been handed to you. You’ve never had to kiss a man’s ass to make sure you got the maintenance paid so you can look the president of the co-op in the eye in the elevator, or try to figure out if you can afford a thirty-six-dollar lunch because your alimony check might be late again.

Do you know how I have to degrade myself with Morty—month after month—because I have no control over anything? You don’t, Elise, and you never will.”

Brenda’s anger came quickly. She realized that even though she was trying to control her voice, she was beginning to attract the attention of some nearby diners. But Brenda didn’t give a shit.