The Worst Best Luck
Read The Worst Best Luck Online
Authors: Brad Vance
Copyright © 2014, 2015 by the author
All rights reserved
Cover model via iStockPhoto
Cover art by the author
Createspace ISBN-13: 978-1494899462
ISBN-10: 1494899469
Table of Contents
CHAPTER TWO – IT JUST FELT MEANT TO BE
CHAPTER THREE – SLEEPING BEAUTY
CHAPTER FOUR – EVERYTHING’S RUINED NOW
CHAPTER SIX – DO YOU NEED A LOAN?
CHAPTER SEVEN – WHY DO YOU BREAK ALL OF YOUR NICE THINGS?
CHAPTER NINE – I’LL BE YOUR SAMWISE
CHAPTER ELEVEN – YOU’LL REMEMBER WE BELONG TOGETHER
CHAPTER TWELVE – NOTHING BUT A PACK OF CARDS
STAY TUNED at the end for a 10,000 word preview of my new novel, “Have A Little Faith In Me”!
“Do you have that ready for me?” Jeremy asked as he flew past Peter’s desk without looking up from his BlackBerry.
“Have
what
ready for you?” Peter asked, palming a small object off his desk before Jeremy could see him do it. He was trying to break Jeremy of the habit of starting his conversations in the middle of an idea. It probably wasn’t going to work, because Jeremy enjoyed the confusing effect it had on his co-workers.
Jeremy stopped and scowled at him. “The USB drive with my presentation on it.”
Peter opened his hand, like a magician showing off. “The magic bean, ready to plant.”
Jeremy smiled despite himself. “You rock.”
“Yes,” Peter agreed. “Yes, I do.” He turned back to his computer, where he had his hands full fixing some broken web links in a proposal.
Creative types
, he shrugged.
Always cooking brilliant meals, and never cleaning up the kitchen afterwards.
Well, he reminded himself, using “advertising” and “creative” in the same sentence was enough to make most people laugh, and they’d bend over in stitches if you added “brilliant” to the mix. Peter usually laughed with them, too.
He saw Katie at her desk, her red hair as visible as a signal fire from the other side of the floor. Other than the partners’ offices, the floor was a big gleaming white open plan space, with no cubicles, just shiny glass desks and the latest Aeron chairs and huge Apple monitors.
He opened his instant messenger app and pinged her to see if she was up for lunch. >
Let your appetite run wild, at MacAfee’s!
he typed with a grin.
She didn’t look up from her computer, but immediately typed back,
>Special after five o’clock! Two seniors can eat for the price of one!
>What a great deal! Because senior citizens love to leave the house after five!
>
Seriously, where do you want to go? And it has to be after one, because I’ve got to get the B of R storyboards done for Martin.
Peter groaned. One of the agency’s accounts was a nationwide jewelry retailer, whose ads featured elderly people nodding and smiling approvingly when young men spent a month’s pay on a shiny gewgaw for their girlfriends. Peter and Katie agreed that if you really loved someone and wanted to blow a lot of money to prove it, you should spend a couple thousand bucks on a European river cruise. Not on a ridiculously overpriced gift from Bradley of Rialto, whose products Katie secretly referred to as the “Box of Rocks.”
>
That’s fine. At least we’ll miss the lunch rush.
>
Lemons, lemonade
, she responded in her characteristic shorthand.
>
Always. Like a diamond. Forever.
>I kill you now.
Peter laughed, and then scowled as his phone rang. Dammit, it was Larry.
“Hi, Larry.” He steeled himself for the unreasonable request to come.
“Peter, I need you to punch up the WebMax material. Jane’s plane is stuck in a holding pattern and the plane’s wifi is out. I need it by 2 o’clock.”
“Larry, I’m an assistant. I don’t write copy.”
“Peter, I am asking you to step up here. This is a very important account and I need everyone to bring their A game.”
Peter rolled his eyes. He used to think that people were just bullshitting when they used CorpSpeak, that nobody actually talked like that outside of meetings and press conferences and brochures. Then he met Larry, who not only drank the proverbial Kool-Aid, his veins ran purple with it.
“This could be a very big get for us, and I know you can do this.”
Peter knew now that he never should have let anyone (other than Katie) know that he blogged about theater as a hobby, and even had a small but decent following. Suddenly the agency knew that he could write, and mistakenly assumed he’d naturally want to “grow into the role” of advertising copywriter.
He sighed. “Larry, WebMax is gross.” It was true – the company was responsible for “maximizing the web presence” of scams and near-scams that sank their teeth into your credit card number and never let go. If there was an AdSense ad that said “Your Town Mom makes millions whitening her teeth at home using this one simple weight loss rule!” that was WebMax at work.
Larry paused, stunned. “They could be a very valuable client, Peter.”
“Well, valuable and gross, then.”
“So you’re telling me I can’t count on you.”
“I am telling you that you can count on me to do my job. I am not writing something about how terrific some sleazy outfit is.”
“Fine. And you can expect your bonus to reflect your unwillingness here.” Larry hung up, hard.
“What bonus?” Peter asked the air. The bonus he received last year was worthy of the Duke Brothers from “Trading Places” – two billionaires giving their butler five bucks for Christmas. Together. Not even five bucks each.
His screen was flashing with a message from Katie. >
No lunch today. Box of Rocks PPT now needs animations. Must! Make! Shiny!
Peter sighed. Katie’s gift for making presentations beautiful was a curse sometimes. >
OK. I’ll just go get some dirt and eat it in a ditch by myself.
>Sounds great! Have fun!
>Ha.
“Ahem,” said a slinky voice behind him.
Peter smiled. “Who can it be?” He turned around.
Kyle was gorgeous, and he knew it. Tall, built, lean, with the broad shoulders and narrow hips that Slim Fit dress shirts were made for, he leaned against the white pillar, looking like the classical statue for which he could have been a model.
“Your secret gay lover,” Kyle purred, idly fingering open a second button on his shirt to reveal the cut channel between his smooth, golden pecs.
“You wish,” Peter said, but grinning as he did. Kyle was a flirt, and Peter knew that yeah, he half meant it, and given a holiday party and one too many eggnogs, Kyle would cheerfully have him over the copy machine.
Of course then he’d be as cold to Peter as he was to that poor starry-eyed intern who’d sucked him off in the supply closet last week. A fact that Peter knew because, running out of printer toner at just that moment, he’d surprised them in the middle of the act. The intern had been flustered but Kyle, of course, had only winked at him as Peter hastily shut the door on the scene.
Besides
, he told himself,
he’d only do you because you’re convenient. You’re a bland bowl of mush, Peter
. Peter knew what he was. His ex, Cody, had always made sure he knew.
“Peter Rabbit,” Cody used to say, “scaredy cat, little mouse.” Some part of him had wanted to speak up, to contradict Cody, if only to call out all the mixed metaphors. But the other part of him, the scaredy cat he supposed, never had the nerve.
Cody used to say those things as he held Peter, but not as a lover would hold another – more like the way a predator would play with its dinner, letting Peter know how lucky he was to have someone as gorgeous as Cody, who certainly could have done better. Funny how a man’s touch could make you feel colder rather than warmer.
“I need you,” Kyle whispered, closing his eyes and running his elegant hand through his wavy, $200 haircut.
“At your service, m’lord,” Peter said with a mock bow.
Kyle opened one eye. “Hmm. Yeah, I bet you like that. You’ve got such an attitude when people try and command you around here, I bet in the bedroom you love being bossed around.”
“That’s different,” Peter said, and Kyle’s eyes widened in shock. Then he laughed.
“You are full of surprises. Listen, I do need a favor. My car needs to get serviced. Too.”
“Ha.”
Kyle pulled out his billfold, and extracted one of the many crisp new hundred dollar bills that Peter knew he kept there at all times. He’d made these easy and profitable deals with Kyle before.
“Take your lunch hour and get Miss Yvonne to the garage, would you please?” Kyle knew the answer, because the Benjamin was already in Peter’s hand.
“Keys.”
“Right, keys.” Kyle tossed them and Peter caught them easily. “And I’ll text you the address of the new place; I’m not using the dealership anymore. Make sure you get my guy there, ask for Matt, nobody else is to touch her. Oh, and don’t look in the glove compartment.”
“Hmm. Interesting.”
“Thanks, Peter.”
“Any time.” Truth be told, he probably would have done it for free. Kyle was one of the few creative directors who actually treated Peter well, and who never considered verbally abusing people to be motivating or effective. But, given his financial situation, Peter wasn’t going to turn down a hundred bucks, either.
And since the errand required driving in Manhattan, definitely the least relaxing activity Peter knew of, he’d be earning it. Still, it was nice to play king for a day, he thought as he eased the all-too-comfy two-seater Mercedes SLK out of the building’s parking garage and onto Madison Avenue. Or king for a half hour, anyway.
He had to laugh when he stopped at the light at Central Park South and saw two gorgeous male models crossing in front of him, carrying bags from the Apple Store. Both of them turned to look at him, magnetically drawn by the car’s sensuous curves, the low purr of its engine, its paint job as shiny and black as Darth Vader’s helmet. He knew they were models because he’d spent half a day last week rearranging their pictures on a storyboard.
Peter always sighed painfully when he heard himself described as “nice-looking.” Nice-looking was what guys in most commercials were, as he knew well from working at Ball-Smithson. Handsome enough to be appealing, but not so perfect that they would keep the customer from identifying with them. A beer commercial level of good-looking, a “guy” face – not that glossy, glowing beauty of the Masters and Commanders they put in the suit ads.
And besides, you don’t even have that kind of looks,
he told himself.
You’ve got a face for comedy, as Cody used to say.
These two guys had what the industry obliquely referred to as “aspirational” looks. You’d see one of them in a commercial, driving a Lexus, and you wanted to be that guy, gorgeous and rich, and you know what? If you drove a Lexus, hey presto you would be. The words didn’t say that, of course, but the picture did it well enough that words weren’t necessary.
They were looking at Peter, as well as at the car, because for that one moment,
he
was that guy. The Mercedes made it so. He laughed – hell, in this industry, even the models drink the Kool-Aid.
Then they were gone, and the light turned green, and he made a right on 51
st
to head down towards Hell’s Kitchen. He’d taken the car to the dealership before, but this was the first time he’d gone to this garage.
He liked this neighborhood – it was
real,
a place where real people did real things, not just a bunch of symbolic analysts or knowledge workers down here. This was where the cars got fixed, the repair shops were located, where half the buildings had entrances with roll-up doors, because trucks were always coming in and out with actual stuff – a million miles from Madison Avenue and the things he did all day at his job, for sure.
He pulled into the shop and got out. There was nobody in the office, and he walked into the garage. The place was busy, for sure, with gleaming foreign imports up on racks and machinery whirring and spinning and clackaclacking as these guys did…whatever guys did with cars. Peter knew how to put gas in one, and windshield wiper fluid, and that was it.
“I’m looking for Matt!” he nearly yelled at a guy in safety glasses, trying to be heard over the death metal music.
The guy cocked his head. “Back there, last bay.”
Peter walked carefully through the garage, looking down to make sure he didn’t trip on a hose or stick a toe in a channel. In the last bay, there was a man with his back to Peter. He couldn’t help noticing the incredibly fine ass that even a saggy pair of black Ben Davis pants couldn’t hide, as the man bent over the engine of a vintage yellow Merc SL, the great-granddaddy of Kyle’s model.
“Matt?” Peter inquired. “Matt!”
The man didn’t look up. Then Peter noticed the earbuds, knew what they were because he had a pair himself – Bose noise-cancelling earphones.
He saw a wrench, and picked it up and started clanging it on a toolbox, just loud enough for the noise to slip through the filter.
Matt turned around, pulling the earbuds out as he did.
Peter blinked.
Cat eyes,
he thought for a moment as Matt’s face came into full view and his emerald green eyes locked on Peter’s sea-green ones. He had a face that made the models Peter had just seen look like chopped liver. A strong jaw on a big head, a finely drawn nose, strong eyebrows that Peter could just see under the longish dark-brown hair falling over his eyes. A big, strong body, well-muscled, fit but not buff – a man who used his body to do things, who didn’t just work out to look good.