Unraveled by Her (6 page)

When she realizes that I'm not about to give her that satisfaction, she gives a sigh, then jumps up and declares, “I can hardly wait for tomorrow, when I intend to unveil all my plans for chapter two.”

I sigh with relief; the evening is over.

Once I'm in bed, though, I find it impossible to sleep.

Just relax, Miranda, and remember . . .

Robert naked, his strong, perfectly formed body, his spectacular pecs, his long legs, his broad shoulders. The strength in his big hands as he flexes his fingers, readying himself to spank me, their tenderness when he caresses me, the fire in his kiss, the intensity in his eyes. Image after image courses through my mind, but rather than relax, I am plunged into an agony of pain and regret.

Robert's favorite poet, Dante, once said, “There is no greater sorrow than to recall happiness in times of misery.” And judging by the degree to which my happy thoughts of my past with Robert torment me, I am forced to concede that he was spot-on.

And then it hits me: What if I never see Robert again? What if I never manage to get out of here? At the thought, I burst into tears. I quickly stuff my fist into my mouth so that I won't give my captors the satisfaction of knowing the distress I'm in.

When I've cried myself out, I fly in the face of Dante's wisdom and let myself think of Robert again, picturing him in every desirable detail. First, in his dark Armani suit and white shirt, his presence that of a king or a general whom men would gladly and unquestioningly follow into battle. Robert—tall, broad-shouldered, dashing, his piercing emerald eyes, his devil-may-care smile, his confidence, his aura of invincibility. Robert in all his glory, the most glamorous, sexually attractive man I've ever met.

And then the memory of his passion, his dominance, his loving consideration for me makes me forget my surroundings, forget my terror, forget everything apart from the throb between my legs.

I thank God that since I met and fell in love with Robert, and he worked his magic on me, I don't need my vibrator to help me come anymore . . .

And come I do, in an orgasm that is so strong, so powerful, so enhanced by my memories of Robert that afterward I fall into a deep and peaceful sleep after all.

Chapter Six

First thing in the morning, after I've just woken up, Georgiana is looming over me, dressed from head to foot in violet, brandishing the tape recorder.

“Oh, Miranda, working with you is such fun!” she says.

Then she twirls out of the room, gets me some breakfast, and afterward lets me takes a shower (the bathroom door guarded by Tammy, alas); when I'm done, she hands me my Alexander McQueen outfit.

The second I'm dressed, she sits down opposite me, fixes me with a sparkling smile, and says, “Yes, I am so enjoying working on my autobiography with you, Miranda . . .” After a pregnant pause, she continues, “But I know I should relish the experience so much more if I could be certain that once you begin interviewing me in earnest, we won't encounter any untoward intrusions at any point in the process.”

“Intrusions?” I say, still half-asleep and unable to grasp what she means.

“My husband galloping in on his white horse and attempting to rescue you,” she says.

“But that letter you made me write . . .” I say, my heart palpitating with a combination of joy and terror.

“That letter was intended to sound the perfect death knell to your little romance with my husband, but thinking back to the cryptic way in which you signed it, my instincts tell me that you may, after all, have found a way to signal Robert. In which case . . .”

Her words hang in the air.

When in doubt, don't react.

To distract her from this line of questioning, I ask her, “Shall we start the interviews now?”

All of a sudden she brightens and I thank my lucky stars that any suspicions she may have are temporarily banished from her mind. “You know, as a child, I always had waist-length blonde hair and wore little black velvet dresses with pink ribbons on them, so adorable,” she says, while I try hard not to wince.

“I'm sure that when Robert sees what a sweet and adorable child I was, that will make him fall in love with me even more. So do let's have pictures in the book!” she gushes, and I gulp.

“Of course, Georgiana, we'll definitely do that,” I say, and for a second I find myself actually contemplating the glamorous photo insert the autobiography will have.

She's driving you insane! This is never going to become an actual book.

But to lull her into a false sense of security, I have to maintain the fairy tale that it is destined to be one, so I spend the rest of the day interviewing her about her childhood, her teens, and her time at the Swiss finishing school where she first met Gigi and Tamara.

When she first said that the evil Tamara Hatch was at finishing school with her, I struggled hard to mask my surprise, but today she explains that, although Tamara was much older than the average student, and came from a particularly impoverished background, she was able to attend the school after her father had won the lottery, and paid a premium for her admission.

“But as soon as she graduated from Les Orchidées, Tammy found her true vocation in life, and the die was cast,” Georgiana says, and I'm about to ask her what she means when the mausoleum door opens and Tamara appears on the threshold, with Pluto in tow.

I switch off the tape recorder just before Pluto races over to me and jumps straight into my lap.

Tamara lunges at me, but Georgiana intercepts her. “Let me make you a cup of tea, dear,” she says.

I push Pluto off my lap as gently as possible, and he scampers over to the other side of the room. Tamara flops on the couch, kicks her shoes off, and says, “So what have you told her so far, Georgie?”

“Just about to tell her about how Simon Watford, the Les Orchidées school governor, saw me in the end-of-the-year play, announced that I was a born actress sure to one day become a Hollywood star, and offered to pay my way through drama school. Which is how I became an actress, Miranda—and a mother.”

A mother! Georgiana is a mother! When did she have her baby? Where is the child now? And why didn't Robert tell me about it?

I'm about to put all those questions to her, but she steams on. “Chapter three will cover my drama-school triumph, in particular, my tour de force performances as Lady Macbeth and Ophelia, all of which Robert is unaware.”

Lady Macbeth and Ophelia? A murderess and a madwoman? I'm sure Robert will conclude that the casting is apt. If, of course, he ever reads her autobiography. Maybe someday we can laugh about it together.

In fact that's what's saving me from cracking up entirely, imprisoned here as I am: picturing my reunion with Robert, telling him about my experiences with Georgiana, and then laughing about them together.

“In chapter four, I plan to cover what happened next: Simon Watford and the rape,” she says, and wipes the laughter right out of my mind.

“He raped you, Georgiana?” I say, shocked to the core.

Her eyes fill with tears, and she nods.

“And I need Robert to know not just that I was raped but the truth of it, the horror of it,” she says.

“Did he hurt you, Georgiana?” I say.

She takes a deep breath, then meets my eyes squarely.

“In every conceivable way. I just hope that when you write about that harrowing time in my life, you will do so in such a dramatic and heartfelt way that Robert will fully understand and empathize with the wrong that was done me,” she says, her eyes still brimming over with emotion.

“Would you like to tell me more about it?” I say, flying in the face of the interviewer's cardinal rule—never ask a question to which the interviewee can answer yes or no—simply because I feel so sorry for her.

“Just that it made me hate men,” she says.

“Robert?”

“The only exception—and I want him to read my book and know it,” she says. I wish to God that I hadn't asked her.

For what seems an eternity, she closes her eyes and doesn't say a word.

Then she leaves the living room, still in silence.

After a few minutes, she glides back in again, takes both my hands in hers, and opens her eyes very wide, and to my amazement I see that they are no longer blue but are violet once more.

“I've arrived at a momentous decision,” she declares. “I no longer wish to waste another second on submitting to interviews pertaining to the distant past anymore. I want to focus on telling you the true story of how I first met Robert,” she says, and my heart sinks.

“Because of the man who called himself William Masters?” I volunteer, out of shock, and for want of anything else to say.

“William Masters?” she echoes, with a delicately furrowed brow. “I've never met anyone named William Masters in my life.”

How can that be, when Murray told Robert that William Masters had owned Pamela/Georgiana? And when I showed a picture of my grandfather to Robert, he identified him as the man he knew as William Masters, yet Georgiana claims to have never met him. Strange, when, long before he started posing as William Masters, my grandfather met Georgiana at Les Orchidées, where he taught her astrology, and he then became her astrologer. So how come she says she's never met William Masters?

I stare at her, gobsmacked. My stomach clenches and there is no way in the world that I can hide the violence of my reaction from her.

Witnessing it, she leaps up and claps her hands in the air. “Movie time!” she proclaims, as if she were the captain of the basketball team and Tamara and I her star players. Tamara takes her place next to me, Georgiana sits on the other side, and the mausoleum swells with the strains of the
Gone
with the Wind
theme.

I know the movie well, so at first, I close my eyes and brood over the nightmare scenario in which I'm currently trapped. And silently reassure myself that if the dark day ever comes when Robert sees Georgiana once more, forgives her for her past crimes, and is seduced by her all over again, it will be just a matter of time before she shows her true colors, her spell over him is broken, and he comes back to me.

Deep down in my very soul, I truly do believe that Robert will never find a love greater than ours. Or a woman who loves him as much as I do, and who is outwardly strong and assertive, yet genuinely sexually submissive to the core.

But then Rhett Butler's voice booms from the screen, for the first time in the movie, and I drown all my fears in the romance of
Gone with the Wind.

Much later that night, I dream of the scene when Scarlett, in the crimson dress garlanded with feathers, makes her entrance to the party, and afterward Rhett carries her up the sweeping staircase and ravages her. Only in my dream, it is Robert who carries me up the stairs and then ravages me. In my sleep, I come so strongly that I wake up soaked in sweat. Then I realize where I am, and the shock sets in—and the despair.

Chapter Seven

My third day in the mausoleum. To my relief, Georgiana backtracks on her snap decision of yesterday, and instead of launching into the epic romantic saga of how she first met Robert, she spends hours detailing her triumphs as an amateur actress instead.

By the afternoon, I've been subjected to her boasts for so long that my eyes have glazed over, and I'm only barely awake. Outside the mausoleum, the rain pours down in thick sheets, mirroring my misery, my sense of hopelessness.

Without any warning, Georgiana dives into the kitchen and emerges with a plate of strawberry-iced cupcakes. I take one, and when she isn't looking, I swiftly rub my finger in the icing and extend it to Pluto, curled up on the couch. He licks it off, wags his tail in delight, then runs over to the desk, nestles underneath, and falls asleep.

I gaze longingly at the laptop from afar and wonder how I will ever manage to get over to it, chained up as I am. But even if the chain were long enough for me to drag myself all the way there, how could I ever conceivably crack Georgiana's password, log onto my e-mail, and send an SOS to Robert?

Before I can answer my own question, she spies the direction of my gaze, races over to the laptop, and switches it off.

“And don't think that if by some miracle you ever managed to make it all the way to the desk, you would be able to guess my password,” she says.

“She always uses her own special word, so you never will,” Tamara says, with a smirk.

Then, to my surprise, she and Georgiana suddenly start to busy themselves around the mausoleum, cleaning and tidying so frenetically that I wonder whether they are about to throw a party in here.

Then Tamara puts on a raincoat, rain hat, and galoshes and stomps over to me.

“Gonna get our good friend from JFK,” she says. She puts a bowl of water at my feet, plus a plate of oatmeal and a spoon, checks that my bonds are still secure, then laughs and says, “But of course you won't be going anywhere, will you, Miss Bitch?”

Then she scoops up Pluto and heads to the door.

“Hang on, Tammy; Gigi is seriously allergic to dogs!” Georgiana says, and Tamara stops dead in her tracks.

“Damn, I forgot! Can't have Pluto in the car with her, then,” she says, and dumps him at my feet.

“There, there, baby, Mommy won't be long. And bad Auntie Miranda will look after you real well, won't she?” she says, and digs me in the ribs.

“Fine, Tamara,” I say, and try not to look pleased that I will finally be alone in the mausoleum with just Pluto for company.

I start to calculate how much time I have before they get back from the airport: First they have to get to the secret passage and cross the lake, and then when they reach the other end, there's the ride to the airport, then parking the car. After that, they'll have to wait ages at immigration for Gigi to come through customs.

Say about three hours. Three hours to get it right.

For what seems like the fiftieth time in the past three days, I case the mausoleum. Difficult given that I've only got a few feet in which to maneuver. I am so frustrated that I could scream. Then—miracle of miracles—I suddenly hear a phone ring close by me. A phone!

Pluto barks excitedly.

“Fetch, Pluto, fetch!” He races around the mausoleum as if his tail is on fire, but neither of us can figure out where the sound came from.

Then the phone rings again, and I realize that it's coming from the couch.

I strain my neck, and there, stuffed down the side of the sofa, is an iPhone in a purple rubber case.

And I thank God for that. Rubber. Soft and malleable. Malleable enough for a dog to bite into it.

It takes me an hour of “Fetch Pluto, fetch” before the little poodle valiantly comes through, snaps his teeth around the phone, and drops it at my feet.

Almost there, Miranda!

Just as long as the battery hasn't run out.

The screen saver is a JPEG of the Union Jack. Unlikely that a New Yorker like Tamara would opt for that. So this must be Georgiana's. But what in heaven's name could her password be?

She'll never guess Georgiana's password,
Tamara's taunting words echo in my mind.

So Georgiana's pattern is to use words, not numbers, as her password.

I keep a check on the wall clock as I enter word after word into the phone:

VIOL for violet.

ORCH for
orchidée
.

GENE for Geneva.

GIGI.

TAMM for Tamara.

ROBE for Robert.

GEOR for Georgiana.

No luck.

Nothing.

In the eleventh hour, I have a brain wave.

The old violet seller. The violet seller who pinched Georgiana's nipple and gave her her first sexual thrill.

I take a deep breath, cross my fingers, and type in four letters, S-A-K-S, and hey, presto! I've cracked her password.

But what do I do now?

They'll be back any second now, so there's not enough time for me to call 911 and explain my plight in detail. If my luck doesn't hold and they burst into the mausoleum while I'm still on the phone, I'll have Tamara's Glock aimed at my guts, pronto.

Log onto my e-mail and e-mail Robert?

Same difficulty as calling 911: lack of time.

Call Robert?

If he suddenly hears my voice after receiving that lying letter, he might just hang up on me instead of listening to what I have to say.

Only one alternative: text him.

My hand shakes like a leaf as I type in the number of his emergency phone, the phone he sometimes has on, but not always. There are no guarantees he'll see this, but I have to try. After all, what are my alternatives?

I type in the words “Prisoner in the Mausoleum. M,” press send, then delete the message afterward.

Then I kick the phone under the couch for Georgiana to find when she gets back.

At that fortuitous moment, Pluto barks like a mad dog, and I love him for the warning. I curl up in a ball and pretend to be asleep, just as the mausoleum door swings open.

Tamara hurtles in, grabs Pluto, and ties him up in her bedroom.

“Sorry, baby, Mommy has to keep you away from Auntie Gigi, otherwise she'll break out in hives all over her pretty face,” she says.

Then Georgiana steps through the door, trailed by Gigi, all tumbling red hair and hourglass curves. Gigi, the monster who sent the purple wreath to Robert and almost destroyed our love before it had a chance to fully flourish.

“
Mes chéries, c'est merveilleux ici!
” she says, casting her shrewd doe eyes around the mausoleum.

Just to avoid engaging in any meaningless dialogue with any of them, I pretend to be asleep. From then on, I am subjected to the endless chatter of the three Les Orchidées graduates, amid their giggles and the chink of what I guess are champagne glasses.

All at once, Gigi claps her hands with so much delight that I get the distinct impression she has just won the lottery.

“Now I cook lunch for all of us, the French way,” she announces.

Then she pulls out a large tin of foie gras, one of snails, and another of snail shells from the bottom of her case, and at the same time, a black leather corset and a single-tail whip spill out on the floor. With a giggle, she crams the last two back into the case again.

Then she bustles around preparing lunch while Tamara and Georgiana watch a rerun of
Scandal
in the living room.

When she's done, she sets the table. “
Musique,
” she says. “We must have
musique
!” She fishes an iPod out of her black crocodile Kelly bag.

“Shall we let her have lunch with us?” Tamara asks, nodding her head in my direction.

Georgiana fixes her with a fierce look.

“Use your head, Tammy. She won't be much good to us if we starve her to death . . .” she says.

“And I'm so very looking forward to seeing the little
salope
put in her place and on her knees to us, and not to him anymore . . .” Gigi says.

Just give me time, bitch. He'll be here, it will be over for the lot of you, and I'll be free!

I watch the clock and stealthily count the minutes since I first sent the text to Robert.

Careful not to betray my tension, I take my place at the table and wish that I were anywhere else but here. But I still can't help but perk up a fraction when Gigi serves us escargots in an herb and garlic sauce.

Until now, though, she hasn't said a word to me directly, hasn't even acknowledged that we've met before, never mind that she deliberately tried to turn Robert against me in Geneva.

At the memory of that purple wreath, an escargot sticks in my throat.

I manage to gulp it down, then turn to her.

“So did they force you to send it? Or did you come up with the idea of destroying my life all on your own?” I boil with anger.

Gigi narrows her eyes at me.

“
Ma chérie,
you underestimate me. Ten seconds with you and Robaire in the boutique, and the way in which he ate you up with his eyes, I knew that you had him by—what do they call it—ah, yes, his essentials. And that you were in danger to derail all our plans.

“I knew
tout de suite
to call Georgiana, even while you were still in the shop and making the show like some Hollywood movie star. So I followed her commands
immédiatement
; I arranged to bug the hotel suite that very night, then had the wreath delivered there.
Et voilà
! The fairy tale
est fini,
” she says, and before I have a chance to react, she turns up her iPod as high as it goes to drown me out.

Through the rest of lunch I sit there and face Georgiana and Tamara, with Gigi next to me, as the iPod plays romantic song after romantic song.

“I recorded a playlist just for you, Georgiana,
chérie,
” she says, “and one specially for you, Tamara,” she adds.

Tamara's playlist, as it turns out, tells a story:

“Native New Yorker.”

“It's Only Make Believe.”

“Love for Sale.”

“Big Spender.”

“Milord.”

And a series of French and Italian songs, none of which I recognize. Periodically Gigi dashes back into the kitchen to present yet another French delicacy to us.

“And now for you, Milady Georgiana,” Gigi says, with a mock curtsy, after she has flambéed the last crêpe suzette and served one to each of us in turn.

Georgiana's playlist opens with “She,” then is followed by “All in Love Is Fair,” “You're a Lady,” “Where Do You Go To My Lovely?” then a long series of songs in praise of beautiful women, and ends with “I Am What I Am.”

“So full of courage, so full of defiance, so very you, my Georgiana,” Gigi says with a loving smile.

Then she turns to me.

“And now a special song for you,
ma chérie
!”

Then the first words of the song ring out.

“
Le ciel bleu
 . . .”

And I turn chalk white.

“So your instincts were correct, Gigi! ‘Hymne à L'Amour' was some kind of a love pact between Miranda and Robert. And her reaction just now proves it!” Georgiana says. “Robert knows she hasn't left him! Signing the letter ‘
Ciel
' was her signal to him that she hasn't left him at all.” She jumps up from the table.

“My phone! Where the hell have I left my phone? I need to set our back-up plan in motion,” she says, while I sit there shaking with terror. And more so when she finally finds the phone, snatches it up, and turns it on.

Whereupon the message bell rings. A text message.

“He knows! Robert knows, and now he's coming after us. We'd better get out of here right now,” Georgiana says.

My heart plummets.

Out of the mausoleum?

I'm dead! If we leave the mausoleum now, Robert will never find me!