How to Trap a Tycoon (8 page)

"That's not the problem, either," Anita replied. "Quite frankly, the last thing I want is for Lauren to come forward as a stuffy academic from some snooty women's college."

Dorsey tried not to feel offended—even if she did have to concede that she was rather stuffy and Severn was rather snooty—and went on, "You also promised me that keeping Lauren Grable-Monroe under wraps would be a piece of cake."

"See, now
that's
the problem."

"Anita…"

"Look, Dorsey," her editor interrupted her—again. "Just think about this for a minute. Book sales have been phenomenal with Lauren lying low behind the scenes. If—
when
—we bring her out, the numbers are going to go through the roof. Through—the—roof," she reiterated slowly. "We're talkin'
New York Times
list, baby. We're talkin' 'More than a million books in print.' We're talkin' foreign sales out the wazoo."

"All the more reason to maintain my anonymity," Dorsey said, her tone pleading.

"No, Dorsey, you're not listening," Anita replied. "We're talkin' incredible royalties. Way beyond your initial advance. We're talkin', potentially, many hundreds of thousands of dollars. Financial security for the future," she added pointedly, and, as far as Dorsey was concerned, that was the lowest of blows. "I thought that was what you wanted. I thought earning a nice little nest egg for your mother's retirement was the whole point of writing
How to Trap a Tycoon
. How can you turn that down?"

She couldn't turn it down. Dorsey knew that. The promise of cold, hard cash was what had generated this whole fiasco. Carlotta, as charming as she was, had absolutely no head for financial planning, and she'd always made her way on someone else's ticket. Nowadays, those tickets were coming fewer and farther between. The proceeds from
How to Trap a Tycoon
were supposed to fund Carlotta's future, so that she could spend the rest of her life in relative comfort without relying on a benefactor. Dorsey just wished she didn't have to sell off so much of herself to guarantee her mother's health, happiness, and well-being.

In spite of the feeling of defeat that gripped her, Dorsey said halfheartedly, "Anita, I can't identify myself as the author of this book."

Anita's exasperated sigh was followed by an impatient "Why not?"

Even as the reasons unfolded in her head, Dorsey knew her editor would never understand them. She scarcely understood herself why she was so reluctant to do what Anita was asking her to do. All she'd ever wanted from life was security. Not just financial security, but personal security, too. Psychological security. Emotional security. In her own small way, she had won, or was about to win, all of those things. She was about to earn her Ph.D., was close to nailing down a position at
Severn
College
that would someday lead to tenure. She had a stable income and regular rituals she observed in her life, along with a daily routine that was wonderfully routine. There were no ups and downs for her these days, no unforeseen curves, no hidden trapdoors.

It was exactly what she wanted after growing up in an atmosphere where she and Carlotta had often, quite literally overnight, gone from living in posh apartments to the streets. One day her mother would be bringing home carryout from five-star restaurants for Dorsey's dinner, and the next day they'd have trouble scraping up enough for McDonald's. The quality of their lives had always depended on whether or not Carlotta had a benefactor lined up, and as often as not, those benefactors would disappear without warning. These days, more than anything else, Dorsey craved stability. Security. Routine.

The financial reward that Anita was promising, should Dorsey pose as Lauren Grable-Monroe, would give her mother all of those things, and Dorsey, too, by extension. Contrary to popular belief, she knew money could buy happiness. Because money could buy security. And security was everything—everything—she had ever wanted. For herself
and
Carlotta.

In spite of that, very softly, very slowly, Dorsey said, "I don't want to identify myself as the author, Anita, because, for the first time in my life, I'm enjoying a quiet, orderly existence. Something like this would wreak havoc in my life, with absolutely no guarantee of anything more. And I don't like havoc. I like even less the absence of guarantee. I'm going to be defending my dissertation in six months. If everybody knows I'm Lauren Grable-Monroe, it's going to totally blow my credibility in the academic community. There's a very good chance they wouldn't let me teach at
Severn
anymore."

"Dorsey, your mother will have piles of money," Anita reminded her. "You won't need to teach at
Severn
anymore."

"But what if you're wrong?" she asked. "What if those piles of money never materialize?"

"I'm not wrong."

"But what if you are?"

Anita seemed to sense Dorsey's distress, and, like any good New Yorker, she pounced on it. Ruthlessly. "Dorsey," she said, "if you come forward as Lauren to promote this book, it'll spur sales even higher. It'll garner your mother a
fortune
. Carlotta could potentially make a
ton
of money. I thought that was the whole point. How can you even think of balking at an opportunity like this? Lauren Grable-Monroe needs to come out of the closet. Now. We have to put her in the public eye. Now. She has to be made real. Now."

"She's right, Dorsey," Carlotta said, her voice somber, all traces of playfulness gone. "We did this for the money. I know I'll be the one benefiting from the profits—at your insistence—and I hope you don't think me frightfully selfish, but I do wish you'd reconsider."

This time Dorsey was the one to sigh. As cheerful and happy as Carlotta was now, she knew her mother feared growing old like nothing she had ever feared before. Although Carlotta had been the recipient of enormous financial backing over the years, her backers hadn't been heavy on cash. They'd been more amenable to investing jewelry, dinners, and lingerie, with a car or vacation thrown in as a year-end bonus.

They hadn't embraced any long-range goals where their investments were concerned either. They'd stayed for as long as they were interested, and then they'd pulled out—if one could pardon the incredibly tacky pun.

And as Carlotta had aged, her investors had become less frequent and less generous. Certainly she was still an attractive, vivacious woman, one who was capable of doing just about anything she wanted, should she set her mind to it. But what Carlotta wanted was to be cared for by a wealthy man. Nowadays, there just weren't that many wealthy men who wanted to take care of her.

Dorsey couldn't ever understand her mother's ambition. Or, rather, her lack of ambition, as she was more inclined to view it. Her mother was intelligent, resourceful, spirited, and in the prime of her life. Carlotta was capable of achieving so much, with or without a man involved. Convincing Carlotta of that, however, was next to impossible.

As much as Dorsey had tried to dissuade her, her mother was certain she could do nothing but what she had been doing since she was eighteen. Her entire adult life had been defined and made possible by the fact that she was young and beautiful and witty and because of that, rich men enjoyed being with her. She had never worked—well, not at anything that required punching a time clock—had never graduated from college, had never been trained to do anything that might lead to a career.

And because her benefactors these days were more infrequent and less inclined to hang around for long, Carlotta was convinced that she would die a desperate, destitute old woman, having nothing of interest to offer anyone of the male—and economically enhanced—persuasion.

Her position over the years—or, perhaps, positions, if one wanted to be gauche, which of course, Dorsey didn't, but that was how her mind worked sometimes, unfortunately—hadn't provided Carlotta with a nice retirement package. So she'd decided to create her own little financial nest egg. How to go about that, however, had eluded her.

Until the day cable television had brought them the Classic Movies Channel.

Carlotta had been watching one of the network morning shows one day when she'd seen coverage of a wildly best-selling how-to book that instructed women on the dos and don'ts of husband-hunting. Immediately after the show, she had changed the channel—to the Classic Movies Channel—and found herself watching
How to Marry a Millionaire
.

And then, at the very back of Carlotta's brain, a little light had flickered on.

Carlotta MacGuinness had never wanted a husband. But she had always wanted a millionaire. She'd grown up poor and neglected and wanted to be rich and well cared for. So she had devoted her life to creating just such an existence for herself. And she had been very good at what she set out to do. She'd had lots of millionaires over the years. So it made sense that she would author a book about, if not marrying a millionaire, then certainly about having one. Or two. Or more.

The only problem was that Carlotta couldn't write a sentence to save her life. Her daughter, however, the academic who was used to years of term papers and theses and dissertations, could write up a storm. Or a book. Or, evidently, a national best-seller.

Mother and daughter had made a nice team. Provided, Dorsey thought, one didn't mind one's entire way of life being blown into bits. Carlotta, it seemed, didn't mind at all. Then again, it wasn't Carlotta's way of life on the line, was it?

"If what Anita says is true, and I come forward as Lauren Grable-Monroe," Dorsey told her mother, "my life will become a media circus."

Carlotta smiled. "It sounds rather fun to me. I always liked the circus. In spite of the proliferation of clowns. What on earth were they thinking to put makeup on men, for heaven's sake? And so much of it! How could they think children would like that? Not only is it frightfully macabre, but it skirts the surreal, and no child—or adult for that matter—is comfortable with the surreal. Why, look at Dali and that odd clock painting, for heaven's sake. Who would possibly find that anything but—"

"Carlotta," Dorsey interjected as discreetly as she could.

"What?"

"Um … we were talking about something else?"

"So we were. We were talking about how you should come forward as Lauren."

Dorsey shook her head. "No, we were talking about how I
shouldn't
come forward as Lauren."

"Oh, come on, darling. It would be fun."

Dorsey brightened. "Then
you
come forward as Lauren."

Ruefully, her mother shook her head. "As much as I'd like to, there are two reasons why I can't. Anita," she added, spinning around to face the telephone. "Dorsey and I need to talk about this. We'll call you back in an hour."

"Fine, Carlotta," the disembodied voice of their editor answered. "You two talk. But we need to get this settled today."

"I promise you," Carlotta said, "it will be settled within the hour."

Dorsey opened her mouth to disagree, but Carlotta lifted a hand, palm out, to halt the flow of words. So, with a sigh, Dorsey disconnected the phone, then scooted over to make room for her mother on the massive bed.

For one brief moment, she flashed back to her childhood, when she would climb into her mother's bed at night after a particularly bad dream, of which there had seemed to be many when Dorsey was growing up. Dreams of abandonment and solitude and loneliness. Whenever such dreams had plagued her, her mother had always gathered her close and tugged the sheets higher around them both.

And then she had always said, in a quite matter-of-fact way, "Dorsey, there will be abandonment, solitude, and loneliness in your life. You can't escape that. People will come and go, and they'll find what they need in you and overlook the rest. But your mother will love you—all of you—no matter what happens. And I will never, ever abandon you."

As Dorsey grew into adolescence, the speech became more specific, as her mother had traded the word "people" for the word "men." And over the years, her mother's was a prediction that Dorsey had seen fulfilled. Carlotta had always been there for her, had always loved her unconditionally. And people, including men, had come and gone in Dorsey's life—though not with the frequency or the intimacy that they had with her mother. Dorsey made certain of that. And people, especially men, did seem to find what they wanted in her and overlook the rest.

For some reason, that made her think of Adam Darien. To him, she was simply Mack. One of the boys. A pal, a bud, someone with whom he could speak frankly and nothing more. She couldn't imagine him seeing her as a woman. Unless, perhaps, she was someone like Lauren Grable-Monroe. Party girl, sexpot, tycoon-trapper.

Hmmm…

Having Lauren come forward into the public eye might possibly deter any exposing that Adam Darien and Lucas Conaway might undertake. If they saw Lauren in the flesh—or at least in the print and television media—then they might not be so inclined to dig deeply into her background. If Lauren saturated the market, then they might just leave her alone. They might never find out that she was, in fact, Dorsey MacGuinness, sociology instructor and stuffy academic.

That thought brought her back to the matter at hand. She looked at her mother beseechingly, but she knew going in that the battle was already over. Because she'd already fought the hardest conflict with herself—and lost it.