Malice (23 page)

“What makes you think you didn't sign one?” he teased her as her heart sank. “Besides, maybe I want them for my scrapbook.”

“You have no right to them. And are you telling me I signed a release while I was drugged?” She was beginning to panic.

“I'm not telling you a damn thing. And for all the hoops you put me through, I have a right to anything I want. You're nothing but a prick tease, you little bitch. And you keep your hands off my fucking pictures. I don't owe you anything. Get lost, you got that?” He already had a date that night with one of the other girls from the agency, and Grace heard all about it on Monday morning.

Cheryl asked her how the shoot with Marcus had gone on Saturday and Grace was vague and said she'd had the flu and couldn't do it.

But on her birthday a few weeks after that, when she turned twenty-two, Bob Swanson took her to lunch to celebrate. Cheryl was in New York on business for the agency, and Bob had taken her to Nick's Fishmarket. He had just poured her a glass of champagne, when he turned to her with a smile and an appreciative look. Grace had always appealed to him, and he agreed with his wife, she was a godsend.

“I saw Marcus Anders the other day, by the way.” She tried to look unconcerned and sip her champagne while he chatted. It was Dom Pérignon and the first alcohol she had touched since Marcus had drugged her. And even now, the excellent French champagne made her feel faindy queasy.

Bob lowered his voice and looked at her, as he slipped a hand over hers and squeezed it. “He showed me some pretty sensational pictures of you, Grace. You've been hiding from us … I think you've got a real future. They were the hottest shots I've seen in years … there aren't a lot of models who can heat it up like that. You're going to have guys panting.” She felt sick as she looked at him, and tried to pretend she didn't know what he meant. But it was useless. What a bastard Marcus was to have shown him. He had never sent her either the photographs or the negatives, and he wouldn't return her calls now. He had never really answered her either about the release, but she was sure she had never signed one. She had been in no state to sign anything, and she didn't remember anything like that. He was just trying to scare her.

“I don't know what you mean, Bob,” she said icily, sipping her champagne, and trying not to look embarrassed or worried. “We only took a few, and then I got sick. I had the flu that day.”

“If that's how you look with the flu, you should get sick more often.”

And then she couldn't stand it any longer, and looked her boss squarely in the eye. It was like facing a hungry lion. He was a big man, and he had a big appetite, she knew from a number of the models.

“What exactly did he show you?”

“I'm sure you remember the shots he took. Looked like you were wearing a man's shirt, it was open all the way down, and your head was thrown back … looked pretty passionate to me, like you'd just had sex with him, or were about to.”

“I was dressed, wasn't I?”

“Yeah, pretty much. You had the shirt on anyway, for what that was worth. You couldn't see anything you shouldn't have, but that look on your face told the whole story.” At least Marcus hadn't taken her shirt off. She was grateful for small favors.

“I was probably asleep. He drugged me.”

“You didn't look drugged to me. You looked sensual as hell. Grace, I mean it. You really should be modeling, or in movies.”

“Pornos maybe?” she said angrily.

“Sure,” he said happily, “if that turns you on. You like pornos?” he said with interest. “You know, Gracie, I have an idea.” In fact, he had had the idea well before lunch. He had called to rent a suite upstairs in the hotel before they arrived, and it was waiting for them with more champagne at that very moment. Marcus had pretty much let him know that she looked prim, but she was easy. Bob lowered his voice when he talked to her, and squeezed her hand again. “I've got a suite waiting for us upstairs, the biggest one in the place. I even requested satin sheets … and they've got a video channel that offers every porno movie you could ever want to see. Maybe you should see a few before you go into the business.” She wanted to throw up listening to him, and she felt tears rise in her throat as she restrained a desire to slap him.

“I'm not going upstairs with you, Bob. Now or ever. And if that means you're going to fire me, then I quit. But I'm not a hooker, or a porno queen, or a piece of ass on the menu for you to grab like an hors d'oeuvre any time you want to.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” He looked annoyed. “Marcus said you were the hottest babe in town, and I thought maybe you'd like to have some fun … I saw those pictures,” he looked at her angrily. “You looked like you were about to come all over his lens, so what's the Virgin Mary routine? You afraid of Cheryl? She'll never know. She never does.” No, but everyone else in town did. She wanted to scream looking at him, and what a rotten thing for Marcus to tell him.

“I like Cheryl. I like you. I'm not going to sleep with you, and I never slept with Marcus. I don't know why he told you that, except maybe to get even with me. And I told you, he drugged me. I was asleep when he took most of those pictures.”

“In his bed apparently,” Bob said with a look of vast annoyance. He hadn't thought she'd be so difficult with him, after what Marcus had said about her. He'd always thought she was pretty straight, and he had left her alone, but Marcus had told him she did a lot of drugs and loved kinky sex, and Bob had believed him.

“I was in a chair in his studio.”

“With your legs three feet apart, I'd say.” He got excited again thinking about it.

“With my clothes off?” She looked horrified at what he'd just said, and he laughed.

“I couldn't tell, the shirttails were hanging between your legs, but the message was pretty clear. So what about it? How about a little birthday present upstairs between you and Uncle Bob? Just our little secret.”

“I'm sorry.” The tears welled up in her eyes, and spilled over. At twenty-two, she still felt like a child sometimes, and why did this keep happening to her? Why did men hate her so much that all they wanted to do was use her? “I just can't, Bob,” she said, crying at the table, which seemed to annoy him more because it attracted attention.

“Stop that,” he said brusquely, and then narrowed his eyes as he leaned closer to her. “Let me put it to you this way, Grace. We go upstairs for an hour or two, and celebrate your birthday, or you're out of a job as of this minute. Now is it ‘Happy Birthday,’ or ‘Happy Trails to You,’ which is it?” If it hadn't been so awful, she would have laughed, but Grace wasn't laughing, she just cried harder, as she looked him in the eye and told him.

“I guess I'm out of a job then. I'll pick my paycheck up tomorrow.” She left the table without saying another word and went back to her apartment in tears. And the next day she went back to the agency to pick up her things, and her last paycheck.

Cheryl returned from New York the next day, and she smiled broadly when she saw Grace come in that morning. Grace couldn't help wondering what Bob had told her. But it didn't matter anymore. She had made her mind up. She only had a little over two months left until her probation ended anyway, and then she could do anything she wanted.

“Feeling better?” Cheryl asked sunnily. She'd had a ball in New York. She always did. Sometimes she was sorry they didn't live there.

“Yeah, I'm fine,” Grace said quietiy. After twenty-one months of working for them, she was actually sorry to leave them, but she knew she had no choice now.

“Bob said you got a terrible case of food poisoning yesterday at lunch, and had to go home. Poor baby.” Cheryl patted her arm, and hurried back to her office. She seemed to have no idea that Grace had been fired, or was quitting. And at that moment, Bob came out, and looked at her blankly.

“Feeling better, Grace?” he asked as though nothing had happened between them. And she spoke quietly, so no one else could hear her.

“I came to pick up my check, and pack my things.”

“You don't need to do that,” he said with no expression whatsoever. “I think we can both forget it, can't we?” He looked at her pointedly, and she hesitated for a long moment, and then nodded. There was no point creating a scandal over it, it had happened, and now she knew what she had to do. It was time.

She waited another six weeks till Labor Day, and then gave them a month's notice. Cheryl was heartbroken, and Bob pretended to be too, and Marjorie cried when Grace told her. But in another three weeks she'd be free from probation, and she knew it was time to leave Chicago. She was pretty sure by then that the photographs Marcus had taken were not obscene, even Bob Swanson had said she was completely covered by the man's shirt and nothing was exposed, but they were unpleasant anyway, and he had it in for her. And so did Bob. Marcus was prepared to lie and tell people she was a cheap trick. And God only knew what Bob would say to protect himself, maybe that she'd put the make on him, if it ever served his purpose. She was tired of people like them, photographers who thought they owned the world, and models who were all too willing to be exploited. And she felt as though she had done all she could at St. Mary's. It was time for her to move on. And she knew it.

They gave her a farewell party at the agency, and lots of photographers and models came. One of the girls had already agreed to take her place at the town house. The day after her last day of work, Grace went to see Louis Marquez. She was two days late checking out with him, because she'd been too busy packing up, and finishing at the agency, and legally, she was already out of his jurisdiction when she went to see him.

“So where are you going now?” he asked conversationally. He was really going to miss her, and his occasional drop-in visits to her apartment.

“New York.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Got a job yet?” She laughed at the question. She no longer owed him any explanations. She owed nothing to anyone. She had fulfilled all her obligations, and Cheryl had given her a fantastic reference, which Bob had co-signed.

“Not yet, Mr. Marquez. I'll get one after I get there. I don't think it'll be too hard.” Now she had references and experience. She had everything she needed.

“You shouldda stayed here and been a model. You're as good-looking as the rest of those girls, and a whole lot smarter.” He actually said it almost kindly.

“Thanks,” she would have liked to feel at least civil to him, but she didn't. He had been rotten to her for the entire two years, and she never wanted to see him again. She signed all the necessary papers, and as she handed him his pen, he grabbed her hand, and she looked up at him in surprise, and then pulled her hand back.

“You wouldn't wanna … you know … knock off a quick one for old times’ sake, huh, Grace?” He was sweating noticeably, and his hand had been wet and slimy.

“No, I wouldn't,” she said calmly. He didn't frighten her anymore. He couldn't do anything to her. She had done everything she was supposed to. And he had just signed off on her papers, and she had them firmly clutched in her hand. She was just an ordinary citizen now. Her past was finally behind her. And this little bastard wasn't going to revive it.

“Come on, Grace, be a sport.” He came around the desk at her, and before she could move away, he grabbed her and tried to kiss her, and she pushed him back so hard, that he hit his leg on the corner of the desk and shouted at her. “Still scared of guys, huh, Grace? What are you going to do? Kill the next one who tries to fuck you? Kill 'em all?”

But as he said that to her, she moved toward him instead of away and grabbed him by his collar. He was probably stronger than she was, but she was a lot taller, and he was surprised when she grabbed him.

“Listen, you little shit, if you ever lay a hand on me again, I'm going to call the cops on you, and let them kill you. I wouldn't bother. You touch me, and you'll be doing time for rape, and don't think I wouldn't do it. Now don't ever come near me again.” She flung him away from her, and he watched without a word, as she grabbed her bag and strode out of his office, banging the door hard behind her. It was over. It was all history. The moment Molly had promised her years ago had come. Her life was her own now.

Chapter 9

L
eaving Marjorie was hard for Grace, she was the only friend Grace really had. And leaving the people at St. Mary's was sad too. Paul Weinberg wished her luck, and told her that he was getting married over Christmas. She was happy for him. But for a lot of reasons, she was glad to leave Chicago. She was glad to leave Illinois, and the nightmarish memories she had there. There had always been the fear that someone from Watseka would turn up and recognize her.

In New York, she knew that would never happen.

She took a plane to New York this time, not like when she had come into Chicago by bus from Dwight. And most of her savings were still intact. She had never spent much money, and she'd been paid well by the Swansons. She'd even managed to save a little extra money, and her nest egg was back up to slightly over fifty thousand. She had already wired it ahead to a bank in New York. And she already knew where she wanted to stay, and she had a reservation. One of the models had told her about it, and thought it was a dumb place, because they didn't let you bring in guys, but it was exactly what Grace wanted.

She took a cab from the airport directly to the Bar-bizon for Women on Lexington and Sixty-third, and she loved the neighborhood the moment she saw it. There were shops and apartment houses, it was busy and alive and residential. It was only three blocks from Bloomingdale's, which she had heard about for years, some of the girls had modeled for them, and it was a block from Park Avenue, and three from Central Park. She loved it.

She spent Sunday wandering lazily up Madison, and looking at the shops, and then she went to the zoo and bought a balloon. It was a beautiful October day, and in a funny way, she felt like she'd come home finally. She'd never been happier in her life, and on Monday she went to three employment agencies to look for work. The next morning they called her with half a dozen interviews. Two at modeling agencies, which she declined. She'd had enough of that life, and the people who were in it. And the agencies were disappointed, since her reference from the Swansons was so good, and she knew the business. The third interview was at a plastics firm, which seemed boring and which she turned down, and the last one was at a very important law firm, Mackenzie, Broad, and Steinway. She'd never heard of them before, but apparently everyone in business in New York had.