SNAP: The World Unfolds (22 page)

“Those two will probably make some splash in TV ‘reality’ shows, and we’ll give them minimal coverage then. But they’re not right for SNAP.”

He added, “Unless it’s as an Ice Princess,” getting a low laugh from the room.

The third blond had broken out of the mold. She was slim and sleek and moved with poise. “She reminds me of a young Grace Kelly,”’ someone said and Mina nodded.

The other two girls were stunningly different. Both mixed-race, they were dark-haired, black-eyed and honey-colored. Neither was tall enough for a runway model but both moved with feline grace.

“I want to see more of these two, also,” Jean-Louis said and turned to Chaz’ assistant. “Give me their contacts, too.”

SNAP covered the same celebrities that other entertainment and gossip media did, but one thing that set us apart was “finding” the undiscovered and this was the first time I was in on the ground floor. It was interesting and exciting. I doubt there wasn’t a young woman in the Western world who would say no to being featured in SNAP and these three might be given a chance.

The meeting broke up after a run-through of tonight’s television line-up. I collected my stuff and sidled over to Carola. “Thank you for the warning,” I lowered my voice.

She looked startled. “I wasn’t warning you.”

“Why were you staring at me, then?”

“I read your frustration and anger,” she snatched her laptop off the table and turned toward me. “It was a reminder that if I can read your body language, others can, too. Chaz, Mina and the others weren’t watching you, but Jean-Louis was. And I think you want to be concerned about him.”

She was right. Not only did I have to think through what I said to him, I had to re-school my body language. I couldn’t let an instant flush of impatience or anger show. I had to slow down. I thought maybe I’d have to ask the Ice Princesses for lessons in glacial coolness.

“Thank you, Carola. I need to watch how you respond to things. You have such composure.”

She nodded at me and went out, leaving me to face Jean-Louis. He and I were the only people left. He came up to me and quietly said, “Thank you for not reacting to me. The regulars don’t know about me and we need to keep anything personal out of our business relationship for now. Are you adjusting?”

I smiled at him, keeping my resolution to myself. “I am. I want to talk to you about Jazz at some point. Later tonight?”

“There are some Skype calls I have to make, but I’ll try to reach you. I see that Carlos has been with you. Is he being careful?”

“I guess so. I haven’t been approached by anyone I don’t know, but then I’ve been in the office since this morning He was at my front door when I opened it to come to work. Where is he sleeping?”

“We rented the unit next to you. He and Paco are sharing it. What I meant, though, has Carlos been careful about giving you enough space? I know it bothers you to feel closely watched.”

That stunned me. I’d gone along bitching and grousing about being baby-sat, complaining that I was losing my freedom, thinking that Jean-Louis and the other were ignoring my wishes and only looking out for the family, and he’d heard me. He’d given the demons orders to stay with me, to watch me, but to remain discreet and out of sight.

I felt such a rush of love and gratitude that my knees gave out and I leaned against the conference table for support.

“Thank you,” I whispered.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

My phone rang just after midnight. I’d been reading—pleasure, not work—and was dozing off. The sudden noise startled me enough that I dropped the book on my nose so my “Hello?” was rushed.

“What’s the matter?” Concern came through with Jean-Louis’ voice. “You sound upset.”

“No, I just dropped a book on my nose,” I said without thinking.

“You dropped a book on your nose? What in hell were you doing? Standing on your head?” I could hear irritation as well as an undercurrent of amusement.

Testily, I said, “I was reading in bed. I’d snuggled down a little and must have gone to sleep for a minute. When I reached for the phone I dropped the book. Are you still at the office?”

“Yes, I just wrapped up the conference calls. The time difference makes for a limited window. I try and catch Stefan just before dawn.”

“Is everything alright there”

“So far, the Huszars are quiet tonight. Not sure what today brings. You wanted to talk about Jazz?”

What I wanted to talk to him about was touchy. I had a couple of false starts before he spoke. “Just tell me. You’re stumbling around and that’s not like you.”

“Well?” I prodded. “One time I found blood in a bathroom, like one of you dropped a cup. When I went to get Jazz, she seemed surprised. It had been cleaned up when we got back the bathroom and she looked at me as though I was half a sandwich short of a picnic.”

Laughter rang in my ear.

“It’s not funny. If my assistant thinks I’m nuts, it makes for an iffy work place.”

“I’m not laughing at you; I’m laughing at your idiom. My English is excellent, but more formal than yours. Your sayings are odd.”

Sometimes I did slip into weird slang and jargon without realizing it. Well, tough. This is one thing that Jean-Louis would have to live with. Or not. I wasn’t going to watch every word.

“Whatever, my question was, ‘What does Jazz know?’”

“As far as I know, she’s not an employee who knows about us,” he answered slowly. “Why?”

“She’s naturally curious about the trip, about the Baron—Stefan—about what I did there. I don’t want to say anything that she’ll question. She’s plugged in to the circuit and ...”

“How plugged in do you think she is?” His question stopped me.

“I’m not sure. When you first came she’d heard your real name was Johnnie Lew, that you came from another glossy, maybe
Southern Life
, that you may be gay and that someone ‘up there’ had your back.”

“Well plugged in. I’m glad it worked.”

“What worked?” Jean-Louis and I weren’t having the same conversation.

“Disinformation. We dropped a few pieces about a week before I actually showed up at the offices, counting on SNAP’s garden of gossip to grease my arrival. It seems like every seed took.”

Now it was my turn to laugh. I got out “You guys,” before I had to catch my breath. “I’m astounded at you people. Even when I can’t see a plan, there’re threads and webs tangled in the background. Boy, I’d hate to be on your ‘disinformation’ distribution list. Oohh...”

Jean-Louis’ voice softened. “I told you we’d been watching you. Stefan was interested in your background. You’d worked for
Hello!
which meant you had an understanding of the aristo coverage in Europe. You were fearless but careful and knew how far you could push the envelope. You’d never had to retract a story and never had a fact disputed. We want to stay way away from libel suits—even threats of one—not only for the money but because of the publicity it would bring to SNAP Holdings. We’re privately held and intend to keep it that way.

“And after you started with us, I watched you first hand before I ‘joined’ the staff. My interest in you was stretching beyond your work at SNAP.”

I could feel a low hum coming through the earpiece. I knew he could turn the glimmer up for impact; the hum was a sign of truth-telling. Like a cat’s purr, it was involuntary.

“I can’t begin to tell you how glad I am that you’re not Johnny Lew from the south and how eternally happy I am that you’re not gay,” I said quietly into the phone.

This time the tone of his voice told me he was tickled. “It’s amazing that that seed of disinformation made it as far as it did. Jazz is a good conduit and we can use her. How well do you work together?”

“Very well. I like her; she’s efficient, anticipates things, handles routine decisions on her own, keeps me scheduled, goes beyond, like setting up the personal shoppers and arranging for my furniture delivery. She’s been with SNAP long enough to know where most of the bodies are buried and watches for my missteps. I guess I was hoping she knew everything about you vampires. It would be comfortable to have a confidant.”

There was a subtext to this. It would be wonderful if I could share things with someone who knew about the vampires, but wasn’t one of the family. I wasn’t about to swap confidences with Carola or Mira or, God forbid, Pen.

When I moved back to L.A. I’d looked up some of my friends from college and earlier in my career. I had two women I could go to lunch or dinner with and one closer friend, Donnell, who was always up for a girly day at the spa.

They’d gone on with their lives. Donnell was divorced and worked for a PR firm in the Valley. She worked hard, long hours, but would always fit me in. Krista and Holly were married with kids. Krista was a family law attorney and I marveled at her staying power after watching other marriages fall apart with anger, nastiness and violence. Holly was a real estate agent who worked part-time. She’d married well, a client to whom she’d sold a $4 million house. She was available between tennis lessons, play dates and carpools.

None of these women could ever know who Jean-Louis really was. I could, and did, regale them with stories of my travels and celebrities but as I grew closer to the vampires, I was growing away from these women.

CHAPTER FORTY

It was after 10 when I woke. The sun was burning through drifting morning fog and later would drag people to the beach like a magnet.

For now, though, I could get some exercise. I wasn’t dedicated. When I could, usually two or three times a week, I’d do a walk/run for a couple of miles; just enough to work up a gentle sweat. The last time I exercised was my walk to the stream in Hungary, and that didn’t work up much of anything.

I pulled on a pair of shorts, t-shirt, socks and running shoes, finger-combed my hair into a loose ponytail and started out. Smack into Carlos’ chest.

Carlos and I trotted outside into wispy fog, crossed the block and walked out onto the sand. I gave myself half an hour and set out on a slow jog along the tide line, where the sand was firmer. It seemed out of place to have a big man dressed in a black suit keeping an eye on me through binoculars, but, oh well.

Being out doors felt good. One of the things I missed hanging around with the vampires was fresh air and sunshine. I could indulge, just not with Jean-Louis. This morning it was a high tide, so my path was parallel, close to the street and south of the pier. In fact, there was enough mist that its shape was shadowy; I could only glimpse it occasionally though I could hear the surf washing against the pilings.

I’d gone about half a mile and was turning around when a dog chased a ball in front of me. I slowed and glanced through a patch of fog to spot his owner. Something hit me from behind and I smacked face-first into the packed sand, knocking the wind out of me. I pulled my arm in to push myself up but hands grabbed both arms, wrenched them behind my back and whipped a plastic cuff around them.

“What the hell...” I started as a hand jerked my pony tail and pulled my head back. I was trying to spit out a mouthful of sand when something dropped over me and the sunlight disappeared. The cloth smelled dirty and musty as though it’d been stored at the bottom of a gym locker; it was beginning to make my nauseous. I was kicking out, trying to find a body part I could hurt, when I was suddenly hoisted up and thrown over a shoulder. My ribs were going to crack from the force of landing on bone and my lungs were fighting to get air.

“Just cool, it,” a spidery voice said. “I’m not going to hurt you, just deliver you.”

My kidnapper hadn’t taken more than two steps before I landed back on the sand again, thrown down with Spidery Voice on top of me. A second later, his weight was off and there were distinct sounds of hurt coming from him.

The cloth over my head was jerked off. A distraught Carlos leaned over me. “Are you alright? I’m so sorry. Jean-Louis and the Baron will punish me for this.”

The moist, salty air smelled like a rose garden after the gym socks or whatever had covered me. I sucked it in and sucked it in and finally got enough in so that my heart stopped hammering. “What happened?” I gasped and tried to stand up, damned difficult with my hands cuffed behind me.

“Let me get that plastic off. Should we take you to a hospital?”

“No, no, I think I’m OK. Let me just breathe for a minute, I had the wind knocked out of me. Who did this? Was it a Huszar? But it couldn’t have been! It’s bright daylight.”

Back on my feet, I saw that Paco had a man in a hold and was talking quietly and earnestly at him. He was a short, slight Hispanic man in his early 20s with slicked-back hair and a small chin patch.