The Agency (30 page)

The dean, after consultation with my father, recommended I spend the following term abroad at NYU.

As Saleema towered above me at the Boathouse—at least as much as a five-foot-tall woman can tower—I wondered if I was in for another fight. When she took off her sunglasses, her eyes were two cold black dots. She pulled out the chair opposite me, sat down, and swept her lustrous hair back. I was already gauging the distance from the balcony to the tables below and wondering if I would survive the fall.

“I saw you at the play last night,” Saleema said.

“You were there? I didn’t see you.”

“That’s because I saw you first.”

We were off to a good start. I signaled the waiter for another beer, and Saleema ordered a glass of cabernet. When our drinks came, we sat in silence for several minutes. I wasn’t sure what she wanted, and I didn’t know why she was here.

“One question,” Saleema said finally.

Her pretty lips were scrunched, and she tapped the side of her wineglass with purple fingernails.

“Okay.”

“Did you sleep with Evan in New York this week?”

Shit!

I thought about lying, but I didn’t figure she could be any madder than she already was.

“Yes.”

Saleema nodded. “I wondered if you would try to bullshit me about that.”

“You already knew?”

“Evan made a point of bragging about it.”

That son of a bitch.

“So are you going to slap me again?” I asked.

“No, I got that out of my system. You can be a slut with whomever you want.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that without making things worse, so I said, “Exactly why are you here, Saleema?”

My ex-friend stared out at the river and didn’t reply immediately. After she took another sip of wine, she said, “I talked to Guy.”

“Okay.”

“He told me all about Dorothy and this David Milton. The one with the fraudulent manuscript.”

“Do you think I’m stupid, Saleema?” I asked.

“About some things, yes, I do, Tess. When it comes to men and sex, you may be the most stupid woman I have ever met. But I’ve never said you were anything but a great agent. That’s why I couldn’t believe it.”

“Believe what?”

“What you said to me in New York. That was the name you threw at me. David Milton.”

“So?”

“So do you really think I would try to defraud you and your client? Do you honestly believe that?”

Ten minutes ago, I would have said yes. Now I’m not so sure.

“I think you would do just about anything to beat me,” I told her.

“Well, you’re right about that. We’re agents. We compete. I’m not ashamed of it. And, yes, I made a special effort to go after some of your clients after the whole thing with Evan. But a fake
manuscript? If you think I’d go that far, then you have gotten way too paranoid.”

“Are you telling me you’ve never met David Milton?”

“I’ve never heard of him,” Saleema said. “I told you that in New York.”

“He did pro bono estate work for victims of 9/11,” I said.

“So what?”

“So your secretary needed legal counsel after the attacks.”

“Her attorney was a man named Joshua Mintz,” Saleema said. “Do you know how many lawyers provided pro bono work back then? Hundreds. Probably thousands.”

“What about Guy?” I asked.

“What about him?”

“I saw the two of you together.”

“You think he and I are
both
in on it?”

“You hate me. And Guy knows Dorothy’s writing style forward and backward. What was I supposed to think?”

“God, you really are paranoid. Get a clue, Tess. Not everything that happens in this world revolves around you.”

I shrugged. “When have you known me to believe it didn’t?”

Saleema actually laughed. Not loud. Not long. But she laughed.

“I appreciate your coming here to tell me this,” I added. “You didn’t need to do that. You could have let me make a fool of myself.”

“You’ve never needed my help with that.”

This time I laughed. But I knew it meant something for her to come here. It was a crack in the ice.

“I’m sorry,” I went on, “for a lot of things.”

Saleema took a long breath and stared at the table. “I know.”

“Remember when I said I missed you?” I asked. “I do.”

“We’re not friends anymore, Tess.”

“I’d at least like not to be enemies.”

She stood up. “Maybe someday. Not now.”

“You want to stay for lunch?”

“No, I can’t.” She hesitated, halfway being staying and going. “How’s your father?”

“Fine. I’m still disappointing him.”

“That’s why we have fathers,” Saleema said.

I knew she didn’t want to leave. Not really. Just like I knew I didn’t want her to go. Despite everything, it would have been easy to slip into our old routine, the way we did when we were best friends. We could have sat there all afternoon. She could tell me Hollywood stories. I could tell her about Darcy. We could get drunk, loud, and obnoxious with our laughter.

But she was right. It was too soon.

Her phone rang, breaking the awkward intimacy between us. She looked grateful for the interruption. She answered the phone and said, “Yes, Guy, I told her. Just so you know, she thought we were in it together. I told her that Tess Drake orbits the sun, not the reverse.”

She listened, and her eyebrows knitted in confusion, and she hung up.

“Guy said to tell you something,” she said.

“What?”

“He said that Filippa wasn’t totally out of line to question his ethics. What does that mean?”

“Guy tried to get me to kick back part of my commission on Dorothy’s next deal.”

“Seriously?”

“That, and I should spend a naughty weekend with him in Brighton.”

“That son of a bitch,” Saleema said, looking genuinely angry.

“He’s a greedy goat, but what else is new? You don’t have editors and authors proposition you all the time?”

She shrugged. “True.”

But I knew what it was. It was the old Saleema. The one who rushed to defend me, the way I always did her. The one who loved me. After all these years, that was the moment when I fully understood why Saleema had been so ferociously angry about Evan. It wasn’t Evan’s betrayal that had knocked out her foundation. It was mine. And I felt guilty all over again.

If she knew what I was thinking, she didn’t go there.

“Take care of yourself, Tess,” Saleema told me.

“You, too. Give me a call next time you’re in London.”

She didn’t answer or make any promises. Instead, she cocked her head and said, “Filippa? What’s that about?”

“Oh, that’s one of Guy’s little jokes,” I said with a sigh. “After we did the film deal for
The Bamboo Garden,
we had to change the name of one of Dorothy’s characters to keep the producer happy.”

Saleema nodded. She left without another word, and I watched her go. I began to understand all the ways I had sabotaged my life, and I wondered if I was being given a chance to repair the damage.

I took a last swallow of Young’s bitter.

And then it hit me.

Filippa.

I KNEW THAT GUY
was innocent, because Guy of all people would never have made that mistake. Whoever David Milton had hired to craft his fraudulent manuscript was good. Very good. But I knew something that he didn’t. The edition of
The Bamboo Garden
that fills the shelves of bookstores around the world includes a delightfully over-the-top, Disney-worthy villain who goes by the name of Filippa.

The woman who tries to destroy the pandas.

The woman children love to hate.

Except Dorothy didn’t come up with the name Filippa. Neither did Tom Milton. I did.

The first edition, the one that sold about a hundred copies, the one that collectors snap up for big bucks on eBay whenever one comes available, used a different name for the villain. Liudmila.

So when I got back to my flat and opened up the attachment of chapter two that David Milton had sent me, I held my breath. Because in Dorothy’s book, that’s the chapter in which her villain
first visits the London Zoo. Her wonderfully wicked genius. Liudmila to a handful of early readers, Filippa to the world at large.

I scrolled down the screen, reading through seven pages of brilliant forgery, until the very last paragraph, the one where we meet her, the one where she appears outside the panda cage for the first time. And there she was.

Filippa.

I reacted like a Chelsea forward landing a tie-breaking goal. Hands in the air. Did a little dance. Wiggled my butt at the screaming crowd. If I had been Brandi Chastain, I would have stripped off my shirt and waved it in the air. It’s not often in the art of dealmaking that you can count a win rather than a draw, but this was a win, pure and simple. Victory. David Milton was exactly what I thought he was: a cheat and a fraud. And I could prove it.

I called Dorothy to tell her the good news. No answer, as usual.

I thought about calling David Milton to gloat, but I wasn’t going to give him any chance to repair his mistake. He’d learn about it soon enough. Tomorrow I’d chat with my IP lawyer and let him carry the ball the rest of the way.

Victory.

I got up and paced restlessly back and forth across my carpet, out to the terrace, through the kitchen, back to my desk. I was keyed up, stressed out, scared, and I didn’t know why. I should be relieved, and, yes, I was, but there was something more. Then I realized what was happening. What this all meant. The last obstacle had been cleared from my path. I didn’t have any reason to wait now, any more excuses to delay and procrastinate. I was ready. At my meeting with Cosima in the morning, I would drop the bomb and tell her she could bury me if she liked, but I was gone. Sayonara. Adios. Auf Wiedersehen. Tomorrow I would launch the agency.

The Drake Media Agency.

My agency.

I looked at my hands. They were shaking. It’s one thing to dream about it and fantasize about it, and it’s another to do it. But
I was going to do it. I was terrified. That’s how you know you’re doing the right thing.

I called Emma. “Pack your bags, girl.”

“What? Why?”

“Tomorrow’s the day.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

I explained what I had found about David Milton, and she whooped with excitement.

“What about Dorothy’s next deal?” Emma asked. “Will Cosima try to go after it?”

“What deal?” I replied, laughing. Thank you, Guy.

“Oh, Tess, this is fabulous. Do you think everyone will come with us? I still can’t figure out why no one is writing back.”

“Don’t worry about it. I told everyone we were on hold when I thought this Milton thing would derail my plans. Once I make it official with Cosima, we can start getting representation letters out to all the clients.”

“Have you written something?”

“I’ll do it right now.”

“God, this is exciting,” Emma said, with the naïveté of someone who’s at the beginning of her career and can go anywhere and do anything. For me, my joy was tempered by the gravity of what I was doing. Sally’s warnings flitted through my brain. Cosima’s threats, too. I wondered if I knew what the hell I was getting myself into.

“Yes, it is, darling,” I told her. “Have fun tonight,” Emma said. “I told Jane to look for you.”

“Tonight?”

Emma giggled. “Remember? Darcy?”

Tonight. The Hilton. I had almost forgotten.

The queen is not a fan of the Hilton on Park Lane. In a city of low buildings, the Hilton is notoriously tall; and on those rare days when the fog clears, guests on the higher floors have a southern
view of the private gardens behind Buckingham Palace. I suppose this means that Liz can’t take a morning stroll in her curlers and bathrobe anymore, sipping coffee from her
I LOST MY HEAD AT THE TOWER OF LONDON
ceramic mug.

Just kidding.

However, I am not the queen, and I love the Hilton. When clients stay there, I make a point of meeting them for breakfast in the executive lounge, where we can sit by the window and watch the traffic on Park Lane and the joggers in Hyde Park. The Hilton is the most American of the London hotels, but, to be honest, it means the service is better than at almost any other hotel in the city.

A town car picked me up in front of my flat at nine thirty. There was no way I was getting into an ordinary cab in my Julien Macdonald. I wanted a leather backseat caressing my bottom, with no chewing gum, no cigarette ash, and no crumby remnants of chips and crisps. Besides, if you are wearing a full-length mink, you want to make an entrance like a star.

I couldn’t bring myself to go naked, but I didn’t wear much. My sexy, knee-length red dress. Killer heels. Pearl earrings. Armani sunglasses, even at night, because that’s what you do. Under the dress, I went for a white lace thong, so you know I was feeling horny, because I don’t really like the idea of a shoelace wedged up my arse.

Over all that, the fur. Wrapped around me like an Eskimo blanket. The London temperature had turned cold again, but it could have been the hottest day in July, and I still would have worn the fur. It’s so elegant I didn’t know if I even had the courage to show it off in public. If you wear something like that, you have to walk the walk. Pretend to be someone you’re not. When I got out of the elevator at my building, Samur didn’t even recognize me at first, and when he picked up on the streaky colored hair, his mouth fell open.