Chasing Harry Winston (14 page)

Number two.
And in record time.

Russell cleared his throat and looked uncomfortable enough that Leigh felt a momentary pang of sympathy. She decided to rescue him. “Mom, how about a glass of wine? Is there some in the fridge?”

Mrs. Eisner pointed to the mahogany bar in the corner of the den. “There should be a couple bottles of chardonnay in the wine cooler. Your father likes it, but I find it a tad dry. If you would prefer red, you’ll need to get it from the cellar.”

“I think we’d probably rather have red,” Leigh said, mostly for Russell’s benefit. She knew that he hated white wine—chardonnay most of all—but would never express such a preference in front of her parents.

“You two visit for a minute,” Russell said with an award-winning (an Emmy, to be precise, bestowed last year for “Outstanding Studio Show—Weekly”) smile. “I’ll go get the wine.”

Mrs. Eisner clasped Leigh’s left hand and pulled it directly under the table lamp. “My, my, he certainly did his homework, didn’t he? And of course, so did you. Russell will make such a wonderful husband. You must be so pleased.”

Leigh paused for a moment, uncertain of what she meant. It was implied that Leigh had been poised and ready for this moment her entire life, that this ring signified success in a way that valedictorian, Cornell, or becoming a star editor at Brook Harris never could. She loved Russell—really, she did—but it rankled that her own mother considered him Leigh’s greatest achievement to date.

“It’s all so exciting,” Leigh offered with an extra-large smile.

Her mother sighed. “Well, I should hope so! It’s so nice to see you happy for once. You’ve worked so hard for so long now…. Suffice it to say that this didn’t come a moment too soon.”

“Mother, do you realize that you just—” But before she could say
managed to imply that, one, I’m always negative, and two, my age is so advanced you worried I might never snag a husband
, Russell came back with Mr. Eisner in tow.

“Leigh,” her father said in a voice so steady and quiet it was almost a whisper. “Leigh, Leigh, Leigh.” His hair was now completely gray, although, as with many men, it made him look not so much older as more distinguished. Same with the deep lines etched in his forehead and around his mouth and eyes—they conveyed a feeling of wisdom and experience, not the air of a problem that should be dealt with at the plastic surgeon’s next available appointment. Even his sweater—a three-decades-old navy cardigan with leather elbow patches and toggle buttons—seemed somehow more intelligent than the sweaters most men wore these days.

He stood in the doorway next to the piano and gazed at her in a way that always made her feel scrutinized, like he was deciding whether or not he liked her new haircut or approved of her outfit. Growing up, it was her mother who made the most immediate rules regarding their daughter—whether eyeliner was permitted, what was appropriate attire for a school dance, how late she could stay out on a school night—but it was only her father who could make her feel brilliant or idiotic, gorgeous or hideously ugly, charmed or wretched, with the most casual look or comment. Of course, while such comments could appear casual, they never were. Every word he uttered was considered, weighed, and chosen with deliberateness, and woe to the person who failed to select her words with such precision. Although Leigh couldn’t recall a single occasion when her father had raised his voice, she remembered the countless times he had dissected her arguments or opinions with a quiet ruthlessness that intimidated her to this day.

“He’s an editor,” her mother would soothe when Leigh got upset as a child. “Words are his life. He’s careful with them. He loves them, loves the language. Don’t take it personally, darling.” And Leigh would nod and say she understood and make a greater effort at watching what she said, while trying not to take any of it personally.

“Hi, Dad,” she said almost shyly. She had seen both Emmy and Adriana call their fathers “Daddy,” but it seemed impossible to imagine calling her own father something so saccharine. Even though he’d retired six years earlier, Charles Eisner would be an imposing editor-in-chief until the day he died. He’d ruled with a firm hand during the twelve years as head of Paramour Publishing—none of the “handholding warm fuzzy shit,” in his words, of today’s big publishing houses—and he’d remained consistently aloof and detached at home, as much as he could manage. Fall lineups, production schedules, assistant editors, pressures from corporate, even authors themselves were perfectly predictable after the first few years, which is why Leigh always thought it drove him particularly crazy that children were not. To this day Leigh tried to remain as steady and evenhanded around her father as possible, taking particular care not to blurt out whatever she was thinking.

“I’ve already congratulated my future son-in-law,” he said, moving across the room toward Leigh. “Come here, dear. Allow me this pleasure.”

After a brief embrace and a kiss on the forehead, neither particularly warm nor affectionate, Mr. Eisner ushered everyone into the dining room and began issuing quiet directives.

“Russell, would you please decant the wine? Use the stemless glasses from the bar, if you will. Carol, the salad needs to be tossed with the vinaigrette. Everything else is finished, but I didn’t want that to get soggy while we waited. Leigh, dear, you may just be seated and relax. After all, tonight is your special night.”

She told herself it was paranoid and neurotic to interpret this as anything other than a compliment, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that it felt like a small attack. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll be the official relaxer.”

They discussed her parents’ trip over the arugula and goat cheese salad and told about their own engagement during the filet with asparagus and rosemary potatoes. Russell entertained the table with anecdotes of ring-shopping and planning the proposal, and Leigh’s parents smiled and laughed far more than was usual for either of them, and everything was quite civilized, almost even enjoyable, until Leigh’s cell phone rang in the middle of dessert.

She pulled her bag up from under the table and removed her phone.

“Leigh!” her mother chided. “We’re
eating
.”

“Yes, Mother, I know, but it’s Henry. Excuse me for a minute.” She took her phone and headed toward the living room but, realizing that everyone would be able to hear her, she ducked out back to the deck and heard her father say, “No publisher I ever worked with would call one of his editors at nine o’clock on a Friday night unless something was very, very wrong,” right before she pulled the door closed behind her.

“Hello?” she answered, convinced her father was right and that Henry was calling to fire her. It had been ten days since the whole Jesse Chapman debacle, and although Leigh had apologized numerous times, Henry still seemed distant and distracted.

“Leigh? Henry. Sorry for the late call, but it couldn’t wait until tomorrow.”

Here it comes
, she thought, bracing for the news. It was bad enough to get fired from the publishing house where you were on track to be the youngest senior editor in history, but having to walk inside and tell her father was going to make it unbearable.

“It’s no problem. I’m at my parents’ and we just finished dinner, so it’s a perfect time. Is everything okay?”

Henry sighed.
Shit.
This could be worse than she thought. “You’re with Charles? That’s just perfect. He’s going to love this.”

Leigh took a deep breath and forced herself to speak. “Yes?” It sounded more like a squeak than a word.

“Are you sitting down? You’re not going to believe this. God knows I barely do.”

“Henry,” she said quietly. “Please.”

“I just hung up with Jesse Chapman…”

Oh, thank god
, Leigh thought, her hands finally unclenching.
He’s just calling to tell me that Jesse has chosen a publisher.
She knew she should probably care whether or not he chose Brook Harris, but her relief was too all-encompassing.

“…and he has decided that he would like us to publish his next novel.”

“Henry, that’s wonderful! I couldn’t be more thrilled. And of course you know I’ll personally apologize to him again when—”

He interrupted. “I’m not finished, Leigh. He wants us to publish him, but he has a condition: He wants
you
to edit him.”

Leigh was just about to say “you’re kidding” when Henry spoke again.

“And this is not a joke.”

Leigh tried to swallow but her mouth felt like cotton. The combination of excitement, relief, and terror was too much to endure. “Henry, please.”

“Please what? Are you listening? Did you hear me? Number one
New York Times
bestselling author, winner of the Pultizer, seller of five million copies worldwide, and, up until this very moment, a complete and total vanishing act, has requested—no, excuse me,
demanded
—that you, Leigh Eisner, edit him.”

“No.”

“Leigh, pull it together. I don’t know how else to say this. He wants you and only you. He said that once he really made it, no one would be straight with him anymore. Everyone just coddled and indulged him and told him he was brilliant, but no one—not his editor or publisher or agent—would ever give it to him straight. And apparently he loved that you weren’t afraid to be honest with him. I think his exact words were ‘That girl has zero bullshit tolerance and so do I. I want to work with her.’”

“‘Zero bullshit tolerance’? Henry, my entire job description is based on telling authors only what they want to hear. Hell, my whole life is. Sometimes I slip up, but—”

“Slip up?”

“Okay, so that’s a slight understatement. So I’ve been known to talk without thinking, occasionally. But I don’t think I’m capable of honesty on demand. It just sort of comes out when I’m least expecting it.”

“Well, I certainly know that, but our friend Jesse does not. Nor will he.” He paused. “Leigh, I have to say I was every bit as shocked as you are, probably more, but I want you to listen very carefully. You have what it takes. I wouldn’t have agreed to this if I weren’t absolutely certain that you could handle it. And not just handle it—make it work. You certainly don’t need me to tell you how significant this will be to your career. Take some time this weekend, think this over, and come to my office when you get in Monday, okay? I’m behind you on this one, Leigh. It’s going to be great.”

Her family was discussing the wisdom of an engagement party when she returned to the table and quietly announced that she would be editing Jesse Chapman’s new book.

“Oh, he has a new book coming out?” her mother asked while pouring herself more coffee. “How lovely. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

Russell was slightly more clued in, but not much. He was supportive, of course, and always seemed proud to tell his friends and colleagues about her job, and he knew that Leigh had most likely offended Jesse Chapman that day in Henry’s office, but authors like Jesse Chapman weren’t at the top of his personal reading list.

It didn’t really matter, though. The only person who understood the significance of the situation had heard her loud and clear: Her father looked as though someone had used his gut as a punching bag. “Jesse Chapman?
The
Jesse Chapman?”

Leigh just nodded, unable to trust herself to keep from gloating if she opened her mouth.

He recovered quickly and held aloft his wineglass for a toast, but Leigh could see the doubt and disbelief in his eyes. She knew he was thinking that there must be some mistake, that his daughter, so inexperienced when compared to his own illustrious career, would be editing an author bigger than any he had ever worked with. Leigh almost felt sympathetic—almost—when she saw that for the very first time in her life, her father the wordsmith, the great guru, the judge and jury extraordinaire, was speechless.

While the rest of America spent the long holiday weekend watching fireworks and attending poolside barbecues, Emmy slumped with her friends on the pavement at the Curaçao airport and tried to figure out when their vacation had gone so terribly awry. She didn’t even feel the sunglasses being stolen off her head. The thieves—two long-haired, pimply teenagers in a crumbling pickup truck—stopped a few hundred yards away, hung out the windows, and waved them at her while shouting gleefully in a language she didn’t recognize. Still unsure, Emmy touched her head to confirm they were gone.

“Why are those kids screaming at us?” Adriana asked, looking puzzled. “Are they trying to sell us those sunglasses?”

Answering felt like an overwhelming task. Emmy’s tongue was thick, unresponsive. It seemed like it should be quite simple to explain that those were
her
sunglasses, but no amount of effort on her part produced any actual sound.

Apparently Leigh didn’t get it, either. “Tell them you don’t need any sunglasses, that you just bought a pair,” she slurred.

“But I
do
need a pair,” Emmy croaked. She waved listlessly in the general direction of the boys, who had just thrown the truck into drive and were moving toward the airport exit. “Help us.” She sounded like Rose from the movie
Titanic,
frozen and nearly unconscious on her raft, adrift in the Atlantic, although thankfully they were neither freezing nor afloat.

“Come on, girls, we need to get ourselves together. This is a vacation—a celebration—not a funeral,” Adriana said, barely enunciating a single word.

The “vacation” was significantly less festive than the last wake Emmy had attended—not to mention that the food wasn’t as good. But she said nothing. After all, they were there to celebrate Leigh’s engagement, and she’d be damned if she was going to ruin it. So what if the whole thing had become a giant nightmare before it even really got started? Your best friend gets engaged only one time (hopefully…and if that friend was Leigh, then definitely), and she was going to show Leigh a good time if it killed her. Which it just might.

She had managed not to dwell on the irony of the whole situation, but sitting drunk and half-drugged at a Caribbean airport while local teenagers robbed her blind had prompted a bit of contemplation. Her ex-boyfriend had planned this trip to celebrate their five-year anniversary, and after said ex-boyfriend had left her for the virgin cheerleader trainer, he had offered her the tickets as some sort of consolation prize. Emmy’s gut had told her to have some dignity and tell him to fuck off, once and for all, but everything was fully paid for and she’d been stressed lately with the new job and, well, it had been worth accepting just for the chance to imply that she would be going with a new boyfriend.

“Seriously, Em, go. It’s all arranged and paid for. It’ll be nice for you,” Duncan had said when he came over to pick up his DVDs and underwear a week after she’d returned from Paris. It had been a perfect trip workwise, but she was still smarting from Paul’s blatant rejection—not to mention her obvious role in driving him away with the talk about having kids. It didn’t help that Duncan looked incredibly fit and happy, probably the best since she’d known him. Fucker.

“What? You and the cheerleader aren’t ready for a trip together yet? Or is premarital traveling banned also?”

He had sighed, suggesting he expected nothing less from Emmy, handed her a folder with the complete itinerary, and pecked her on the cheek. “Go. Get some sun. I’d hate to see it go to waste.”

“Thank you, Duncan, we’ll do just that.” Emphasis on the
we
, of course. He hadn’t even blinked.

Bastard.

Emmy hated him for encouraging her to go, but she hated herself more for taking him up on it. She might have ditched the whole idea, but when she floated the idea of a solo trip to the Dutch Antilles to her friends, they had not been pleased.

“Solo? Why would you ever go there
alone
? Especially considering that you have two best friends sitting right here, one of whom just got engaged. I think it would be downright
negligent
not to invite us,” Adriana had sniffed.

Not surprisingly, Leigh had been a bit more reserved. “Oh, please, it’s not that big of a deal. And besides, things are just crazy at work right now. I’m editing my first huge author. And I don’t think Russell would be thrilled if I ditched him for the Fourth.”

Emmy nodded. “See? Leigh’s too busy and I’m sure you’ve got, uh…stuff going on, too.” No one had any clear idea what Adriana did all day, but there was an unspoken agreement never to address this. “Besides, it’s only booked for two.”

Post-breakup resolution or not, Emmy had little interest in spending the week scouting for men or tabletop dancing at local nightclubs. Paris and the whole Paul debacle had been a serious blow to her ego; the last thing she wanted was Adriana pushing her to hunt for men day and night.

“Two, three, what’s the difference? Nothing a little phone call can’t fix. And Leigh, darling, I don’t give one goddamn what you have going on at work. As for Russell, he’ll just have to understand that your best friends are happy for you and want to toast you.” Adriana smiled expansively at both girls. “Well, that’s settled. When do we leave?”

Things had rapidly deteriorated since they’d left New York, although by now the details were a little fuzzy. They’d flown on the six
A.M.
flight from LaGuardia to Miami and somehow, against all judgment, sense, and reason, Adriana had made a convincing case for in-flight Bloody Marys. Bloody Marys before nine in the morning. Which, although Emmy was loath to admit it, had been pretty nice. The second and third had gone down quite easily, and by the time they’d landed at the Curaçao airport, the Miami layover was little more than a hazy dream. The only solid proof that it had actually occurred—the $200 Gucci sunglasses Adriana insisted Emmy
needed
to buy at the duty-free shop—had just evaporated. Emmy’s suitcase had also vanished, but the tiny pills that Adriana had insisted she and Leigh try were working their magic: suitcase, sunglasses,
whatever.
She could not care less.

In the brutal late-afternoon sun the girls sat slumped against Adriana’s and Leigh’s suitcases—both of which were miraculously present and intact.

“Where are we again?” Leigh asked, tugging ineffectually at the bandanna she had tied around her hair. “I can’t seem to remember.”

Adriana glanced up. “Jamaica?”

They giggled, both certain that Jamaica wasn’t the right answer but unable to remember what was.

Emmy pulled the folder from her carry-on and began to read. “Aruba. Bonaire. Curaçao. The A-B-C islands of the Netherlands Antilles. Eighty miles off the coast of Venezuela. Population—”

Adriana held her hand up. “I’m bored.”

“It’s all coming back,” Emmy slurred. “We are currently in Curaçao. Our flight from Miami was delayed and we missed our ferry to Bonaire. We’re stuck.”

“Stop being so negative, girls!” Adriana sang. “We’re getting great color. We’re going to meet hot Dutch men.” Pause. “Are Dutch men hot?”

“Dutch men? I didn’t know there were Dutch men in Jamaica!” Leigh shrieked in a very un-Leigh-like way. Adriana cracked up and the two girls high-fived.

Emmy’s temples throbbed with pain and her skin was on fire. “Pull yourselves together, people. We need to get out of here.”

The trouble had started when the girls deplaned in Curaçao slightly buzzed but fully conscious and made their way to the ferry counter. Emmy politely requested three tickets.

“No,” a fleshy black woman wearing a muumuu and sandals announced with obvious joy. “Cancel.”

“‘Cancel’? What do you mean ‘cancel’?” Emmy did her best to glare, but the fact that her chin barely reached the top of the counter negated the intended effect.

The woman smiled. Unkindly. “No more.”

Another hour passed before they learned there once had been a ferry; there was a ferry no longer; and the only way to traverse those thirty miles now was by flying one of two local airlines, unnervingly named Bonaire Express and Divi Divi Air.

“I would rather die than fly something called ‘Divi Divi,’” Adriana announced as they surveyed the airlines’ side-by-side ticketing counters, each consisting of a single employee and a wheeled card table.

“You might die anyway,” Leigh said. She picked up a handwritten sheet listing the current schedule. “Oh, wait, this should make you feel much better. It says here that the refurbished six-seater planes are
very
reliable.”

“Refurbished? Six seats?
Reliable?
That’s the best fucking adjective these people can come up with and we’re entrusting our lives to them?” Emmy was about three minutes from ditching this whole godforsaken idea and getting on the next flight back to New York.

Leigh wasn’t finished. “Hold on, look, here’s a picture.” Stapled to the back of the schedule was a surprisingly high-quality print of an airplane. A very colorful airplane. Almost fluorescent, actually. Leigh passed it to Adriana, who waved her hands in disgust and lit a cigarette. She inhaled deeply and handed the cigarette to Leigh, who reached for it instinctively before remembering she was no longer a smoker.

Adriana exhaled. “Don’t show me that. Please! There is no conceivable, imaginable, acceptable excuse why a plane needs to look like a Pucci dress!” She glanced at the picture again, then inhaled and moaned simultaneously. “Oh god, it’s a prop plane. I won’t fly prop planes. I
can’t
fly prop planes.”

“Oh, you most certainly will,” Leigh sang. “We’re even going to let you decide which one. Divi/Pucci flies at six, and Bonaire Express—that’s the one that looks like a Jackson Pollock painting, in case you were confused—has a flight at six-twenty. Which do you prefer?”

Adriana whimpered. Emmy looked at Leigh and rolled her eyes.

Adriana dug through her wallet and handed Leigh her American Express Platinum card. “Book whichever one you think gives us the best chance of surviving. I’m going to find us something to drink.”

Having bought three tickets using an indecipherable combination of guilders, dollars, and traveler’s checks, since the airline didn’t accept credit cards, Emmy and Leigh looked for a place to sit down. Hato Airport, it seemed, didn’t have much in the way of amenities, and seats were no exception. It was a dusty, open-air structure that, against all likelihood, offered not one square inch of shade from the brutal midday sun. Too exhausted to continue looking, the girls returned to the stretch of pavement where they’d sat before, an area that could have been a sidewalk or a tarmac or a parking lot. They had just collapsed atop her suitcase when Adriana, clutching a plastic bag and appearing triumphant, flopped down beside them.

Emmy grabbed the bag from her hands. “I’ve never needed water so bad in my life. Please say you bought more than one?” Inside the bag was only a single glass bottle of electric blue liquid. “You got Gatorade instead of water?”

“Not Gatorade,
querida.
Blue curaçao. Mmm. Doesn’t that look delicious?” Adriana removed her ankle-wrap ballet flats to reveal a pale pink pedicure and tucked the bottom of her tank top under the band of her bra. Even though she’d seen Adriana’s tight tummy and love handle–free sides a million times, Emmy couldn’t stop staring. Adriana politely pretended not to notice. She nodded toward the bottle. “Local special. We should get started right away if we plan to be obliterated by takeoff.”

Leigh took the bottle from Emmy. “It says here that blue curaçao is a sweet blue liqueur made from the dried peel of bitter oranges and that it’s used to add color to cocktails,” she read from the label.

“Yeah, so?” Adriana asked, massaging a dime-sized drop of Hawaiian Tropic oil onto her already golden shoulders.

“So? So it’s really just food coloring with alcohol in it. We can’t drink this.”

“Really? I can.” Adriana unscrewed the cap and took a long gulp.

Emmy sighed. “No water? I’d kill for some water.”

“Of course there’s no water. I covered the entire airport. The only little shop was boarded up—permanently, it appears—with a sign that says
NO
. I saw something that might have been a bar at one point but could’ve also been customs, and an area that was designated as a restaurant but looked like downtown Baghdad. There was, however, a folding card table near the Divi Divi gate staffed by a kind gentleman who claimed he was duty-free. He had about ten cartons of something called Richmond Ultra-Lights, a few crushed bars of Toblerone, and a bottle each of Jim Beam and this. I chose this.” She handed Emmy the bottle. “Oh, come on, Em. Relax a little. It’s a vacation!”

Emmy took the bottle, stared at it, and took a swig. It tasted like liquid Splenda with a kick. She drank again.

Adriana smiled, proud as a parent at a sixth-grade talent show. “That’s the spirit! Leigh, sweetheart, take a nip. There you go…. Now, girls, I have a little present for you.”

Leigh forced herself to swallow and shuddered. “I know that look. Please tell me you didn’t smuggle in something truly illegal. If
this
”—she waved her hands expansively—“is the international airport, can you imagine what the prison looks like?”

Undeterred, Adriana pulled a red and white container shaped like a large pill capsule from her jeans pocket. She twisted off the cap and shook out three tablets. One disappeared down her throat. She handed one to each of her friends.

“Mommy’s little helper,” she sang.

“Valium? Since when do you take Valium?”

“When? Since we decided to fly on an aircraft that looks like a Six Flags ride.”

Well, that was all the convincing Emmy needed. She swallowed the little round pill and washed it down with some blue curaçao. She watched Leigh do the same and then everything once again got soft around the edges.

An hour passed, and then another. Emmy opened her eyes first. Her calves were a splotchy salmon color and there were six empty beer cans on the ground. Vaguely she recalled being approached by a man who wore a cooler suspended from his neck. He didn’t have any water, either, but he was selling cans of beer called, suspiciously, Amstel Bright. At the time it had seemed like a good idea, but the beer and the blue curaçao and the Valium combined with hundred-plus-degree heat and no water was probably not the wisest move.