“Went for a walk.”
Aud laughed. “From where?”
Derian clenched her jaw. “I was in the
neighborhood.”
“Okay, fine.”
Derian registered the hurt in Aud’s voice and
shook her head. “Sorry. I dragged you down here and you came without a second
thought, even though I haven’t been much of a friend.”
“Oh, Dere,” Aud said, “that’s not true. Just
because I wanted you to stay here with me and you couldn’t doesn’t mean you
weren’t a good friend. I haven’t reached out to you either. I’ve been too
pissed at you for leaving me.”
“Running away, you mean.”
“Hey, sometimes we have to run in order to
survive.”
“Maybe you can’t outrun who you are,” Derian
said.
“Bullshit. Martin was poison to you.” Aud
sipped her martini. “Wow, this place is a find. Best martini I’ve had in
forever. So, why are you here? It’s not Henrietta, is it?”
“No, she’s fine. Making great progress.”
“What the hell happened?” Aud finished her
cocktail and asked for another. “If it’s not Henrietta, and you haven’t had
another run-in with Martin—”
Derian snorted. “Martin and I have nothing
left to say to each other. We both know where we stand, and nothing will change
that.”
“Then it has to be a woman, and that being
the case, I’d say it’s Emily May.”
“What makes you think that?” Derian tensed at
the mention of Emily, wanting to protect her even though Emily could do that
perfectly well herself.
“I’ve seen you two together, more than once,
and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look at a woman the way you look at her.
Like she mattered.” Aud ran a fingertip around the wide-open mouth of the
glass. “She looks the same way at you.”
“Apparently, looks are deceiving.” Derian
laughed at the lie. She’d always wanted to use that excuse when others judged
her on appearances, but in her case it wasn’t true. “We had a thing, and that’s
over now.”
“A thing. A thing as in you’ve been sleeping
together.”
“That’s generally part of a thing, yes.”
“Really, Derian, Henrietta’s protégé? Do you
have to follow your clit everywhere it leads?”
“According to popular opinion, yes.” Derian
didn’t even mind the verbal assault. She didn’t feel it, really. She was
strangely numb.
Aud rolled her eyes. “So…what? You broke it
off and things got messy?”
“Actually, that’s not the way it went. Emily
changed the game.”
“She put you on the street? Well, that must be
a first.”
“Thanks,” Derian said dryly.
Aud sighed. “Hey, all right, I’m being
bitchy. I’m sorry. What happened, exactly?”
“I told her I thought we ought to get
married, that that would solve her visa problem and take care of the agency
going forward.” Derian finished her beer and thought about another. She wasn’t
driving anywhere, hell, she couldn’t really even walk anywhere. She pointed a
finger at her glass and the bartender magically whisked it away and set a
fresh, foaming draft in front of her. “Apparently, my offering to help her out
with something we both knew she wanted was manipulative. She suggested that my
motivation was to piss off my father.”
“Well, wasn’t it? Sort of? Because it
certainly would make Martin crazy.”
“No,” Derian said. “Sure, anytime I manage to
get to him is a good day, but that’s not why I said it.”
“Then why in the world did you? Marriage is a
serious thing, Dere. It’s a legal commitment, at the very least, and usually a
lot more. Honestly, what were you thinking?”
The numbness dropped away like ice shattering
under a too-heavy tread. Anger came roaring back, scalding and indiscriminate.
“I was thinking that Henrietta needs Emily not just now, but to pass on her
life’s work. I was thinking Emily loves this place, deserves her job, and needs
to know she’s not going to be sent back to Singapore after everything she’s put
into getting where she is now because of a bureaucracy that doesn’t deal with
individuals, only quotas and categories and groundless prejudices. I thought I
was offering help.”
“What about you, Dere? What were you thinking
about you in all of this?”
Derian stared, the heat dissipating as fast
as it had flared.
“How many women have you slept with?”
“What?” Derian might have trouble navigating
in new places, especially when she was emotionally unsteady the way she had
been earlier, but the rest of her mind worked perfectly, and she wasn’t
following Aud. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Go ahead, answer the question.”
Derian laughed despite herself. “I don’t
know. A lot. Why?”
“Because you don’t know anything about women
at all. I’m sure you’re fabulous in bed, but do you have any idea what makes a
woman tick?”
“Well I should, I am one.” Derian stopped,
admitting she rarely thought about why she did what she did, beyond the one
primal motivating force in her life. Escaping Martin. Escaping the constant
rejection. Getting away from the thousand cuts that were bleeding her to death.
“You’re saying I’m insensitive and self-centered.”
“No,” Aud said softly, “I’m not, because I
know you’re not. But has it occurred to you that marriage is something that
most women—hell, maybe most people, I don’t know, I can’t speak for guys—think
about, maybe even dream about, their whole lives? It’s not a business decision,
Derian.”
“It often is, and you know it,” Derian said.
“Besides, Emily is all about her profession. She’s not looking for a romantic
relationship. We talked about it.”
Aud’s eyes widened. “The two of you talked
about getting married?”
“Not exactly,” Derian said, exasperated. “We
talked about the future, you know, what we wanted and didn’t want. We both
pretty much said marriage wasn’t for us.”
“Pretty much…” Aud laughed wryly. “Oh, Dere.
You mean marriage isn’t for you. I bet Emily is all about her job right now. I
get that. Me too. But that doesn’t mean that somewhere down the road she didn’t
see that for herself.”
“Well, there won’t be any down the road at
Winfield’s if she’s back in Singapore.”
Aud gave her a long look. “That’s what this
is about, isn’t it. You don’t want her to leave.”
“That hardly makes any difference, since I’m
leaving myself.”
Aud stiffened. “Are you? When?”
“Soon.” As soon as she could.
“For how long?”
“I don’t know how long, a couple weeks
probably. Henrietta is doing really well, and as long as she keeps to her
regimen, she’ll be back before too long.”
“And does Emily know this?”
“I mentioned it, yes.”
“So you announced you were leaving in the
same breath as you suggested the two of you get married?” Aud said dryly.
Derian flushed. “Not quite like that, no. I
don’t know. We didn’t actually get to the planning part. What are you getting
at?”
“That maybe you don’t know the woman you’re
sleeping with as well as you think.”
Derian rubbed her face. “Well, she certainly
knows me.”
“Don’t be so sure.” Aud leaned over to kiss
Derian on the cheek. “Maybe you’re the one who doesn’t know you.”
Derian landed in Rio in the late afternoon. She
hadn’t slept the night before or on the plane, and the buzz of being beyond
tired ran through her. She wasn’t looking forward to navigating another
unfamiliar place—but then it looked like she wouldn’t have to. An Asian woman
bearing a sign with her name on it waited near baggage claim. She didn’t look
like anyone from the hotel or travel agency, unless their reps were wearing
Prada and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of diamonds these days.
Derian held out her hand. “Hello, I’m Derian
Winfield.”
The woman, somewhere in the range of thirty,
extended a manicured hand. “I’m Mingzhu Tan, from Beijing Aerotech. Please call
me Ming.”
“Ah,” Derian said, putting the pieces
together. She’d met with the tech’s CEO six months before when the rising
tycoon first showed interest in investing in American sports teams. “And how is
Mr. Yee?”
“Very well, thank you. We’re so happy to have
this opportunity to meet with you.”
“As am I,” Derian said automatically. She’d
danced this dance dozens of times in the past and wondered if she hadn’t
inherited far more of Martin’s business shrewdness than she wanted to admit. Right
now, the last thing she wanted to be thinking about was Martin. Every time she
thought about him, she heard Emily’s subtle accusation that she was motivated
by her need to best him. She shook off the memory. “I appreciate you meeting
me.”
Ming smiled slowly. “Of course, we are
pleased to offer you any courtesy we can.”
Derian had a feeling those courtesies might
extend far beyond a ride from the airport, and felt not the slightest twinge of
interest. What she wanted was a long shower, a longer drink, and something,
anything, to occupy her mind. A liaison with a strange woman, however, was not
on that list.
She collected her luggage and carried it out
to the waiting car. The trip to the hotel was mercifully short and she didn’t
have to do more than make casual passing conversation with Ming. When the limo
pulled up in front of the Copa, she shook Ming’s hand and bowed. “You were very
gracious to take the time to meet me.”
“We are staying here as well,” Ming said,
again with a smile that could be an invitation but stopped short of being
insistent. If she was disappointed that Derian didn’t request to meet at
another time, she didn’t show it. “My suite is 407. Please ring me if I may be
of service.”
“I’m sure I’ll see you again, and please give
my regards to Mr. Yee.”
Derian picked up her key from the express
check-in wall and headed directly upstairs. The hotel bar would undoubtedly be
filled with people she wasn’t in the mood to talk to just yet. Her suite was
another large, fully appointed trio of rooms with the requisite balcony, this
one overlooking the Copa beach. A cool ocean breeze cut the shimmering heat
enough to make sitting outside look inviting. Still jittery, like a car with
the idle revving too high, Derian took a shower and ordered up a bottle of
champagne. In briefs and a short-sleeved shirt, she settled on a lounger on the
balcony and let the alcohol slowly dull her nerves. Watching couples amble
across the white glittering sand, she glanced at the empty recliner beside her.
Loneliness was not a sensation she generally dwelled upon, but she couldn’t
help wishing Emily was there with her. An evening spent over a quiet dinner and
a late-night stroll on a moonlit beach, Emily’s hand in hers and Emily’s warm
laughter washing over her, struck her as more satisfying than anything she’d
ever done. She’d never wanted that with any other woman, and she wouldn’t be
finding it anywhere she went tonight.
Derian dropped her head back and closed her
eyes.
When she woke, the last red-gold rays of a
brilliant sunset slanted across the ocean and draped her body in fiery shadows.
She had to be at the sponsor’s reception in half an hour. She took another
shower and, after the cold water drove the alcohol fumes from her brain,
dressed and joined the familiar crowd in the ballroom on the mezzanine. The
room was exactly like a hundred others she’d been in—huge gleaming chandeliers,
tall columns flanking both sides, ornately painted ceilings, and an army of
waiters with silver trays and a thousand flutes of champagne. Plus the bars
discreetly spaced at intervals around the perimeter.
Derian took a glass of champagne she wasn’t
interested in drinking and made a mental note of the time. An hour was about
all she could take. Ming nodded to her from across the room. Derian made the
rounds, shook all the right hands, and made her business manager happy by
wooing potential new partners. As soon as she could, she slipped away and
ordered a car to take her to a hotel in a less popular part of the city.
Gambling was illegal in Brazil, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t any. You just
needed to know where. She settled at the baccarat table and played all night.
When she returned to the Copa at noon the
next day and finally fell asleep, she still couldn’t leave Emily behind. Her
dreams were a dark chaotic tangle of lost opportunity and fruitless searching
for something just beyond reach.
*
“Okay, thank you, everybody.” Emily grabbed
her iPad, quickly rose as the rest of the staff gathered up their things, and
escaped into the hall. She’d barely reached her desk when Ron slipped in behind
her and closed her office door.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were
a ghost,” he said in way of greeting.
“I don’t have any idea what you’re talking
about.”
“How about you’ve been hiding out here for
the last week, and avoiding me.”
“I haven’t been hiding or avoiding,” Emily
said, although she doubted she sounded convincing. She was terrible at lying.
“If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s
too bad,” Ron said. “Because whatever it is, I can tell you’re miserable.”
“I’m not miserable,” Emily lied again. She
dropped into her chair and tried to ignore her iPad and the picture she’d seen
just that morning on Flipboard of Derian and a beautiful woman getting into a
limo outside the Copacabana Palace. A minute passed and she straightened up.
Ron was still in the same place, hands on his hips, the look on his face
suggesting he wasn’t leaving anytime soon.
“You might as well sit down if you’re not
going to leave.”
He took his customary seat and regarded her
with a sympathetic smile. “Sometimes it helps to talk.”
“And sometimes there’s nothing to say.”
“It’s Derian, I already know that. You’ve
been miserable since the day she left.”
“Coincidence.”
“Really, and I look like I was born under a
mushroom?”
“Ron,” Emily said gently, “I don’t want to
talk about Derian.”