Sun-kissed (Au Pairs, The) Read online

Eliza heard the sound of waves in the background and Jeremy fumbling with his cell phone. "Hello? Hello?" he called. "Liza, are you there?"

  "Hi, baby."

  "Hey." He had a voice that melted her heart. A deep rumble. Eliza felt a twinge of pity for any girl who didn't have a guy with a voice as sexy as Jeremy's. She remembered how Charlie Borshok, her former paramour, had a voice like a hyena and tended to laugh in a high-pitched giggle.

  "I just left the garage, and I'm about to go into the tunnel. I should be there in a few hours." Her conversational voice was quickly replaced by schoolgirl cooing. "Did you miss me?"

  "Not one bit," he joked.

  She steered the car into the cavernous Midtown Tunnel, and the signal started to fade. "Jer, I'm going to lose you. I'll call when I'm on 27, okay? Love you!"

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  There was no answer. The symbol on the dashboard was dull. She'd lost the connection. No matter. She'd call him again once she got past the tunnel. She felt a thrill thinking of the special custom-made lingerie set in her luggage. The palest pink silk, with satin ribbons. Jeremy didn't know it yet, but tonight her V card would expire. Hopefully the world wouldn't end before then because Eliza had absolutely no intention of dying a virgin.

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  the devil wears louboutin

  THE FIRST GIVEAWAY THAT THIS WASN'T GOING TO BE A

  normal job was the sight of her boss's heels perched on top of her desk. Mara admired them from the corner of her eye. They were hot-pink patent-leather Louboutins with fire-engine-red soles--the status-conveying detail that communicated each pair's

  five-hundred-dollar price tag to observant and shoe-sawy females everywhere.

  For a decade Sam Davis had ruled the New York media world. She had single-handedly transformed several sluggish, out-of-touch magazines into cash-cow bonanzas, starting with American Teen and working her way up the "pink ghetto" of women's magazines, from Sophisticated to the Spanish import Anna Claudia to the mainstream Glitter to her most famous reinvention yet-- Them- --a notorious weekly celebrity tabloid that fed the public desire for knowledge about the intimate private lives of nubile reality television stars. Sam Davis was the reason pop starlet Chauncey Raven, newly married to her former backup singer Daryl Wolf and mother to four-month-old Liam Spenser Raven Wolf, had already totaled two Mercedes-Benz convertibles in high-speed paparazzi car chases through Malibu.

  Sam Davis bent the media landscape to her will, and her

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  trajectory had seemed to go higher and higher. For years, it seemed she was unstoppable. Thinking she could conquer all, she set her sights on reinventing the intellectual mag market. She proposed a magazine that was equal part Harper's and In Style that would make "smart people sexy." She did this by putting Nobel Prize winners in skimpy outfits and having actresses review the latest literary tomes. The high point had come when a reality show host summed up a Pulitzer Prize-winning book on famine in Africa as "making her hungry for more." The magazine folded after three issues, her multi-year contract was canceled, and as quickly as she had been the toast of the town, she was a laughingstock.

  Hence the exile to the Hamptons. She swore it was to get back in touch with her family (she worked sixteen-hour days, her staff reported, even while her five-year-old son was in the hospital with a brain tumor) and to enjoy the slower pace of Hamptons reporting (garden shows, horse shows, show-offs). But New York knew the truth--she was over.

  But not out. Sam Davis was eager to put her personal stamp on Hamptons and shake things up once again.

  Mara waited eagerly while Sam was on the phone harassing her assistant about her coffee. "Haven't I told you a thousand times? A dry cappuccino has no foam!"

  She still couldn't believe she'd landed such a sought-after gig. The speed of it still made Mara's head dizzy. All her life, she'd been told getting ahead was the result of hard work and discipline, but how could she believe that when with one simple

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  phone call--one connection---she'd landed the job of her dreams? It didn't seem quite fair. What about all the other girls who had applied for the position but weren't lucky enough to have once worked for Sam Davis's college roommate?

  But thoughts like that were "lame" according to Eliza. The world operated on the Rolodex system. It was all about whom you knew-- the more important and worth knowing, the better. At seventeen, Mara was surprised to find she knew quite a lot of those people.

  "Yes?" Sam asked, finally acknowledging Mara's presence. She was a solidly built woman of thirty-six with a hard, lined face. Her jet-black hair was meant to look punk, as was the dog collar around her neck, but somehow, stuffed into a too-tight Vivienne Westwood sweater and thigh-hugging bootleg Shagg jeans, Sam Davis still managed to looked like any other suburban mother of three but one who was desperately--and vainly--trying to hold on to her rebellious youth.

  "I'm Mara Waters. Your new intern. I filed the story on the benefit at Cain last night."

  "The what?" Sam asked. She whipped her feet back onto the floor, her pink shoes disappearing in a lurid flash. "Oh. Right. Got your copy. We cut it."

  "Oh," Mara said, stung and disappointed. All that work, leaving Ryan, and the piece hadn't even run. Plus, it proved her worst fear--she wasn't a writer. She couldn't even make a society gossip column exciting. This was seriously depressing.

  That morning, Mara had woken up in bed alone. Ryan had

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  left a note saying he'd gone off to surf. He had a habit of waking up at dawn to catch the waves. She'd felt a little sad--last night they'd been too tired to hook up, and then they hadn't even been able to spend the morning together. She'd planned on making them a romantic breakfast in the galley kitchen but had had to settle for a cold bagel alone by the television.

  "I thought about running it next week, but by then it'll be old news. And we don't do old news at Hamptons," Sam Davis declared pompously.

  "Of course." Mara nodded. She began to put her notebook back in her bag. It was obvious she was about to get relegated to the keeper of the office supplies. Her shoulders slumped.

  But to her surprise, Sam gestured for her to take the seat across the desk, and, after Mara removed the piles of manuscripts, magazines, envelopes, and FedEx boxes lying on top of it, she did.

  "Listen, it's not a big deal. Happens all the time," Sam said, rolling her eyes. "It was a little heavy on the puns--but otherwise not a bad read. A little wordy. You buried the lead by putting the polo player hooking up with the NBC star in the fourth 'graf. But you'll learn."

  Mara perked up. "Really?"

  Sam shuffled through some papers on her desk and found a hard copy of Maras story. She skimmed it quickly. "There are some nice things here--'celebrity math'--that's funny. I like that. We need more of that."

  Mara glowed. She'd thought that was a cute turn of phrase.

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  "Tell you what, the managing ed hired another intern, some favor to the publisher's sister-in-law or something. So it turns out, we don't need you to intern," Sam said.

  But before Mara's face could crumple, Sam finished her sentence. "But I do need someone to fill in the Social Diary column regularly. Courtney von Wilding called. She's spending the summer sailing the Mediterranean on some Greek prince's boat and won't be back in New York till the fall." Sam sighed. "That's what I get for hiring some junior socialite to write the Diary column. It's almost impossible to get those girls near a keyboard. Ruins the manicure."

  She pulled out a few old issues of the magazine and threw them across the desk in Mara's direction. "You're going to cover fashion shows, the polo, benefits, dinner parties, who's in, who's out, what they're wearing, who they're sleeping with, who got snubbed at the fireworks this year. Let's shake it up a little! Give them something to read between all the Cartier ads."

  Mara nodded, scribbling furiously. Who in/out, read btw Cartier ads.

  "Sydney Minx is opening his new boutique tomorrow. I want you there; make sure you get
an interview with him. Let's do a full profile. More of that outsider-turned-insider stuff you do. Maybe we'll do it as a cover. See what the old bitch has got up his sleeve. I want three thousand words by Monday."

  Three thousand words! Practically a novel! And had Sam Davis said "cover"? This was her big chance!

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  "But before I forget, there is one thing I desperately need," Sam Davis said. "Socks."

  "Socks?"

  Sam pointed to her feet. "Socks. For my tennis game. I need some. Get Sydney to send some over. Tell them we're shooting for a fashion page."

  "Sorry--call in some socks?"

  "Are you deaf? Yes. Here's the number," she said, throwing a card at Mara. "I'm late for my lunch at Nick and Toni's."

  And with that, Sam Davis departed.

  Mara stared at the scrap of paper in front of her. Did her boss actually expect her to ask a designer to messenger over some socks? Why couldn't Sam just pop down to the store and buy a pair? Or go home and pick up her own?

  She dialed the number.

  "Goober Public Relations," said a silky female voice she recognized as Mitzi's assistant's.

  Mara immediately hung up the phone. She just couldn't bring herself to ask someone to send over some socks, especially not Mitzi. Not even with the crazy excuse of needing them for a fashion photo shoot. They were just white socks--they sold them at a drugstore for $1.99. Maybe she should just run down there and buy some. But what if Sam noticed they weren't Sydney Minx socks? Was there something special about Sydney Minx socks?

  Luckily, she had another idea. She quickly dialed Eliza's cell.

  "Liza?"

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  "Mar! Holla!" In Cabo, they'd played Gwen Stefani's album on Mara's iPod speakers until their ears bled.

  "Holla back, girl! Where are you?" Mara asked, feeling a flush of happiness at hearing Eliza's throaty voice. This summer, the three of them would be together again--and who knew what kind of mischief they would find themselves in?

  "Stuck in traffic on 27, as always. I should be there in an hour, though."

  "Listen, I need some socks. For my boss. Sam Davis. Do you think you guys can send some over?"

  "Socks?"

  Mara quickly explained.

  "Oh yeah. Don't worry. I heard she does that all the time, calls in for every little thing. No one even lends her any clothes anymore since she always lies and says it's for a shoot and then they see it on her at some premiere party. But she and Sydney go way back, I heard. I'll get one of the girls in the shop to send over a pair. What's her size?"

  Mara surreptitiously kicked the Louboutin shoe box under the desk so that she could see the label. "Ten and a half. Literally Bigfoot." She snickered.

  Eliza beeped off the line and then beeped back on. "They'll be there by noon."

  "You're a lifesaver."

  "More like a socksaver." Eliza giggled.

  "Guess what? I'm writing a cover story on Sydney Minx!"

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  Mara said, her voice rising with excitement. She doodled on her notepad, writing, By Mara Waters, and, Social Diary by Mara Waters, and tried out a few byline bios: Mara Waters lives in Sag Harbor with her boyfriend. This is her first piece for the magazine.

  "Shut up!" Eliza gasped.

  "Seriously. They're making me the Social Diary columnist. Isn't that crazy?"

  "Insane," Eliza enthused. "Oh my God, you're, like, going to be so important!"

  "You shut up!" Mara laughed. Eliza tended to exaggerate, but it was still nice to hear. She put her feet up on the desk just as she'd seen Sam Davis do. There was no one around who would be able to see her anyway.

  "Will you put me in the story? I styled the whole collection."

  "I'll see what I can do," Mara replied in a professional tone.

  "Oh," Eliza said, disappointed.

  "Loser, I'm only kidding. Of course you'll be in it," Mara promised.

  "Phew. For a minute there, I thought I might have to bring you my super-duper-big-head-shrinking machine," Eliza teased.

  "See you at the Perry house?"

  "If I don't see you first!" Eliza threatened.

  Mara smiled as she hung up the phone. She couldn't wait to see her friends.

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  jacqui tunes out prelude-to-divorce radio

  THE KIDS TRIED TO PRETEND THEY DIDN'T HEAR THEM, BUT the house reverberated with the sound of poison and bile. Kevin and Anna were fighting over the intercom. Again.

  Jacqui looked at the white box by the toaster and wished she could shut off the speakers, but their Hamptons intercom was different from the New York system. In New York, when you beeped for a certain room, you got a private line. But in the Hamptons, which had older technology, when you pressed a button, your voice carried to the fifteen other intercom speakers in the house.

  "Goddammit, where the hell are my golf clubs? How come I can never find anything in this house?" Kevin bellowed.

  "Don't blame me--I wasn't the one who sent them out to get varnished!" Anna screeched.

  "It's not like you do anything around here! All you do is spend money! And by the way, that little stunt you pulled on my ear is serious. The doctor said it's become infected!"

  "So what? I don't care! I'm so sick of the way you treat me. I'm your wife, not your assistant anymore!" Anna screamed.

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  "Yeah, I know. My assistant does more work than you do!" Kevin retorted.

  "Screw you! I want a divorce!"

  "Fine! You've got one!" Kevin yelled back. "You probably just want to be with someone younger! It's not like you ever want to do anything that I want to do!"

  "Earth to Kevin. Your friends are boring"

  "Well, you won't have to hang around them anymore, will you?"

  "I mean it this time!" Anna threatened. "I want a divorce!"

  "Go ahead! Call your lawyer!"

  "He's on speed dial! Just watch me!"

  "They don't mean it," Jacqui said as she ladled out organic, steel-cut Irish oatmeal into the children's cereal bowls. The idle threat of divorce was thrown out so often, it lacked any punch. "Seriously."

  Madison rolled her eyes. She pretended to be indifferent to her father and her stepmother's quarrels, but since Anna was the only mother they had--their real mother, Brigitte, had absconded to a Sri Lankan ashram and had hardly laid eyes on any of them in years--it was evident the fights spooked her. When a long shriek of Anna's voice screeched over the intercom, Madison accidentally upset her glass of orange juice on the table.

  "Don't worry about it," Jacqui said, helping her wipe up the spill with a wad of paper napkins.

  Eleven-year-old William didn't take his eyes off the adventure novel he was reading. The hyperactive little boy had calmed

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  down, surprisingly without the help of any medications, and a miraculous transformation had taken place. Whereas it had been so hard to shut him up before, now you could hardly get him to talk. He had grown tall and lanky and was looking more like Ryan every day. The two older children tried not to show their anxiety, but the noise was clearly bothering Zoe and the baby, which was what they all still called Cody.

  Zoe's lower lip trembled and it looked like she might cry, and Cody, the only one who was Anna's biologically, was pressing his hands against his ears and screaming.

  Her fuse already dangerously short, Jacqui walked over and pulled the plug out of the white box, which immediately stopped squawking. They could still hear the rest of the house echo with the elder Perrys' quarrel, but now it was muffled and distant.

  "C'mon, eat your fruit," she coaxed, handing around a bowl full of raisins and prunes.

  "Anyone home?" a cheerful voice called from outside the screen door.

  Jacqui looked up. Mara walked in, bearing a large basket filled with warm, fresh-baked muffins from Barefoot Contessa. Their cinnamon-and-nutmeg smell filled the kitchen. And for the first time since she'd gotten the bad NYU news, Jacqui actually felt like smiling.
<
br />   "Hello, hello!" Mara said.

  "Holla!"

  Mara came over and hugged Jacqui. "You look so great!"

  Jacqui twirled. She was wearing a blousy eyelet Derek Lam

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  halter top and slim gray plaid Bermudas. "So do you. Is that a Tory tunic! J'adore!"

  Mara nodded and pulled out a seat from the counter, while the kids immediately dropped their oatmeal spoons and raided the muffins.

  "My God, William, you've grown like a weed!" Mara said. "And Madison, you look so pretty in that shirt."

  "It's Bill now. He doesn't like to be called William anymore," Jacqui said fondly. "And we found that shirt on sale at Jeffrey last week, didn't we, Mad?"

  William gave Mara a shy smile and went back to his seat. Mara raised her eyebrows at Jacqui, who merely shrugged. For two summers, the boy had terrorized them with his hyperactive tantrums--it was hard to reconcile the Super Soaker-wielding brat with the quiet boy reading a book.

  Mara ruffled Cody's hair and kissed Zoe.

  "So, how was your first night on the 'love boat'?" Jacqui teased, making air quotes with her fingers as she collected the untouched bowls around the table.

  Mara blushed and looked meaningfully at Ryan's younger siblings.

  Jacqui nodded and quietly explained that as soon as their grandparents arrived, she and Mara could have some privacy. Kevin's parents were taking the kids to their estate on the far end of the island, where they would spend the day fishing in the pond and riding horses. The no-nonsense Perry elders didn't approve of nannies, and so Jacqui basically had the day off.

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  When the kids had left, Mara told Jacqui about the amazingly romantic dinner that Ryan had prepared, only to have it interrupted by a work assignment. "I had to leave him--I didn't really have a choice," Mara defended herself.