Chapter 55

It wasn’t in Emily’s nature to be overly reflective about her life, but as Nick’s jet ascended into the sky above Paris, she found herself thinking back on how much her life had changed in the last two months. For years before she met Nick, she’d worked very hard to maintain something close to stasis in her life. As long as Clive didn’t throw her out or start hanging around more often, as long as she worked enough to have some spending money, as long as people didn’t ask too many questions about her private life or try to get close to her, she could endure. It had been a lonely life filled with frequent anxiety but it was better than the lonely life filled with frequent anxiety she’d left behind in Flyspeck.

Pilar had called her brave for leaving Clive when she did, but it hadn’t felt brave. It had felt like too little, too late. She’d left only when the writing had clearly been on the wall. Too many things she’d tried to keep static had fallen apart and her only choice had been to wait for the axe to fall or run while she still had something left.

Comparably, what she’d agreed to in the last forty-eight hours seemed either heroically self-serving or just bugfuck insane. In a very short time she’d gone from gradually progressing towards a single, attainable goal to risking everything she had and was, in return for a much larger reward. Nick had done everything he could to reassure her that things would turn out all right, but it still wasn’t hard for Emily to imagine everything going wrong from here on out. Not that long ago, she’d dared to hope that life in Nick’s orbit would mean an end to fear and anxiety. Instead, she felt like a woman who’d jumped out of an airplane and was pretty sure she’d packed a parachute, but wouldn’t know for sure until it was time to pull the cord.

Passing through a bit of turbulence reminded Emily that her choice of metaphors wasn’t likely to help her anxiety. Although when she thought about it, a sudden death while still young and beautiful would hardly be the worst fate. It could spare her decades of loneliness trying to make ends meet as a waitress at a roadhouse somewhere.

She looked around to see if anyone else was even bothered by the plane shaking as it rose above the clouds, but nobody seemed to notice. Across from her, Nick and Tanvi were each reading something on their iPads. Emily’s own pad was in her carry-on, but she was reminded that there was a ton of reading she was expected to get through as a member of the Council and even more that she was encouraged to keep up with from Nick’s recommended reading list. Ever since leaving Flyspeck, she’d been a voracious reader, but she’d barely even touched the pad since leaving for Milan two weeks ago. At the very least, she’d better read the document Tanvi had prepared for their meeting with Mathilde Bhatt-Blackstone before they got to Angola.

At her side, Pilar was stroking the edge of a large padded shipping envelope and almost vibrating with excitement. This immediately drew Emily’s attention. She was used to Pilar playing things super cool even when passion seemed more appropriate. “What’s in the envelope?”

“My private portfolio.” Pilar smiled broadly like she’d been waiting for someone to ask. “Nick asked to see it.”

“The one Stringer’s been shooting for you all these years?” Nick lowered his iPad with a look of obvious interest.

“Yes. I had it shipped to meet us in Paris. I was going to show it to you there, but we got busy.” Pilar let her eyes fall to the Jezebel ring Emily was wearing. Emily wondered if she was supposed to be embarrassed or ashamed, but failed to feel either.

“Does that mean you’re planning to show me now?” Nick asked.

“Once we reach cruising altitude, yes. I thought it would help us pass the time.” Pilar looked at the other two women. “Geoff is the only one who’s ever seen them before today ... and Ethan of course, but Nick asked to see them.”

“Can I see them too?” Emily asked, too curious to pretend indifference.

“You can, although I should warn you that Clive definitely wouldn’t approve of them.” Pilar smirked.

“I assume that means you’re nude in some of them?” Emily asked. To Pilar’s smile, she added, “God, I should have done that a long time ago. It’s not like I thought I was going to be with Clive for the rest of my life.”

“I’ve scheduled a session with Ethan for when we get back to the States. I didn’t do one for my birthday this year,” said Pilar.

“Do you think he’d do a session with me?” Emily asked.

Pilar laughed. “I was going to ask you to join me for my session the next time you put your collar on, but I’m sure he’d be happy to shoot you alone too.”

“Do you know if he ever works with Playboy?” Emily asked.

“I don’t think he does, but he definitely does some glamour work,” said Pilar. “Are you interested in doing something like that?”

Emily nodded. “Ever since Clive told me he didn’t want me doing ‘nudie work,’ I’ve wanted to be in Playboy.”

“I imagine if he came to them with a contract to shoot Emily King, Playboy would fall all over themselves to work with him,” Pilar said. “I don’t have the courage to go that far yet. I’m going to be in the construction business for another forty years and I already get enough shit for posing in my underwear.”

Emily frowned, “Nick, I know what you said in the garden, but have you thought about what my being in Playboy would mean to the ACCD Fund?”

“Thought about it, failed to care,” said Nick. “Anybody who has a stick up their ass about taking money from a centerfold can go to the back of the line and think about it. For that matter, anyone who can get past the reputation I’m bound to have over time should take a little bit of ‘nudie work’ in stride.”

“What if your private portfolio gets out, though?” Emily asked Pilar.

Pilar shrugged. “I take reasonable precautions against that, but I’m not going to live my life not doing what I want because of it. When I’m fifty, I want to remember exactly what I looked like at twenty.”

“Do you think you’ll ever release them?” Nick asked.

Pilar nodded. “I keep imagining a big coffee table book some day when I want the rest of the world to remember exactly what I looked like at twenty.”

Monica came over to announce they’d reached cruising altitude and could get up and move around safely. Emily went around the table to sit on the couch between Nick and Tanvi while Pilar brought out a box cutter to extract the portfolios from their envelope.

Emily had been working with Pilar since they were eighteen and twenty-one respectively. Until she saw the first picture in the first portfolio, she would have sworn that Pilar hadn’t changed a bit in the four intervening years. But the first picture looked so young - clearly Pilar, but a little bit softer, and little bit less intense. Emily asked, “Are you twenty-one here?”

“Twenty,” said Pilar. “I started doing these the year before I started modeling. They’re what inspired Stringer to suggest me to Jazz.”

In the first picture, Pilar lay on a double bed with a bright red comforter, knees bent, back arched, one arm thrown back so that it covered one eye. Her jet black hair cascaded down her back. Nick said, “I like the reference.”

“I was afraid it might be too obvious, but I imagined I’d eventually have a collection of thousands of photos and I wanted to start with a classic,” said Pilar.

“I don’t get the reference.” Emily frowned. Tanvi handed her an iPad with a picture of Marilyn Monroe in the same pose on a red dropcloth. “Oh, I guess I should know about this. Is that a particularly famous picture?”

“It’s her first widely-circulated nude - from her 1955 Golden Dreams calendar,” said Pilar.

Emily looked at the iPad and then the broadsheet-size portfolio. “Shit, I think you might have better tits than Marilyn Monroe.”

“So do you. Plenty of women have better tits than Marilyn now. The difference is she had them in 1955 and most men had never seen a really nice pair,” said Pilar.

“Let me see that.” Nick took the iPad from Emily’s hands, compared the pictures, and said, “Shit, you’re right. Marilyn does have a really beautiful body, though.”

“I’d never think to suggest otherwise.” Pilar wriggled happily in her seat.

“I think claiming you have better tits than Marilyn is like suggesting you’re more popular than Jesus. Even if it’s true, it’s probably best not to be caught saying it,” suggested Emily.

After telling them the plane had levelled out, Monica had gone to the back of the cabin for something. Now directly behind their seats, she said, “Oh wow, Pilar. You look amazing. How old are you in that shot?”

“Twenty,” said Pilar.

Nick twisted around to look at the air hostess. “I hope this isn’t too weird for the crew?”

“Oh please, this is nothing.” Monica scoffed. “You have to live in this plane for days at a time. Live your life, Nick. Everyone on the crew has been working private jets for years. We’ve seen it all and we know when to duck into the cockpit and stay out of the way.”

“Would you like to stay for the unveiling?” Pilar offered. “Other than my ex and the photographer, no one has ever seen these pictures before.”

“If you don’t need anything else, I’d be honored,” Monica said, looked around and, after a moment of no one asking for anything, sat at Pilar’s side.

Shortly after leaving Flyspeck for Sydney, Emily had gone through a phase where she’d been obsessed with the naked female form. As Pilar flipped to the second page, this one with a triptych of poolside nudes, Emily said, “I spent a lot of time looking at naked women on the Internet when I was younger.”

“Oh?” Pilar raised an eyebrow.

Emily nodded. “When I left Flyspeck, I’d never seen another person naked and after that, I’d only seen Clive. I was curious. And it turns out you can find a nearly unlimited number of naked people on the Internet if you know where to look.” Nick gave her a side-eye glance to which she responded, “What?”

“Sorry, I just forget how naive you must have been coming out of that little town,” Nick said. “Did you even know the Internet existed before you left?”

“Oh, definitely. Every time we got a new member or someone coming back from the outside world, I would grill them.” Emily laughed. “In hindsight, it was really obvious that I wanted to leave, but I thought I was being clever.”

Nick turned his attention back to the photo book. “I really should get a place with a pool.”

“And impose a no-tops rule?” Pilar smirked.

“I was thinking ‘clothing optional.’ I can be a benevolent despot,” said Nick.

“You could just do that at the Loft,” Emily pointed out.

Nick shook his head. “I’d rather not. Or, honestly, it’s already the dress code at the Loft. People can wear or not wear what they want, but I’m kind of hoping the Loft will stay a place where people feel comfortable sending their sons and daughters to network and learn about saving the world.”

“Free from pernicious boobs?” Pilar teased.

Nick rolled his eyes. “Regardless of what Simon says, I have nothing against the female form in whole or in part, clothed or unclothed. And I don’t think anyone else should either. But I’d hate to limit the discourses we’re going to be having to people who already share my opinion on the matter. I’d like to avoid the echo chamber.” He shook his head. “Plus, it turns out that I own part of at least two clothing optional resorts already. If I want to see topless women lounging around the pool, I don’t need to mix the two domains.”

“Except in the hot tub, presumably,” offered Pilar.

Nick laughed. “Well, yes. I suppose that was the impetus for buying the hot tub. And I didn’t even count Green Mountainside among my clothing optional properties. Threnody really only hinted at how much of the Ferrari-Stones’ former property I own. It seems like every time JT wanted to raise some ready cash, he went to Hugh Hemmick and Hugh more often than not bought what he was selling on my behalf.”

“And that included nudist resorts?” Pilar asked.

“Partial ownership in one down by Rio de Janeiro and another one on Jayanesia.” Nick smirked. “Max has volunteered to help with my survey of the trust’s holdings and I’m thinking of sending him to check them out.”

“You don’t want to check them out yourself? You’re not at all curious?” Pilar prompted.

“I’m curious as hell,” admitted Nick. “I just think it would be funny to make Max my nudist resorts specialist.”

“I’d like to go to one,” Emily offered.

“And suddenly the whole idea is much more appealing,” said Nick.

Emily laughed. “Seriously? You do know you can see me naked pretty much any time you like, don’t you? I don’t know a lot about being a sex slave, but I’m pretty sure that’s part of the package.” Monica’s eyes flicked up in momentary surprise and Emily covered her mouth. “Am I not supposed to talk about it?”

“It’s part of your life, Emily. Talk about it with whoever you want to,” said Nick. Then he added, “As for wanting to go to a nude resort with you, I’m not sure how to explain that one. It’s like looking at these pictures of Pilar. I’ve seen Pilar naked once or twice, but it’s still exciting to see her naked in a new way ... and in the old ways for that matter. I just really enjoy seeing beautiful, naked women. It’s like seeing a sunset. I’m not going to skip it just because I’ve already seen one.”

“Speaking of which...” Pilar turned the page to show them a picture of herself dressed in a red silk blouse, black skirt, black hose, and a thick black blindfold. In the picture, she was tied to a folding chair and her blouse was open to reveal a lacy black bra.

Emily drew in her breath. “Oh, that’s ... uh, hot.” An odd flush crept over her skin.

Pilar chuckled. “Because you’d like to have me in that position or because you’d like to be in that position yourself?”

Emily bit her lower lip and looked sideways at Nick before admitting. “Both, I think. Not at the same time, though.”

“And what would you do if you had me tied to a chair and blindfolded?” Pilar asked.

Emily glanced at Monica to see if she was reconsidering joining this viewing party and saw Nick do the same, but she only leaned forward waiting for the answer. Emily refused to let herself be embarrassed into silence. “Well, I imagine I’d want torture you until you promise to tell me all your secrets.”

Pilar smirked. “Good luck with that. My secrets are all I have that let me compete with you, Blondie.”

Emily suspected Pilar was teasing her, but decided to take the compliment at face value. “Well, I guess I’d force you to tell me secrets until my arms get tired, then.”

Pilar smirked and turned the page. The next series of photos started with her in a leotard and tutu, progressed through various ballet poses with decreasing amounts of her body covered and ended with her naked body arched over her own legs. Emily frowned at them, “Do you dance ballet, too?”

Pilar shook her head. “No, I studied it for a couple of years, but mostly just to fill out my movement vocabulary. Ballroom is the only thing I ever took really seriously.”

“How long did you study ballroom?” Monica asked.

“I started at fifteen, took it super-seriously for three years, then taught it for four years, then kind of drifted away from it after I realized I was never going to go pro.” Pilar said.

“Did you ever think about going one one of those shows like Simply Come Dancing?” Monica asked.

“I thought about it, but I always had the sense those shows wanted you to have a terrible backstory,” said Pilar. “There’s not a lot of reality television about people going from strength to strength.”

“Maybe there should be,” said Nick. “Something where the narrative is about keeping your shit together and overcoming challenges because of consistency instead of leaping from crisis to crisis.”

Pilar gave him a speculative look. “Are you thinking of becoming a TV producer?”

Nick shook his head. “No, but Max pitched the idea of saving the world through media and I’ve been kicking the idea around in my own head. Maybe changing people’s attitudes is a cost-effective way of tackling some social problems.”

“I basically learned how to interact with people from TV,” Emily agreed. When everyone turned to look at her, she added, “People outside of Flyspeck, I mean. I figured out pretty quickly that people didn’t want to talk about Jesus or Armageddon all the time, but I had no idea what they did talk about.”

“Did that work?” Pilar asked.

“Not really, but it gave me enough confidence to go out in public and listen and it gave me a valuable topic. It turns out a lot of people just talk about TV.” Emily answered.

Pilar didn’t say anything, but turned to the next pair of pages. In these photos, she started out seated at a grand piano, dressed in a silver brocade top, red skirt, and a pair of elaborate gold earrings shaped like inverted candelabras and progressed to lying naked across the top of the piano. Emily considered the pictures silently for a minute before asking, “Would you really let me tie you to a chair and torture you?”

Pilar smiled wickedly. “Would you like to?”

“Yes ... I think.” Emily bit her lower lip. “I’m not sure ‘torture’ is the right word exactly.”

“I’m game.” Pilar ran her fingers over the open book and added casually. “This was my prom dress, by the way. Even at eighteen, I thought it was a shame no one ever got to see me out of it.”

Emily laughed. “I guess you were oversexed even then?”

“I didn’t think so.” Pilar furrowed her brow like she was thinking back. “At fifteen, I thought I was oversexed because I was looking forward to having sex. Then after my quinceanera, I started hanging out with Inez and Jazz and Zarita and felt hopelessly unsophisticated sexually. It’s only been the last couple of months I felt really safe exploring everything I want.”

Monica leaned in. “What’s your secret?”

Pilar laughed. “Date a billionaire who adores you and doesn’t judge you for being a dirty, little slut.”

Nick gave a small cough. “I assure you those words have never crossed my mind.”

Pilar gave a happy, little wriggle. “They have now. You can save them for the next time you want to feel transgressive.”

Nick gave a noncommittal grunt like he wasn’t sure he’d ever want to feel that transgressive. In Emily’s periphery, Monica gave him a thoughtful look like she was seriously considering him as a potential lover for the first time. Emily had expected the idea of Nick taking even more lovers would make her painfully jealous, but the feeling was muted and distant as she found herself dwelling on a new thought: As appealing as being with Nick had been all along, Pilar might be the real prize in this relationship. Nick could offer her financial stability and a lifelong circle of friends, but Pilar might actually be able to help Emily reach her own potential in a way that Nick with his own inhibitions couldn’t.

Having been momentarily lost in her own thoughts and lost track of the conversation and next set of photos, Emily said rather abruptly, “I think I would like to tie you up, actually.”

Max had never really been in a fight. He’d been bullied plenty. Sophomore year, he’d snapped on Ryan Vikander and executed the same move he just pulled on Obnoxious Suit Man, going low and punching for the jimmies, but that hadn’t been a fight. Ryan had harassed Max for years and never realized a Braveheart moment was coming. He went down like a sack of potatoes.

Max might only be alive today because that punch came at the end of the school year. Writhing around on the floor holding his junk, Ryan had sworn he was going to murder Max - a threat that could be more than a metaphor in Brownfield Mills. After a very tense finals week, Max had convinced his parents to let him go visit his grandmother in New Jersey for two weeks. When he came back, Nick had made friends with Lev and brought him into the D&D game. Part of Max’s loyalty to Nick came from the sense that his best friend had welcomed his own romantic rival into the fold in order to save Max’s life. Very few friends would do that.

Beyond that one act of defiance, Max hadn’t seen much multilateral violence except at a distance. He’d never been inside a brawl before and was totally unprepared to make sense of the chaos he saw when he was jerked up from his crouch.

The first thing he sensed was that someone had hooked into his arms from behind and was holding him wide open. He tried to jerk away, assuming someone hostile was holding him still to be more effectively punched in the stomach, but the person behind him held him fast. He looked over his shoulder. Dietrich said, “Easy, Max,” like he was handling a difficult horse and forced Max to take a couple of steps backwards.

Max thought Dietrich was an ally in this fight, but his lizard brain wasn’t sure. Dietrich was good looking and athletically gifted; he smelled like an enemy. Max spun his head to find his primary adversary and saw him lying on the rooftop with no fewer than three Gibraltar Security people holding him down. His two friends were backing away like they wanted to melt into the crowd and disappear.

In the next second, a lot of people had interposed themselves between Max and the loudmouth. Some of them were security, but most of them were just friends and friendly faces. In the meantime, the loudmouth was being manhandled to his feet and shouting about how they couldn’t throw him out because he’d spent thousands of dollars on the tickets to get into the party. He called out to Sully and Pastor, presumably his two friends, to defend him, but no one did. In short order, he’d been hustled across the roof and through the access door. As soon as the door closed, Dietrich loosened and then released his grip, “You all right?”

“Yeah.” Max rubbed his shoulder. He’d been dimly aware of being punched in the back when crouched down, but the only pain he felt was where he’d tried to wrench himself free from Dietrich’s grip and strained his shoulder a little. “Yeah, is that it?”

Luba appeared at his elbow. “Do you want me to see if he came in with anyone and have them escorted off the premises?”

Max realized he was panting and forced himself to take a deep breath. With all the adrenaline coursing through him, what he really wanted at the moment was to punch someone again. Having experienced the high of doing so and avoided the consequences, he had to admit that punching somebody who deserved it felt really good - good enough that he could be magnanimous. He shook his head. “No - unless they cause any more trouble, they’re fine.”

“All right. If you don’t need me for anything else, I’d like to find out why Security let that situation escalate and didn’t take care of it then,” said Luba.

“And I’d like to talk to you downstairs, please,” said a woman’s voice over Max’s shoulder, clipped and even like she was forcing herself to be professional.

Max’s spine stiffened and he looked back over his shoulder. Ainsley stood there in an elegant black dress, arms crossed. He said, “Miss Davenport, I wasn’t expecting you until later this evening.”

“Everything I’m working on was in hurry-up-and-wait mode,” said Ainsley. “Meet me down in the conference room?”

“All right.” Max’s heart fell. He’d forgotten he wasn’t really the adult supervision here. The legal department was. Turning to Luba, he added, “Why don’t you bring Security down there too ... we’ll try to settle everything at once.”

He didn’t add that he might feel safer if Security were there than if he were alone with Ainsley. Instead, he let the lawyer lead him downstairs along what was probably the same route the loudmouth had taken. People were still standing and staring, trying to make sense of what was transpiring. Max did his best to not look like he was being perp-walked through his own home. As they walked, he realized he’d picked up quite an entourage. Paige and Dietrich had fallen in with them along with four uniformed security guards and one in plain clothes. Luba must have summoned Zola because she joined them halfway across the floor. In addition, a couple of Broadway people fell into step with them. By the time they reached the stairwell, it looked like an impromptu fire drill.

The loudmouth’s voice was still echoing up from downstairs, half-protesting he couldn’t be ejected, half-pleading that he would behave better if they let him stay. The ground-level door slammed, cutting off his words, but not his tone for the remainder of the walk down to two.

In the conference room, Max took a seat near the head of the table, but left the best seat for Ainsley, assuming she’d be running this impromptu meeting. Ainsley did the same and ended up sitting directly across from him. For a moment, it seemed like the meeting would be acephalic, but Zola, well-versed in preventing awkward social situations from remaining awkward took the empty chair. As everyone sat down, she said, “All right, who’d like to go first?”

Ainsley said, “I’d like to hear from Security, but first I’d like to remind everyone here that, should these matters wind up in court, what you say here is admissible, so please keep that in mind.”

In case Max thought she was talking to the Security team, she stared right at him as she spoke. Before Max could acknowledge her, Paige said, “In court? Do you think Max is going to be charged with something?”

“I’ll need to know what happened before I can answer that,” said Ainsley. “The purpose of this meeting is to give the legal department all of the information it needs in order to provide the best possible counsel to Mr. Whitford should there be any criminal or civil proceedings going forward.”

Max’s heart sank deeper into his stomach. He wanted to believe Ainsley was kidding, but she didn’t seem like the sort to arrange a massive prank on this scale. Although he did have to admit, the charade with Cricket on her first day had been pretty epic.

Charles from Security held up an iPad. “I have an initial incident report here if you’d all like to hear it.”

“Please,” said Ainsley.

Charles read off in a tone used by police in press conferences the world over. “At one forty-two PM, Dietrich Masterson-Stone informed a member of the security detail that a guest was visibly drunk and behaving obnoxiously towards female guests on the roof. Security assigned Robin Wilkins to evaluate this claim and Wilkins confirmed the behavior at one forty-nine and recommended increased visible presence around the subject in question and requested a level one background check. Wilkins was then instructed to remain in place and continue to observe the subject who Base reported was Jason Adams, a second-year associate employed at LKDS Capital Management, aged twenty-four. Adams pled nolo contendere to a drunk driving charge in 2011 and was sentenced to community service, but his record is otherwise clean. Over the next four hours approximate, Adams continued to show the described behavior intermittently and to consume alcohol at a steady pace of approximately two drinks an hour. At five fifty five, Adams approached the ninth woman we observed him speaking to and said something Wilkins couldn’t hear. The woman left speedily and Adams said something additional, also unintelligible, which caused the woman to return and engage in a more spirited discussion with Adams. At this time, Mr. Masterson-Stone became involved in the discussion. Wilkins reported that the situation had escalated and required additional attention. At that time, Agents Lopez, Rodriguez, Shah, and I were assigned to the roof in order to observe Mr. Adams and to provide assistance if a physical confrontation or a preemptive conversation was required.”

“What’s a preemptive conversation?” Ainsley plucked the phrase out of the wall of words and managed to slip her question in even though it wasn’t clear Charles had taken a breath once during his delivery.

“A preemptive conversation is where we believe a subject in a social situation is likely to become belligerent and engage that subject in conversation in an attempt to trigger an event under controlled circumstances if a de-escalation isn’t possible,” said Charles.

“Meaning that you see someone is itching for a fight and you try to get them to start that fight with a member of the security detail as a pretense for removing them from the situation?” Ainsley asked.

“Effectively, yes. If attention from Security doesn’t defuse the situation, we generally consider it unsalvageable unless we have special instructions.” Charles answered.

Ainsley shook her head and wrote something on her legal pad. “All right. Please continue.”

Charles nodded. “The situation remained tense, but entirely verbal until six-oh-three pm when Max Whitford joined the conversation and informed Mr. Adams he was no longer welcome on the premises. Adams responded by shoving Mr. Whitford at which point Mr. Whitford responded with a punch to Adams’s midsection. At that time, Security moved in to de-escalate the situation and escort Adams off the premises. Once we’d determined that the violence hadn’t spread and did not appear likely to do so, we left a minimal presence on the roof and reported here for sitrep. I don’t have a report of final disposition yet, so Mr. Adams may still be giving an exit interview to Base.”