Trophies, page 25
This time, Marion had no alcohol in her system to buffer the shock-horror-heartbreak and the first yip bent her in half. She stared at Tawnee’s (shapely, tight-skinned) knees and fought it, managing to whisper, “Donna Karan doesn’t make sizes for hyenas. What have you done with my husband?”
“Oh, he’sss ssstill wiped out in bed. We were at it until three. He knowsss all about you and your boyfriend.”
“What boyfriend?”
“The bedroom out here isss ssso cute. Did you get that curtain fabric from Diamond Foam on La Bre-a? They have the bessst dissscountsss!”
“Richard!” Marion yelled through her pain. “Richard!”
She started to push past Tawnee into the guesthouse, but the masseuse shot out the heel of her hand, hard, catching Marion square in the chest and sending her stumbling backward, almost off the porch.
“No can do, psssycho,” Tawnee singsonged. “Richie’sss only talking to you through his lawyer. Oh, here’sss the ressst of my ssstuff!”
Marion turned to see that Charlie, the daytime security guard, was trudging up the path to the guesthouse lugging three mismatched suitcases and a Wet Seal shopping bag full of stuffed animals.
That’s when the second yip hit.
Marion forced herself upright and stared incredulously at her guard as he stepped onto the porch.
“Charlie?! What the fuck?!”
“’Scuse me, Mrs. Zane.”
Charlie kept his head down and maneuvered the luggage past Marion, into the guesthouse.
“RI-CHARD!” Marion screamed into the guesthouse. “RICHARD, IT’S A LIE! THERE’S NO BOYFRIEND! RI-CHARD!”
The bedroom door remained closed.
“Shhh! Keep it down, psssycho!” Tawnee winced at the decibel level of Marion’s shouting. “Like, go ssscream in your quiet room, or sssomething. SSSome of usss haven’t lost our hearing yet.”
“Fuck off!” Marion grated, cracking a vicious backhand across the hypersibilant’s mouth.
Tawnee rocked back but she was braced in the doorway and stayed on her feet. She leveled her gaze at Marion, licked her lips, and broke into a cruelly triumphant smile. “Eat me, Mrsss. Zane. Whoopsss! I forgot! Your husssband already did!”
Marion managed to come away with two handfuls of brown-rooted, overprocessed bronze hair and a Lanvin sleeve before Charlie separated them and barred the door himself.
There was a reason why there was only one security guard to watch over the Zane compound in daytime. Charlie was taller than the guesthouse door and now, with his arms outstretched, looked like a crucified Paul Bunyan. Under one of his tree-trunk arms, Marion had a full view of Tawnee, standing upright and clutching her now-patchy scalp. And just where was Richard-the-coward-hearted?
“I told you ssshe’d go psssycho! Oh, my God! I’m bleed-ing!” Tawnee squealed.
“Why don’t you go back into the house, Mrs. Zane,” said Charlie, in an utterly calm monotone, characteristic of behemoths. (Although, from the look on his face, Marion could see he was secretly digging the catfight.)
“Why don’t you throw that piece of shit out in the gutter where she belongs!” Marion yelled back.
“Ow-oww! Ow-oww!” Tawnee howled.
Charlie stared at his shoes. “Sorry. I, um, ride for the brand. Mr. Zane gave instructions that any messages you have for him should go through his divorce lawyer…”
That’s when the third yip hit, with predictable results.
The result in question was the same as it was the time she’d had to give that speech back in high school. When she found out that the boy to whom she’d given her virginity had only boinked her on a bet.
So forceful was the trajectory of the vomit Marion emitted that it shot cleanly under Charlie’s arm and landed in Tawnee’s gaping mouth.
Marion didn’t stick around to savor the aftermath.
42
Giving Up the Ghost
Marion’s legs and feet were doing the thinking now. Unfortunately, they couldn’t see and she fled blindly, almost out onto Foothill, before she turned around. By the time she reached the service driveway, both heels of her Jimmy Choos had broken off and she tumbled across the gravel and banged her head into the kitchen door. She sat there, on the sharp little stones, thinking about the sharp little dents they were putting on the backs of her thighs but not wanting to get up because she had no idea where she was running to. So she dazedly reviewed her morning while removing her ruined fuck-me shoes:
Worked out. Found Richard’s note. Cleared the books until three. Arranged for Zephyr to take hospital donor lunch by herself. Got gussied up. Met Richard’s slut. Learned he’s got a divorce lawyer. Yipped. Ran like hell.
Oh yeah. Now she remembered where she was running.
Marion got to her feet, kicked open the kitchen door, and laid rubber across the marble checkerboard floor, then took the tower’s spiral service stairs in a leap.
As she neared the second-floor landing, Marion launched into an impromptu tête-à-tête with Gilda-the-ghost:
Okay, I get it! I get it! You weren’t pushed! You walked in on Rutherford and the Italian! And you made them pay for it with a swan dive! You could have at least WARNED MY ASS that the same thing was about to happen to me! You could have at least said something: look out…watch your back. If we were sharing the same fate, you could have at least told me what to do…
Nothing. It figured. Marion reached the second floor but kept climbing.
Don’t bother now. I know the routine.
Marion tore off her Donna Karan sheath and watched it fall down the center of the tower.
Easy revenge, right? It’ll fuck them up for the rest of their lives.
And then she climbed higher.
Richard will be racked with crippling guilt and everyone will suspect him of murder.
Marion tore off her stockings and let them fall.
The invitations will dry up. (Not at first, because an infamous guest is a dinner-table stimulant.) Maybe it’ll start with Richard’s name getting “accidentally dropped” from the list for Vanity Fair’s Oscar Night at Morton’s. (Graydon is my friend!)
Marion tore off her garter belt and let it fall.
David Geffen’s boat will be “accidentally” full. (My friend, again!)
And then she climbed higher.
Marion tore off her bra and let it fall.
Maya and Tom will be “too busy” to make Zane premieres. (Totally, absolutely, mine!)
And then she climbed higher still.
The left side tables at Chow’s will be “pre-reserved.” (My turf!) Crustacean will be completely full. And Georgio’s in the canyon won’t even take your call.
Marion, after a quick check at her wax job, stepped out of her G-string and let it fall.
And then she climbed even higher.
Then the politicians won’t join him for photographs, his business contacts will stop doing public meal meetings, his tennis foursome will switch courts, and one by one his friends will drop away because he’s turned into a boorish, maudlin, sloppy alcoholic! Eventually, the only people left on this earth who will welcome Richard Zane’s sorry carcass will be O. J. Simpson and the state of Idaho!
Marion opened the cupola hatch window.
And at last, when his calendar has cobwebs and his liver’s the size of an Olsen-twin tote, he’ll croak. Just like Rutherford!
Marion climbed out onto the tiny balcony.
She’d never been out here before. It felt invigorating. And she could get a look at the neighbors’ remodeling of the back of their house, at last. Looking down, she was glad she’d torn out the reflecting pond and replaced it with sod. No algae-covered corpses in her backyard.
From her high-altitude vantage point, the guesthouse looked to be quiet. Richard and Tawnee-of-the-Valley were probably inside, fucking and bleeding. She didn’t want to imagine.
And Charlie was back in the guardhouse. Marion could only see his hands through the guardhouse window, but they were the size of Birkin bags and unmistakable.
Hmm. The guardhouse had no view of the guesthouse or cupola. All the cameras were focused on the compound perimeters.
All she had to do was wait a few minutes. Until enough time had passed for Richard and/or Tawnee to sneak into the house, push her off the roof, and sneak back.
Even a mediocre prosecutor would force Charlie to testify that he’d had no idea what Richard and the slut did after he left them alone.
Marion felt a tickle on her hand and found that a wad of Tawnee’s hair and a shirt button with thread from Richard’s shirt were caught in her eleven-carat cushion-cut D-color flawless Key to the Kingdom. She laughed as she pulled the wad off and stripped bits around the little cupola-balcony floor.
Oh, this is too easy, Gilda! A little DNA here, a little incriminating evidence there!
Marion stepped up onto the low, fat balcony wall. Exactly where the no-doubt-distraught Gilda had once stood.
AAAND JUMP!
Marion felt a sudden rushing of wind around her body and the weirdest feeling of someone holding her hand and she knew that Gilda was with her. Just behind the veil…
But she stayed on the balcony wall.
Marion eased the pounding of her heart with several shallow gulps of air. Then she wiped away the mascara runs under her eyes and refluffed her hair. With one hand on her hip, she assumed a self-possessed stance and addressed the vibrating air in front of her.
“Gilda, Gilda, Gilda. There’s only one problem with our fate-sharing scenario. Unlike you, I’m not a first wife. Richard left his first wife for me! I didn’t have a period of dating, then courtship, then wedding bells with stars in my eyes. Love didn’t come knocking at my door. I had to cheat and scheme and steal my way into love! And I used my wits to keep it! Because I am a STAGE III TROPHY! I am a SURVIVOR! AND I have no PRENUPTIAL! So you can keep your little brokenhearted suicide and kiss my bulletproof ass! I’ve got options.”
Marion stepped down onto the balcony, opened the cupola hatch, and climbed inside.
Moments later, Xiocena was hysterically rushing up the spiral staircase. Marion padded down and flung herself into her arms.
“Madre de Dios!” the housekeeper cried. “Madre de Dios! I see the whore at the guesthouse! I look for you and I see the clothes! And the window is open! And the ghost of that girl!”
Marion jerked back. “You saw Gilda?”
“Many times,” Xiocena said through her tears. “All of us see…Jeff, Mr. Ivan, Carl—”
“Surely not Roger! He doesn’t even believe…”
Xiocena shrugged apologetically, then took Marion’s face in her hands. “I so scared! I thought you join her!”
Marion smiled at her friend. “No fucking way. I’ve got a hospital to build…and a husband to rescue.”
After they’d cried and hugged a bit longer, they linked arms and headed back down toward the second floor.
“You need clothes,” Xiocena observed.
Marion looked down at herself and nodded. Then she looked up at the cupola window. “And the Louis Vuitton luggage set. I can’t stay here.”
43
War Is Hell
Night fell on the grim figure of Marion-at-War and she turned on the light in her war room (the living room of a two-bedroom private-entrance bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel) then called room service for a pitcher of margaritas before reviewing her theaters of operation.
On the Legal Front:
Richard had made his first crucial mistake when he contacted the legendary legal legion of Newberg, Fligstein, Sacks & a-million-other-partners-names-and-associates at the time that the Pinky scandal broke. What kind of Trophy did he think she was?
Marion already had NFS & etc. on retainer before “Never-Happened Night.”
She’d had them on retainer—and their Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, and Dallas offices on speed dial—since the day she and Richard were married.
Over the years, her payments to NFS & etc. had been funneled through Patti Fink, who forwarded the payments to NFS & etc. in untraceable cash. Richard’s accountants thought they were paybacks for lousy luck on Girl Poker Night. Trophies all over the Westside had been known to suffer similar losing streaks in Girl Poker. You’d think the guys would catch on.
Up until today, Richard thought NFS & etc. was merely “too overextended to represent him in a divorce.”
He had settled on Frank Greene and a-million-other-partners-and-associates for representation. He had confidence in his lawyer and was relieved to learn that Marion hadn’t hired Frank first. Zane corporate lawyers were meeting tomorrow with Frank to begin to compile an assessment of Richard’s net worth.
Frank’s firm’s nickname around the Westside was “The Tough Guys.”
NFS & etc.’s nickname around the world was “The Keyser Sozes.”
One button on the speed dial and all three senior partners sprang into action, as co-generals in Marion’s war, deploying a battalion of etcetera partners and associates from four different offices in rapid response. Three of the etceteras took the NFS & etc. G-5 to Switzerland.
Seven took the other to the Caymans.
At noon, Horton Newberg showed up on her war-room doorstep and handed her a sack containing a Diet Coke, a chopped salad from the Palm, and a red velvet cupcake from Sprinkles.
“It’s best you eat now,” he said.
At twelve-fifteen, Simon Sacks and Bucky (really!) Fligstein arrived with an armed guard handcuffed to a titanium-lined briefcase containing a forty-gigabyte Jaz drive with listings of every single asset that bore the Zane name and thousands of pages of supporting documents and Excel files.
Horton, Bucky, and Simon never left Marion’s side the entire time she reviewed the information on her Tulip E-Go Diamond laptop. NFS & etc. had been following the intricacies of Zane income for twenty years. Hope that the Zane marriage might still hit the rocks had caused Simon Sacks to postpone his retirement. This was the firm’s mother-lode day. They were prepared.
At one-fifteen, while they were going over the file on stocks and bonds, Marion detected a tiny joyful tear in Simon Sacks’s eye.
At one-thirty, she stopped checking eyes because she was too busy becoming acquainted with her Chinese profit-sharing deal.
By two, she learned she had stock in Google, and at four, she found out she actually owned swampland in Florida. (Maya would be horrified!)
At 4:20, they were nearly finished, leaving Marion breathlessly aware of thirty-two Zane-owned accounts, investments, and properties she never knew existed. (But her lawyers did. They’d known all along.)
Then they reviewed the final Jaz file. It contained three estimated Excel-based projections of Richard’s future earnings—ten, fifteen, and twenty years into the future. (At this point she saw Bucky part his lips in sublime bliss and discreetly move a legal pad over his lap; she knew he had a boner.)
At five, they finished and the three senior partners of NFS & etc. packed up the briefcase, reattached it to the armed guard, and left. Marion-at-War stood up in wonder. She now realized that she had awesome power, power beyond her wildest imaginings.
She could go almost five hours without taking a pee.
She also realized she was even richer than she’d thought.
And she also realized Richard didn’t have a prayer.
On the Who’s “Fucking Us Over?” Front:
Marion-at-War’s covert intelligence operatives (planted Zane-office secretaries and a few other strategically placed folks on her take) were able to secure the phone number of a private detective Richard had contacted the previous week. The number had been disconnected. No great surprise, considering the phony name “D. [as in Dr.] Watson!” He had to be the one pulling the “boyfriend” ruse; Tawnee herself wasn’t smart enough to pull toilet paper off the bottom of her shoe. Marion prayed that her private detectives would track him down soon.
Historically, journalists would rather face jail time than reveal their sources, but Marion doubted that the ethic was as strong with gossip columnists. Her five-thousand-dollar-a-day private detectives were trying to get some dirt on Joey Stern, the editor of the industry cheat sheet, to trade for the Pinky source. If that didn’t work, they’d set him up with a girl. If that didn’t work, they’d try bribing a different employee of the rag. And if that didn’t work, Marion planned to start dating one of the investigative team in order to recoup her investment.
On the Assistant Front:
Marion knew it was cruel and selfish and demanding to ask her most valued employee—who hadn’t had a break for friggin’ fifteen years—to cut short his much-needed dream vacation on shut-up island, but this was a friggin’ crisis and she was a Stage III Trophy. Self-preservation was not only in her blood, at times like this it was a primal reflex. And she was, after all, at war. She wanted her Ivan and she wanted him now. The problem was that when she tried to call, Ivan’s cell wasn’t picking up. Marion pictured the cell phone locked away in a monastery strongbox. Well, she reasoned, the monastery had to have a phone of its own. What if they needed medical attention for one of their guests? Or a pizza? She hated to pull a detective off the Who’s Fucking Us Over? Front, but if she still got no answer tomorrow…Now that she thought about it, she was surprised to realize that Ivan had been gone so long without giving in to the urge to check in on them. Surely, he still had that urge. Right? Right? Surely he wouldn’t go native!…Where was that pitcher of margaritas?
On the Public Front:
There was an old saying that living well was the best revenge. Marion believed that living well was also the best defense. Nothing would piss Richard and his lawyers off more than if she continued to roll merrily along, attending social functions as if nothing had happened. After all, this was L.A. Even half the Zane fortune dwarfed most of those in town. Her invitations were secure.
On the Friend Front:
It was only a matter of breaking selected news to a selected few. She’d do that tomorrow at their hospital fund-raising strategy lunch. Somehow.
