Chapter 6 #3
“I gave up on that idea a long time ago,” she said.
“If I do, I want Cooper to help me with it. We work well together. He’s just wrapping a show now.
As soon as he finishes, I’ll talk to him about it.
Maybe the people we just signed with would want to hire us for production.
” She was an experienced producer. She had just never wanted the responsibility of a production house of her own.
“I can mention it to them, if you’re interested,” Robert said, thinking about how pleased Felicia would have been to know that her kids were excited about her work, and starting to get involved.
He had tried to push her toward that for years, and for a long time she’d thought they were too young, but they weren’t now.
They were just the right age to start their own ventures, some of them more than others. And Quinne was a very competent woman.
—
Veronica was carefully studying the contract Robert sent them that afternoon when Scott Freeman called her.
“I hear congratulations are in order. It sounds like a great deal for a series.” He sounded as encouraging and kind as ever. “I spoke to Robert.”
“I was just reading the contract. The terms really are complicated in these audiovisual deals. I signed up for a class this morning before Robert called. I need a refresher course to understand it thoroughly.”
“I’d be happy to go over it with you, if you want me to have a look,” he offered, and the idea was very appealing. “Do you want me to come by after work?”
“How about I meet you at the bar at the Saint Regis?” She knew it was near his office, and she was excited to talk to him and go over the contract with him.
She could have done it with Robert, but Scott had offered, and she enjoyed talking to him.
He was a lot younger and less serious than Robert, who was more like a grandfather to her.
Scott was closer to her own age, only five or six years older.
He had gone to Yale Law School and they had exchanged stories about their law school days.
But she felt awkward having him come to the apartment, particularly if Anson showed up unannounced.
He wouldn’t like her meeting Anson there at all.
“Does six work for you?” he asked her. “I’ll try to get out of here by then.
” He was excited to see her, and Veronica took the contract with her when she went to meet him.
She put her Columbia application in a desk drawer and locked it before she left the apartment.
She hadn’t heard from Anson since their unpleasant exchange the day before, and she didn’t expect to.
It seemed like he was still planning to punish her for a few days, and if he showed up, it would be later, although he wasn’t always easy to predict.
Scott was waiting for her at a corner table, when she got to the Saint Regis five minutes late.
Traffic had been heavy, and she’d taken a cab.
She was wearing black slacks and a striking red coat.
He saw her immediately when she walked in, and he stood up to greet her.
He was struck again by how beautiful she was.
Her cheeks were pink from the cold, and her eyes were bright.
Her dark hair was in a sleek bun, her red coat looked chic and expensive, and she had a large striking gold bangle on one arm that he remembered had been her mother’s.
The sisters had divided the jewelry up among them, without a problem, shortly before Christmas.
Veronica ordered white wine and he had a gin and tonic, and after they chatted for a few minutes, she took the contract out of her Hermès bag.
As he looked at it with her, their heads close together, he could smell her perfume.
It had a spicy, musky scent that was mysterious and sexy, and he loved being near her.
She had an aura of sophistication about her, faintly reminiscent of her mother’s, but in a more youthful style.
Scott hadn’t thought of Felicia as sexy, but he’d thought she was very beautiful, and Veronica was both.
“Does that make sense to you now?” he asked her about one of the deal points in the contract.
She said she wasn’t sure and he explained it to her again, and then she got it.
The contingencies, conditions, and percentages were complicated in audiovisual deals, as she was discovering.
“This isn’t my usual field of expertise either, but it’s more fun than tax structures,” he said.
They ordered another drink and Veronica was relaxed with him.
“Do you miss practicing law?” he asked her.
“I didn’t practice for very long. It was a conflict with the man I was involved with, and I quit in less than a year, and I haven’t practiced since.”
“That’s a big sacrifice to make for a man,” he commented.
“We’re still together, and he still feels the same way about it. He doesn’t want me to take the classes I mentioned at Columbia.” She said it in a simple, straightforward way without being critical of Anson, which caught Scott’s attention. She had a gentle way about her.
“And you signed up anyway?” Veronica nodded. “Is that an act of war?” he asked.
“It’s not intended to be. I think it’s important that I learn more about intellectual property law so I can help my sisters with our mother’s estate. I do have a law degree, after all.”
“It makes perfect sense to me,” Scott said simply, intrigued by the relationship she was in, if her boyfriend had required that she sacrifice her job. “Was it a conflict for him?”
“It could have been. He’s in politics, and his schedule is so crazy and unpredictable and he wants me to be readily available. One overburdened schedule is enough, and that would be his.”
“There aren’t a lot of women who would make a sacrifice like that today.”
“His job was a lot more important than mine, and is liable to become even more so. So I keep myself free, to be available to him.” It sounded excessive to Scott, and unfair to Veronica, but he didn’t want to pry.
He thought she was so fabulous that he couldn’t imagine any man asking her to give up so much.
She had a wonderful time talking to him, as she had before, and she was enjoying being at a chic bar with a smart, good-looking man close to her own age.
She hadn’t done that in a long time, and no one had asked her.
Veronica didn’t meet many single men. She didn’t have a job, and never went out without Anson.
He loved her to stay close to him when they went to big charitable or political events, where she always posed as his assistant, not a date.
Veronica and Scott were still talking animatedly when she saw that it was after eight. They’d finished their drinks, she had put the contract back in her purse, and she looked at Scott with regret.
“I hate to say it, but I should get home.” The way she said it caught his interest. She sounded sorry to leave.
“Same guy who made you give up your job?” he asked boldly, and she nodded.
“Same guy, ten years later. I try to stay available. He has a demanding schedule.”
“And you don’t mind being at his beck and call? Why is his schedule more important than yours?” Scott asked her pointedly, wondering what she would answer.
“I wasn’t voted into office. He has to keep his constituents happy, and I have to take second place to that.
” Scott didn’t know why but he had a vague suspicion that Veronica’s boyfriend was married.
And it struck him odd that ten years later they weren’t married, when any guy in his right mind would have grabbed her.
But he didn’t know her well enough to ask her, and he was glad to have seen her for a drink.
He had wanted to ask her to dinner spontaneously, but that was obviously not going to happen tonight.
He wondered if she dated other men, and if she was single by choice.
“I hope we can do this again,” he said hopefully, as he walked her out of the bar, proud to be with her. Heads turned as she walked by. And she turned to look at Scott regretfully then.
“This is kind of unusual for me. As I said, I try to keep my schedule pretty open for my friend, and I have a feeling he wouldn’t be comfortable with my having drinks with a single man.
He considers me his property.” It startled him when she said it.
It was a statement most women wouldn’t want to make.
“Are you serious?” She nodded. “And you don’t mind?”
“Not really. It’s not as harsh as it sounds.
He’s possessive about me, and he has a busy life, and I have to fit in.
He’s older than I am, so some of his ideas are a little old-school.
” Listening to her, Scott was even more certain that the man in her life was married, no matter how elegantly she expressed it.
To Scott she sounded like a woman under submission to a selfish, domineering man.
By what right did he dictate the terms of her existence, who she had drinks with, and cause her to give up a job for which she had spent three years in law school and passed the bar?
Scott wondered how her mother had felt about it.
Felicia had had very modern ideas about women, that they should have equality and freedom.
Veronica didn’t sound either equal or free to him, and he was sorry to hear it, for her sake as well as his own.
“Let’s see if we can find a time to get together that fits with his schedule,” Scott said to her, as the doorman hailed a cab for her.
“Maybe I’ll get lucky,” he said, standing close to her and looking her in the eye, and it made her nervous for a moment, and then she realized she liked it, and smiled at him.
“I had a very nice time, and I think Robert got you all a great deal.”
“I’m happy to hear it,” Veronica said.
“And good luck in school. When do you start classes?”
“In three weeks,” she said, her smile growing wider.
“Call me if I can do anything to help. Take care of yourself, Veronica. I’m only a phone call away if there’s anything you need.
” He would have liked to kiss her cheek, but decided it was too forward, and might cause her concern about her boyfriend.
Scott felt pulled toward her like a magnet, if only so he could get a closer scent of her perfume.
He didn’t kiss her, and she slipped into the cab, and waved as they drove away, and he stood looking after her from the sidewalk.
She was an enthralling woman, and he envied her strangely controlling boyfriend, and wondered why she put up with it.
He felt certain the guy didn’t deserve her.
In the cab on the way home, Veronica felt nervous and guilty.
There was something so strong, masculine, and appealing about Scott, and he was so intelligent to talk to, that she felt faintly unfaithful to Anson just being there.
Even more so because she had enjoyed it.
Her motive in seeing Scott had been innocent, but somehow as the evening progressed, it had become personal, and it was a heady experience just being with him.
She knew she shouldn’t do it again. Anson would have a fit if he found out about it.
She had committed other crimes recently, inheriting from her mother, spending time with her sisters at the farm they had inherited and the holidays with them, and not being miserable and alone while Anson shared the holidays with his wife and family as he always did.
Signing up for a class at Columbia was a major crime she would be severely punished for.
Veronica didn’t hear from Anson that night, and she found herself thinking about Scott and remembering things he had said that had interested or amused her.
Anson didn’t call or text her, and she knew she was still being punished.
Now she had another crime to add to the list, although she wouldn’t tell him.
Cocktails at a fashionable place with an attractive single man who wanted to see her again.
No matter how appealing the idea was, she knew that it wasn’t possible, but it had been fun, and she’d had a very good time with him.
It was better than sitting at home alone night after night, waiting for Anson to show up and forgive her for the ordinary pleasures he would consider crimes which even she knew weren’t.