Chapter 9
Robert Farr called Quinne on Monday morning.
She had been confirmed as one of the executive producers of the show, and they were offering Cooper an audition for the part they had for him.
It was big news for Quinne and Coop, and they were ecstatic at the news.
Quinne called the others to tell them, and they were happy for her.
She reached all of her sisters except Olivia, who was at a doctor’s appointment and couldn’t pick up.
She was having a sonogram that morning, and a pelvic exam by her gynecologist afterward, and the doctor told her that as far as she could see structurally, there was no reason why she couldn’t conceive and have a healthy pregnancy.
They had taken blood to check her hormone levels.
She was thirty-seven, so her age could be an issue.
“If we have any doubts, we can run tests using dye to check your fallopian tubes, but your periods are regular and you have a very straightforward gynecological history. Do you have a sperm donor in mind? If your numbers are good, we can still use your eggs. Or if we need to, we can use a donor egg. Yours should be fine, if your hormone levels are in normal range.”
“I don’t have a sperm donor yet,” Olivia said, trying not to get too excited, but it was all good news so far. And her thought of having a baby suddenly seemed real.
“The trauma from the accident affected your spinal cord, but not your reproductive organs.” The doctor wrote down the name of the sperm bank she recommended and preferred to work with, and handed Olivia the paper with the name.
“You should be able to carry a baby to term without a problem. I assume you’ll have help with the baby. ”
“Of course.”
“We won’t need to do IVF, in vitro fertilization, if your hormone levels are in normal range.
In that case, we would do IUI, intrauterine insemination, which is much simpler.
We can use IUI fertilization, it’s an easy process, and if your hormone levels are good, there won’t be hormones involved.
It’s a simple procedure. Let us know when you want to get started.
You should have a baby in your arms within a year.
” She smiled at Olivia, who left a few minutes later, feeling excited and hopeful.
She took a cab to her mother’s apartment, where Veronica and Isabelle were waiting for her.
They had already gotten started taking their mother’s clothes out of the closet, and Olivia’s heart ached when she saw familiar things she recognized.
She saw the dress her mother had been wearing the last time she saw her alive, which brought tears to her eyes.
“Sorry I’m late. I had an appointment.”
“No worries,” Isabelle said. She looked better after the weekend than she had when she arrived at the farm, and she’d had a nice evening with the children the night before.
“Was everything okay when you got home?” Olivia asked Veronica, as they continued to take clothes out of the closet and lay them on the bed.
“Anson had been waiting for me for four hours. He wasn’t pleased. He came back early from D.C. I told him I was with you all weekend, and he asked me if I’ve been cheating on him. I think he’s suspicious about the farm and why we keep going there.”
“Why don’t you take him to see it?” Isabelle suggested, and it was hard for Veronica to explain why she didn’t think it was a good idea.
It was much bigger and more substantial than he expected, and Veronica still hadn’t told him about the inheritance and all that their mother had left them.
Veronica had the feeling that he would be threatened by the fortune she had been left as her share.
In some ways, it changed the balance of power between them.
He had sensed it, but he didn’t know for sure.
Seeing the property in Connecticut put Veronica in a whole different league in his eyes.
He wanted her dependent on him and what he gave her, not independently wealthy.
She didn’t want to explain it to her sisters.
There was nothing equal about her relationship with Anson.
All the power was in his hands, not evenly divided between them. This relationship had never been equal.
It was a painful process packing their mother’s things into boxes.
Her papers were all in good order. She had neat stacks of manuscripts in file cabinets in her well-organized office.
It was a small apartment in perfect order, and many of her papers were at the farm, where she had a large storeroom full of file cabinets.
What she had at the apartment were mostly old manuscripts and documents, and albums of her daughters’ childhood, and a mountain of books.
There were framed photographs of the family on every surface, and Olivia wrapped them carefully to send to the farm.
Felicia’s more valuable paintings were at the farm, but there were some others that were sentimental for the sisters.
The kitchen equipment was old and they decided to donate it.
The decisions were easy, but the emotions were raw.
They were glad they were doing it together, and it was strange now to see the apartment where they had visited Felicia.
It looked tiny compared to the farm. The apartment was such a small piece of her life, but all they had known as her home while she was alive.
They finished in a day, and had divided everything between donations and cartons marked for the farm, and some specific boxes marked for each of them, with their childhood photo albums. They texted photographs to Quinne and Charlotte of things they weren’t sure about, some lamps, a number of Baccarat vases since Felicia had always had fresh flowers around the apartment.
It went faster than expected with three of them working.
They kept some of her dresses and coats, but donated most of her clothes.
They were finished by four o’clock. It was an entire life divided into some boxes, and they were quiet when they left.
It was a sad task, but it had to be done, and they notified the building that the apartment would be vacant by the end of the week.
They left together, and took separate cabs to their homes.
Veronica had kept her cellphone in her pocket all day in case Anson called her, but he didn’t.
She guessed she wouldn’t hear from him for a while, after not being there the day before, which he considered a capital offense.
Her cellphone rang as she walked into her apartment.
But it wasn’t Anson, it was Scott Freeman. She was surprised to hear from him.
“How are the classes going?” he asked her.
“Great. I’m getting decent grades so far.”
“I’m not surprised. I’ve got the signature copies of the streaming contract from Robert.
Would you like to go over them with me? It might be a good exercise for you.
They’ve added some interesting clauses. Or I can just send them to you, if you don’t have time.
” But it sounded like fun to look at the contract with him, and Veronica responded spontaneously.
“I’d like that.”
“Do you want to come to the office tomorrow? We could have lunch, and check the contract then.”
“Sure.” She said she’d meet Scott at his office, and as soon as she hung up, she realized that if Anson called her or showed up, he wouldn’t like her going over contracts with Scott, but she wanted to learn what complex contracts like that looked like.
She felt torn, and she didn’t want to risk angering Anson again.
She thought about canceling the appointment, but she didn’t want to, and the next morning she told herself that it wasn’t a big deal, and Anson was busy at the office and unlikely to show up for lunch because he was still punishing her.
She wore slacks and a red sweater and a matching red coat, and boots, and appeared at Scott’s office on time.
He was wearing a suit and tie, and had her sit next to him at his desk to go over the key points in the contract that he wanted to show her.
He leaned close to her while they worked, and it was fun going over the contracts with him.
He showed her what to look out for and where they could get tricky.
They worked for an hour, and then he stood up and she walked around his desk.
He had noticed her perfume again when he sat next to her, and he had to force himself to concentrate on the documents.
He could feel an electric current pass between them.
Something happened every time he was near her, and he was pretending not to notice, but as she tucked her hand into his arm and they walked to the restaurant nearby, he was excited to be with her.
He talked about his family at lunch and made her laugh.
He was from L.A. and had gone to UCLA, and to law school at NYU, and stayed in New York after that.
He was twelve years older than she was and didn’t look it.
He was boyish and athletic, and they discovered that they were both avid skiers and loved to play tennis.
He had to keep reminding himself that it wasn’t a date, she was a client and had a serious boyfriend, but somehow it didn’t matter, he was so attracted to her that he had to keep telling himself that the best that could ever happen would be that they could be friends.
He talked about her mother and how much he had liked and admired her, and how proud she was that Veronica was a lawyer and had graduated magna cum laude.
“And then I threw it all away,” she interrupted him. “It took her a long time to forgive me. She was furious.”
“Why did you give it up?” He was curious and wanted to know everything about her.