Chapter Thirty-Seven
The fashion and style magazines screamed with new headlines: Super Sarah makes her triumphant return! Copies flew from grocery store racks and subscriptions skyrocketed.
Yancy from Starstruck Magazine wrote: Can you believe it, between modeling gigs, Sarah Lang is now living as a country bumpkin?
She can wrangle horses and rope cattle better than any old cowhand.
How an elegant, cultured woman, an elite supermodel, could be happy in such a backward place is anyone’s guess.
Because, ladies and gentlemen, guess what? She is!
Requests for interviews and articles chronicling her life poured in. A major New York publishing imprint offered a contract for her memoir. Her agent became overwhelmed with offers for her: sunglasses, swimwear, evening gowns. A major rock band wanted her in their music video.
Sarah flew to New York and set to work with a single-mindedness and determination she’d never possessed. On this breezy summer afternoon, she stood with her agent outside Grand Central Station, the bustle of New Yorkers all around them.
“Please, darling,” Patrick fretted as he stood in front of her, “just sign a few more contracts.” He wore his customary neck scarf, its red ribbon-like ends flitting in the wind.
He entreated her with his palms clasped.
“Just give me an additional month. Or two. We can do so much in that time. Remember the Chanel handbag, The Sarah? Let’s accept that deal, at least. Then, you can go back to” —he shuddered in revulsion— “your farm in Wyoming.”
“Ranch,” Sarah corrected. “In Montana. And no, I’ve told you every day.
I’m leaving at the end of the week and that’s it.
No sunglasses. No swimwear. No memoir.” In Mountain Wood, Ben was getting ready to close escrow on Old Man Turner’s land.
She smiled to herself. She couldn’t get back to him soon enough.
Standing on the corner of 42nd Street and Park Avenue, with Grand Central Station rising up majestically behind her, Sarah waited on her mark.
The enormous facade featured impressive granite architecture, and was topped by the Glory of Commerce, a sculptural group featuring Hercules, Minerva, and Mercury.
The filming company had chosen the spot carefully and obtained permits to temporarily cordon it off.
Members of the public stood behind the barriers, ogling the goings-on.
The shoot for her perfume promotion was fraught with nothing but problems. People kept yelling to her, cries of “Super Sarah, welcome back!” filling the air, interfering with Sound. The skies clouded over when Lighting needed sun. Even the traffic wasn’t cooperating, backing up for half a mile.
Through it all, Sarah kept her serenity. Because soon, she’d be winging her way back home. To Ben. Her fiancé.
Hair and makeup people flitted around her while the producer anxiously stood nearby.
She wore an emerald green suit perfectly matching her eyes, impossibly tall spiky heels, and her hair was done in an elegant chignon.
Her suit opened at the front, the low-cut ivory blouse revealing deep cleavage.
She appeared to be a top-level executive, headed off for a sexy rendezvous.
The set crew scurried around. Finally, everything was in order. The director said, “Action.”
Taking her cue, Sarah walked toward the station. Behind her, she pulled a rolling designer suitcase. In her hand she carried a curved perfume bottle.
As she walked, she gazed into the following camera, gave it a sultry smile.
The skin of her face and cleavage glowed.
“Fly the friendly skies?” She nodded at the train station entrance.
“Not for me, gentlemen. There comes a time in every woman’s life .
.. to travel a different way.” Closing her eyes as though in ecstasy, she tilted her head back and spritzed the perfume onto her neck.
“Only then can she find the essence of love.” Holding the bottle for the camera, she waited for it to zoom in. In curling script, it read: Essence.
The camera panned to an impossibly handsome man with a square jaw and piercing eyes. He wore a dark business suit. The male model held out a hand to her and she placed her palm in his. He smiled, then led her away.
With a final glance over her shoulder, she said, “Find your essence.”
The message was clear: buy the perfume, and you, too, can be beautiful, win a handsome lover, and travel to exotic places!
“Cut!” the director yelled.
****
At the end of the week, much to her agent’s chagrin, Sarah returned to the ranch. Ben was in town signing papers, so their reunion would have to wait another hour until he got back. She itched to see him.
On the front porch, cracking walnuts and uttering low verbalizations, sat Big Jim. Taking a closer listen, she realized he was humming.
Big Jim was humming?
“Hi, Dad,” she said, dropping her suitcase and giving his cheek a kiss.
“Welcome back, honey. How was New York?” He gave her a wide grin.
His attitude was so different from when she’d left and he’d been so cranky, she felt a new suspicion.
“It was good, Dad. I filmed a perfume commercial.” She took a chair and started fishing. “So ... anything happen here while I was gone?” She filched a few of his nuts.
“Nope.” He cracked a new walnut and popped it into his mouth.
“Nothing at all?”
“Not a thing.” He happily continued his cracking.
Giving up on him but not the subject, she had a new idea, one that might prove more productive. “Think I’ll head down to the barn, see my chicks.”
He waved her off and she went in search of Willie.
She found him mucking out her gelding’s stall.
“Hey, Willie.” She patted the gelding’s neck and it snuffled her arm.
“Miss Sarah!” Willie set aside his shovel and wiped his hands on his jeans. “Glad you’re home. We missed you.”
“Awe, you’re sweet. I’ll be home for a few months now. But I have a question for you. When I left last week, my dad was really grumpy. Today he seems happy as a lark. What’s going on?”
Willie’s expression became knowing. They left the stall and he latched the door. “Could be Miss Milly, that’s what.”
Interesting.
“Is that right?” At the chicken coop she looked through the wire and checked to see if the feeder was full. She’d been so busy in recent days she hadn’t had a chance to talk to Milly. She asked, “What about her?”
“Jim asked her out, is all. I know, because one of her waitresses told me the next day. So far, they’ve been on three dates.”
“Three dates in a week!” She was thrilled. Somehow, Big Jim had figured out how to get out of his own way. Would wonders never cease!
“Yup. Ever since, his step has been pretty light.” Willie filled the chicks’ water basin.
“I can imagine,” Sarah said, feeling incredibly gratified. She grinned to herself. This was perfect. “I can imagine.”