Chapter Forty
The Boom Boom Room is filled with the usual glitterati: the starlets, the star-makers, and the star-fuckers. Everyone’s turned out to celebrate Gruff magazine’s “Hot” issue, and its latest cover girl, Bette Noire.
Mallory watches the scene from a banquette in the farthest corner of the room.
She’s dressed in a vintage crimson Azzedine Ala?a dress, her red hair long and loose, her only jewelry the Elsa Peretti heart necklace.
When she walked into the room, photographers actually moved people aside to get shots of her.
The new issue of the magazine is fanned out on every tabletop, showing off the cover featuring Bette vamping it up in a black bustier underneath the headline “Girls! Glitter! Glam! Behind the Velvet Curtain of New York Burlesque.” Alec’s byline is prominent.
She’s proud of him. The article is already generating a lot of buzz.
“Where’s our cover girl?” Billy Barton says, looming above her in a white tuxedo. “Is she going to be a no-show?”
Mallory shrugs. She doesn’t know. And even if she did, she wouldn’t tell him; she hasn’t entirely forgiven him for ratting her out to Alec about the Baxter party.
“Maybe I picked the wrong cover girl,” he says.
“Everyone in the room is asking who you are. Except for the ones who were at the Baxter party—they need no reminder who the gorgeous redhead is. And now I have to explain why you’re not even mentioned in the article.
You single-handedly made this piece out-of-date, you lovely bitch. ”
“That’s sweet, Billy,” Mallory says, rolling her eyes. “But we both know you got the exact right girl at the exact right moment. The whole world is talking about Bette and Zebra.”
“Isn’t it glorious? I couldn’t have planned it better myself. Oh—there’s Ms. Poppy LaRue. And who is that dowdy creature with her? She’s bringing down the entire room’s aesthetic.”
Mallory turns to look, and there’s Poppy making an entrance with Patricia Loomis.
Of all the things that had transpired over the past few months, their coupledom might be the most incredible turn of events. They both tried to make her life miserable, and in the end, they’d done her a favor—and found each other.
“I’d better steer clear,” Billy says. “She’s still furious with me for not putting her on the cover.”
“Why would she expect to be on the cover?”
“Um, it’s a long story. Now you must excuse me, love.” Billy beelines it over to a muscular young guy she recognizes from a recent action movie.
Her phone buzzes. It’s Bette.
Not going to make it. Apologies all around! On my way to Paris with Z. Don’t be a stranger. Xoxo Bette
“Hey,” Alec says, startling her. She looks up and smiles.
“Just got a text from Bette,” she says. “She’s not going to make it tonight.”
“Billy will be disappointed.”
“I think he’ll survive,” she says, nodding in the direction of Billy with his arm around Mr. Hardbody.
She slides out of the booth and Alec takes her by the hand.
“I have to make a quick trip to the ladies’ room.” As soon as she says the words, she has visions of him pressing her up against the wall of glass. “Why don’t you join me?”
He waits a beat, trying to see if she’s serious.
“I’d love to,” he says with a wink. “Let’s give the whole city a show they won’t forget.”
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