Glitter Baby (Wynette, Texas #3)(84)

Everything stopped like a damaged frame of film frozen in a movie projector. He wore an antique purple satin bowling shirt and a pair of loosely cut wool trousers held up by suspenders. At twenty-three, he wasn’t much taller than he’d been the last time she’d seen him, maybe five feet, seven inches. He had shiny blond hair that fell in long waves level with his chin, a set of narrow shoulders, a small chest, and delicately carved features.

Gradually Kissy realized that something was wrong. “Do you two know each other?”

Michael Anton nodded. Fleur reached deep inside her. “This is one of your better moments, Kissy,” she said, as lightly as she could manage. “Michael is my brother Michel.”

“Oh boy.” Kissy’s gaze flicked from one to the other. “Should I play some organ music or something?”

Michel shoved one hand into the pocket of his trousers and leaned against the door. “How about a few notes on the kazoo?”

He carried himself with the languid grace of old money and the assurance of someone born with an aristocratic bloodline. Just like Alexi. But as he gazed at her, she saw eyes as blue as spring hyacinths.

She curled stiff fingers around her purse. “Did you know I was in New York?”

“I knew.”

She couldn’t stand there with him any longer. “I have to go.” She gave Kissy a quick peck on the cheek and left the dressing room without so much as a nod in his direction.

Kissy caught up with her on the street. “Fleur! Wait! I had no idea.”

She faked a smile. “Don’t worry about it. It was just a shock, that’s all.”

“Michael is…He’s really a terrific guy.”

“That’s…great.” She spotted a cab and stepped out from the curb to hail it. “Go to your cast party, Magnolia, and make them all bow when you come in the room.”

“I think I’d better go home with you.”

“Not on your life. This is your big night, and you’re going to enjoy every minute.” She climbed into the cab, waved, and shut the door. As the taxi pulled away, she sagged back into the seat and let the old bitterness swamp her.



In the weeks that followed, Fleur tried to forget about Michel, but one evening she found herself walking along West Fifty-fifth Street studying the numbers painted above the shop doors, now closed for the night. She found the address she was looking for. The location was good, but the unimposing storefront had badly lit windows…and the most beautiful garments she’d ever seen.

Michel had bucked the tide of current fashion trends where women were dressing up in evening tuxedos and neckties so they could look like men. The small window held a quartet of outrageously feminine dresses that conjured up lavish Renaissance paintings. As she gazed at the silks, jerseys, and gracefully draped crepe de chine, she couldn’t remember how long it had been since she’d spent money on decent clothes. These exquisite garments rebuked her.



Spring drifted into summer and then into fall. Kissy’s theater company folded, so she joined another group that performed almost exclusively in New Jersey. Fleur celebrated her twenty-fifth birthday by making Parker give her another raise. She bought cocoa beans with it.

She lost more often than she won, but when the wins came, they came big. She studied hard to learn from her mistakes, and her initial five thousand quadrupled, then quadrupled again. The more money she made, the harder it became for her to sink it back into risky speculations, but she forced herself to keep writing out the checks. Forty thousand dollars was as useless to her as five thousand had been.

Winter settled in. She developed an enchantment with copper and made almost thirty thousand dollars in six weeks, but the stress was giving her stomach pains. Beef went up, pork fell. She kept going—investing, reinvesting, and biting her fingernails to the quick.

By the first day of June, a year and a half after she’d jumped on her financial roller-coaster, she stared at her balance sheets, hardly able to believe what she saw. She’d done it. With nothing more than sheer nerve, she’d accumulated enough to start her business. The next day, she put everything into nice, safe, thirty-day certificates of deposit at Chase Manhattan.

A few evenings later as she was letting herself into the apartment, she heard the phone ring. She stepped over a pair of Kissy’s heels, crossed the room, and picked up the receiver.

“Hello, enfant.”

It had been more than five years since she’d heard that familiar endearment. She tightened her grip on the telephone and made herself take a slow, steadying breath. “What do you want, Alexi?”

“No social amenities?”

“You have exactly one minute, and then I’m hanging up.”

He sighed, as if she’d wounded him. “Very well, chérie. I called to congratulate you on your recent financial gains. Rather foolhardy, but then one doesn’t argue with success. I understand you started looking for office space today.”

She felt a chill. “How do you know that?”

“I’ve told you, chérie. I make it my business to know everything that affects those I care about.”

“You don’t care about me,” she said, her throat tight. “Stop playing games.”

“On the contrary, I care very much about you. I’ve waited a long time for this, chérie. I hope you don’t disappoint me.”