Blind Ambitions Page 22

  “Who do you think?”

  “Why do you sound like that?”

  “How do you expect me to sound?”

  Neither of them said anything.

  “Well … what do you want?”

  “An explanation. You owe me that much at least. You might not think so, but you do. You owe me that.”

  Sharon sat up, wiping away the moisture that had gathered on the side of her face while she slept.

  “I can’t do it right now,” she answered curtly.

  “Then when is a good time?”

  “Tomorrow. After six.”

  “Alright. I’ll call you then.”

  The sound of a dial tone filled Sharon’s ear, disturbing her almost as much as the call itself. She clicked off the phone and laid it on the table. She made a move to get up from the couch. The room instantly began to spin.

  Sharon gripped the cushions on the couch for balance. She laid, facedown, burrowing into the cream-colored cloth. Her stomach began to lurch, and an excruciating pain shot through her abdomen.

  Terrified, she tried to remain still, hoping the feeling would quickly pass away. The sharp pain intensified, like a bolt of fire inside her loins. Sharon balled up on the couch, bringing her knees close to her chest. The pain continued.

  Her knees shook erratically on their own, in a desperate attempt to minimize what she was feeling. When she glanced down and saw the blood between her legs and on the cushion, she picked up the phone and dialed.

  “Hello?”

  “I need help! Please get over here, I’m bleeding!”

  “You’re bleeding where? Sharon, where are you bleeding?”

  “Between my legs, Dez, between my legs!”

  “Oh, God! I’m afraid I won’t get over there fast enough. I’m going to call 911 and have them send over an ambulance.”

  Sharon was openly crying, the pain ripping through her in spasms.

  “Just do something, please! I’m losing my baby, Dez, aren’t I? Tell me, am I losing my baby?”

  “Just calm down, Sharon,” Desi said. “I’m going to click over and get 911 on the other line.”

  Sharon squeezed her legs together, trying to blot out the pain. She could feel the blood squishing between her thighs as she rocked to keep the sharp bolts at bay.

  “God forgive me, God forgive me, God forgive me,” she prayed through tears. “I know I don’t deserve a baby. I know I don’t. That’s why you’re taking this one away.”

  Desi clicked back on the line.

  “They’re on the way, Sharon,” she said. “I’m going to stay on the phone until they get there. Is the bolt locked on your front door?”

  “Yes. And it hurts too much for me to get up.”

  “Well, they’re just going to have to break in to get you.”

  “I don’t care. Dez, I think I’m losing my baby.”

  “You don’t know that, Sharon,” Desi said. “Things like this happen during pregnancies all the time.”

  “I did it. I smoked too much weed. I drank wine. I didn’t care. I hurt my baby. I killed it, I know.”

  She rocked on the couch, the blood beneath her soaking deep into the cushion.

  “I’ve fucked up so many times in my life, Dez,” she sobbed. “It’s like I can’t do anything right. Maybe I was trying to kill it the whole time.”

  “Sssssshhhh,” Desi whispered. “Listen to my voice and try to be calm. Everything’s going to be just fine, Sharon. Everything’s going to be just fine.”

  When Sharon awoke in the hospital bed, Glen was sitting in a chair beside her. He was wearing a gray sweat-suit. A large welt streaked across his face. He was fast asleep.

  She blinked her eyes a few times, looking around for a clock. There was a large white one on the wall before her. It was 7:08 P.M.

  “I’m going to miss 60 Minutes,” she mumbled.

  Glen’s eyes opened.

  He leaned forward, taking her hand. Sharon drew it away.

  “You shouldn’t have come here.”

  “Where else would I be?” he asked, his brows knitted in anger. “Don’t be stupid, Sharon. You act like this wasn’t my baby, too!”

  “Wasn’t?” she whispered, and then began to cry. She turned her face away so that he couldn’t see.

  Glen, stricken, came around to the other side of the bed. He sat on the edge of the mattress and pulled her into his arms, rocking her gently.

  “Honey, I am so sorry that this happened. I am so very sorry.”

  Sharon was sobbing quietly, her body shaking with every breath and tear.

  “Why did you leave me then?” she cried.

  Glen’s face, above hers, contorted in surprise.

  “I never left you! You told me to leave! You’re the one who put me off!”

  “I know how you feel about ghetto girls and baby’s mamas,” she said, her arms hanging limply around his back. “I wasn’t about to have you throw that in my face and make me feel worse than I already did.”

  “I am truly sorry, Sharon,” he replied. “I would never do that to you. Sometimes I just talk shit without even realizing what I’m saying.”

  “You weren’t talking shit,” she said. “You have a definite opinion about unmarried pregnant women who live under poor conditions.”

  “Alright,” he agreed. “I guess I do, and I know it’s wrong. But when I saw those pregnancy tests, Sharon, I was actually happy.”

  She stopped crying and pushed back from him.

  “What do you mean, you were happy? I thought you didn’t want any kids.”

  Glen wiped the tears away from her face.

  “I don’t want kids. At least, I don’t think I do. Not right now. But when I figured out that you were having mine, something about that made me happy. I don’t know. Something about it made me proud.”

  Sharon turned away, the tears welling up again. She thought about Jackson and his expression in the photograph.

  “Sharon … Sharon …” He pulled her face towards his. “I’m not saying I’m ready for marriage. I don’t know yet. That’s something I want to be sure about. I’m not saying I want to be a daddy. Before Friday, I would have never even entertained the thought.”

  Sharon’s lip quivered as she watched him speak.

  “All I know is that I was happy to know you had something of mine growing inside of you. I don’t know if that means I’ve got a huge ego, or if it means that you’re my soulmate. All I know is that it made me happy. That is, until you hit me in the back and gashed me across the face.”

  Sharon giggled, still sniffling, as she reached up and traced the outline of the welt cutting across his cheek.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I was mad.”

  “Well,” he said, pulling her close to him, “now I know to get as far out of the way as possible the next time you’re angry. You almost put my eyes out with those pretty pink flowers.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said with a laugh.

  “Apology accepted,” he replied.

  He rubbed her back, part of which was exposed through the flimsy hospital gown. She rested her head against his shoulder, wrapping her arms tightly around his waist.

  “I love you, Glen,” she whispered, not caring that she said it first.

  “I love you, too, Sharon,” he answered, his voice just as soft. “Don’t scare me like this anymore. You and I, we can get through anything. I don’t care what it is. Just don’t count me out like that, or decide what it is that I want or that I might do.”

  “Okay.”

  “Promise me,” he said.

  “Alright, I promise.”

  “Good. We’re gonna do this just like we said before. One day at a time.”

  He kissed her forehead and rubbed her back.

  “What is this, anyway?” he asked, feeling the small nodule along her lower spine. “I’ve always felt it, but I’ve never known exactly what it was.”

  Sharon didn’t answer, the sound of his words fading as she gazed
absently over his shoulder, past the doorway, and into the hall.

  “Randall, Sharon’s not going to make those meetings tomorrow.”

  “What do you mean, she can’t make them?” he asked. “When I talked to her earlier today, she said she’d be there.”

  “She’s in the hospital. There’s no way that she’ll be able to come.”

  Randall was watching Dateline. He put the sound on mute.

  “What’s she doing in the hospital?” he asked. “Is it something serious? Is she going to be alright?”

  “She’s going to be just fine. But she’ll need about three days or so before she can get started with things.”

  “Damn!” Randall exclaimed, concerned for his friend, and also concerned for himself.

  Desi was quiet. It had been a long day for her. After meeting Sharon at the hospital, she immediately called Glen. Once he arrived, she came home, changed clothes, and went for a run to clear her mind. She lay across her bed now, fresh from a hot shower. Her nerves were finally relaxed, and she didn’t feel like doing or saying anything that would upset them again.

  Randall didn’t know how to interpret her silence. He wasn’t sure if Sharon had told her about his lie. He was too afraid to ask.

  “Would you like me to come to the meetings tomorrow?” she asked.

  Randall froze.

  If he said yes, it might not necessarily be a bad thing. They could bring her to the meetings to show that she had truly signed on. But then she would know that this was the first meeting they were having with the networks.

  If he said no, she might be offended. She was new to television, and might not understand what was going on. Randall had been in meetings before where naïve first-timers made egregious mistakes.

  “Deal squashers,” he called them. He had no idea if Desi was a deal maker, or a deal squasher. He had no idea of how to find out, either, short of letting her participate.

  There was far too much for her to have to be briefed on. The more he considered it, the more he saw that it wouldn’t work.

  “We should be fine, Desi,” he said. “Your contract will be coming tomorrow, so I expected you to be tied up with your legal counsel, reviewing it. What I’ll do is update you immediately after things occur. Is that alright?”

  “Sounds fine,” she said.

  Inside, he heaved a sigh, relieved that she had apparently not learned anything from Sharon. He debated for a moment whether he should still confess.

  When he heard a yawn coming from her end of the phone, he decided not to.

  “Do you think it’s okay if I send Sharon some flowers?” he asked.

  “Sure. That would be nice. She’s at the UCLA Medical Center.”

  Desi yawned again, exhausted.

  “Okay. Well, you sound like you need to get some sleep.”

  “I’m pretty tired,” she said.

  “Well, I’m going to knock out too, once I take care of a few things. Tomorrow’s a big day for all of us.”

  “Just keep me in the loop.”

  “I’ll do just that, Desi,” Randall said. “Have a good night.”

  “Yeah,” Desi said. “You guys better come out of there with a deal tomorrow. Remember, you promised to make me a star!”

  “We’re giving it one thousand percent.”

  “That’s all I need to hear,” she replied. “Goodnight.”

  Desi clicked off her cordless phone and laid it on the bed beside her. She only intended to lay there for a few moments.

  Seconds later, she was in a deep sleep.

  ASK, AND YE SHALL DECEIVE

  Meredith lay in her sumptuous California king-size bed, with its rich chocolate sheets, chocolate velvet duvet cover, and chocolate shams and pillowcases.

  She had been in that very bed with Wade, what seemed like at least a thousand times during their fourteen-year affair, rolling and romping without a thought other than the moment. Now she lay in it alone, nothing to soothe her save the enchanting aroma of the melon candle burning on her nightstand.

  And the satisfaction of knowing tomorrow would be the beginning of the end of Anna Weldon.

  The phone rang twice, then stopped. Meredith continued to languish, having become accustomed to erratic phones her entire murky life.

  She had sent over the proposal for Native Suns, which was actually an identical copy of Ambitions, untweaked, except that she changed the names of the characters and the restaurant. Had she been the one to present it to NBC, she would have tweaked it considerably, making the issue of idea infringement just a shadow of a question that no one could actually cling to.

  But since Anna insisted the presentation of the show be left to her and Wade, Meredith decided she’d make it fun. Make it worth Anna’s while.

  She also sent over the action plan for Stickies and Westwood, as requested, essentially making Anna’s job much easier, yet not being able to take any of the credit for the work.

  She rolled around on the sheets, thrilled at the possibilities of the following day. All she wore was a smile, and a big one at that.

  “Take that, Wade Massey!” she said to the air. “Let’s see if your precious little wife can keep you afloat while she’s trying to save herself.”

  MIDLOGUE #3

  Alicia sat in the library, surfing the Net.

  She searched a superengine called Dogpile, and it gave her several options for looking up phone numbers, personal files, and addresses.

  She clicked the one called Bigfoot.

  When the page opened up, she typed in her mother’s name. The system claimed to be able to locate anybody. It did.

  Under her mother’s name, there was only one listing. It gave an address, an e-mail address, and a phone number. The phone number was the same as the one Alicia already had.

  She jotted down the information, forgetting, in her haste, that she could select Print from the file option menu, and just as easily have a hard copy of the information.

  That didn’t matter much to Alicia. She was so focused on the task ahead that all she could think about was getting to the next step.

  She brought up the Web site for MapQuest. Once she punched in her mother’s address, MapQuest would give her exact directions, from her door to her mother’s, and all the turns in between.

  Now all she needed to do was wait.

  If things didn’t go well by six o’clock the next day, Alicia was determined to take the matter on herself.

  PART FOUR DECISIONS

  NET NOIR

  Devin had a program on his computer called InterPeek, something he had ordered from the Net for $39.95. It claimed to be able to cull from the Web even the most buried information on a person’s life. His brother in Brooklyn had forwarded an e-mail advertising the product, and when he read the flashing e-mail script, it piqued his curiosity.

  Discover deep dark SECRETS about your relatives, friends, enemies, employers—even your lover or spouse! The NEW InterPeek has it all!!

  Devin couldn’t resist. He was always curious about his clients and the people he did business with, from their liquidity to their backgrounds. He immediately ordered it, and found it a useful tool when trying to negotiate. It was like having a map to a person’s Achilles’ heel.

  Now the software had a different value. With it, nothing was sacred. It located addresses from just a name, unlisted phone numbers, license plates, driving records, and social security numbers, and allowed for anonymous, untraceable e-mails, criminal background searches, and education verification.

  He had already punched in Bettina, but didn’t find much of interest with her, other than a few changes of residence. There was nothing drastic, which surprised him. He had expected plenty of secrets, perhaps a criminal record or two, but found none of that.

  He’d spent way too much time obsessing over her, he knew, but she’d hurt him, and hurt him bad. It was late, and his wife was already in bed asleep. He didn’t want to go to bed, not with her. His longing for Bettina was much too great.
He didn’t even want to pretend with his wife anymore.

  Devin was in love. He knew it. And while he had turned vindictive and cost Bettina her job, he didn’t really mean to hurt her. He just wanted her to know how bad she made him feel.

  Bored, determined, grasping for any kind of connecting straw, he punched in name after name, all the names he could remember her telling him about as they lay in her bed and talked about their lives.

  The query on Randall James produced an interesting dossier, with his double degrees and an annulled marriage that occurred right after high school.

  He punched in Dawson Jonas. Jet’s record was most impressive. Devin still found it incredible how much information InterPeek provided. Jet had an awful driving record, including two DUIs that had never been made public.

  He typed in Steve Karst, first spelling the name Carst, but coming up with someone in Iowa. When he used the letter K, and changed the Steve to Steven, he found him, address, unlisted phone number, and all. He lived on Wilshire in Beverly Hills. He was a white man with blond hair.

  Devin wondered if that was who Bettina had gone out with.

  Devin had the license plate number of the white man’s car, the result of tailing them a good ways down Sepulveda until they turned on Imperial and got on the 105. He crossed-checked the information. It came up as Steven Karst. According to his driving information, he was listed as a white male with blond hair. It was definitely him.

  Steve had an incredible listing of assets: properties in London, Prague, Vail, Vancouver, and some twenty-seven others. There was a Gulfstream parked in a hangar in Denver. There were four other license plate listings for his four other California vehicles, which included a 911, an 850i, a Testarossa, and a Diablo.

  Steve obviously had a thing for fast cars and fast women.

  Steve was obviously paid.

  Now he knew why Bettina had bounced. Mr. Karst had much loot, and Devin was beginning to pale in comparison.

  The quarter-million-dollar commission he had told her about was now a reality. It was delivered to him on Friday by day’s end, via a wire into his private bank account—the result of the deal having been closed that morning. After Bettina kicked him out. The reason he originally told her about it was because it was so close at hand. He wanted her to know how liquid he would soon be.