Даниэла Стил - The Affair

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Rose called Nadia from the airport before she boarded her flight to New York.

“What was all that about? He shouldn’t come in and out like that as if everything is normal and he still lives there, even if he does spend the night occasionally. He doesn’t even call you first?” Rose was incensed by Nicolas’s behavior, his entitlement and presumptuousness, and how selfish he was being.

“He told me he wasn’t coming to the château for the first two weeks in July. He says he’s staying with friends in the South. I assume that means Pascale. But it will give me time to think.”

“He couldn’t send you an email or a text to tell you that? He had to deliver the message in person?” Rose said, annoyed.

“He probably wanted to spend the night. But I told him to go, after you left. It’s just too easy for him like this. He probably went right back to her as soon as he walked out the door. When I don’t let him stay, it just drives him right back to her.”

“Tell him to act like a man and get an apartment,” Rose said firmly.

“I just did. This is all new territory for me, Mom. There are no ground rules here.”

“Maybe there should be. That’s why you need to see a lawyer.”

“I will,” Nadia said with a sigh. Like it or not, she knew it was time. Her mother was right. Maybe she’d invite her sisters to visit her in July. She wished her mother a good flight and went to check on the girls. They were playing peacefully in their room, and Nadia went to stand on the terrace. She looked down at the river drifting by, with barges and boats full of tourists. The Eiffel Tower was lit and sparkling. It was odd how it all looked the same, but everything in her life had changed in the last month, and she knew that nothing would ever be the same again. She doubted that her heart and her feelings for Nicolas would ever recover.

Chapter 4

Ironically, the first meeting of the day on Monday—when Rose got to her office punctually, although she had gotten home late and only slept a few hours, worried about Nadia—was about Pascale Solon on the September cover. The decision needed to be made of who was going to style it, which meant working with both the photographer and the subject, being involved in the choice of wardrobe, and everything that went with it, including the hair and makeup. The beauty editor would participate too. They were trying to decide if they wanted to go “soft and romantic” or do something more hard-edged and sexier. Pascale’s sensual, sometimes punky look lent itself better to the latter.

“No nudity, please,” Rose said firmly. “There’s enough going on there, we don’t need to be blatant about it, nor should she. We’re Mode . We don’t need to see nipple rings or her Brazilian bikini wax. I want her dressed, and to keep this all about fashion, not her sex life,” or Rose’s son-in-law’s, although she didn’t say that. They eventually agreed on which designer’s clothes she would wear, and the look they decided to go for was contemporary, youthful, gutsy, bold, without ever being offensive or too sexual. Rose made it clear that she wanted to keep the interview above the waterline too: her recent success, her big movie, the next role she was going to play, her goals for her career. “Let’s keep it as professional as possible,” Rose said with her work face on.

“Obviously, we’re going to mention the affair with Nicolas Bateau in the interview. And the baby?” Charity asked her.

“Let’s stay off the baby. Things happen. We don’t want to have to pull the interview if something goes wrong with the pregnancy. We’re not a maternity magazine either. And let’s shoot her now before it shows much.” She was five months pregnant, tall, thin, and in great shape. They still had a few more weeks before the pregnancy became apparent. “The interviewer can mention Nicolas, but I want it strictly to be in passing, and no lurid details. Don’t open that door,” Rose said sternly to the staff writer who had been assigned to write the story and who was only a few years older than Pascale. They thought she would easily relate to Pascale. It was not going to be a deep, intellectual piece.

“We’re going to interview him with her for part of the article, aren’t we?” Charity pressed the point, feigning innocence, and Rose turned her blue X-ray eyes on her.

“No, we are not. I already vetoed that, and you know it. He’s not on the cover with her or part of the interview, except in passing, as I said. If he wants an interview about their affair, he can do it for another magazine. We’re not interested. May I remind you again, Charity, he is a married man, still living with his wife and young children. I’m not going to showcase the affair and turn it into a love story. He cheated on his wife and got a young woman pregnant. We’ve already heard more about it in the tabloids than any of us wants to know. For our purposes, it stops there. I am not interviewing him for Mode . I won’t allow it. Is that clear?” Her voice rose a notch and everyone in the room fell silent, except Charity, who was fuming. She had won the battle to get Pascale on the cover, now she wanted to make it a clean sweep and interview Nicolas too, which would be much more interesting. He was brilliant, and his novels were hugely successful. He would be a better interview subject and together they’d be on fire. But Rose was not budging. She made it clear that mutiny would not be tolerated. She felt perfectly comfortable holding her ground. They had standards to uphold about what they endorsed and what they didn’t. Pascale and Nicolas’s illicit liaison was well over that line for her, even if Nadia weren’t her daughter.

“I don’t find stories about cheaters romantic. And I hope you don’t either. You can always write it on spec and freelance it elsewhere, but not here. I want this interview clean, strong, and about two subjects: her career and her views on fashion. The rest is off limits.” Charity knew when she was beaten, and finally retreated and slumped in her chair like an angry schoolgirl who had been reprimanded by the teacher. And Rose had already been pushed to her limits, and would go no further.

Charity was still stewing about it when she went back to her office and asked her assistant for an Advil and a cup of tea.

“Rough meeting?” her new assistant asked and Charity rolled her eyes.

“The boss wants us to stay off any hot topics with Pascale Solon when we shoot her. And I’m not doing the interview, I’m just styling her. Rose wants her lily pure. She’s got the wrong girl for that, and the readers don’t expect her to be a virgin or act like one. She’s having a baby with a married man, for chrissake, and she does full-on frontal nudity in all her films. Rose has her confused with the Virgin Mary.” Charity’s assistant, Betty, hesitated for a minute before she went to get the Advil and tea. She seemed as though she wanted to say something but wasn’t sure if she should.

“Something up?” Charity asked her, sensing that Betty had more to say.

“I…not really…this is probably really out of line, and I shouldn’t say anything.” She looked flustered and nervous, not sure if she’d get in trouble. She hadn’t worked for Charity for long and didn’t know how she’d react or what she’d do with the information. “My mother is a decorator. She does a lot of jobs in Europe for American clients. She knows Rose’s daughter, who lives there. She’s an interior designer too. Nadia McCarthy.”

“Yeah, I think she’s married to some French guy,” Charity said, her head pounding.

“She’s married to Nicolas Bateau,” Betty said softly. Betty was twenty-five years old and scared to death. Charity had a temper and was unpredictable and indiscriminate as to who she would unleash it on. She stared across her desk at her assistant in disbelief.