скачать книгу бесплатно
‘You got the money?’ asked her friend and the girl frowned at her bluntness, but then her friend had always been able to separate money and emotion. It was business, she had said to her when she balked at the amount her friend suggested for the baby.
The woman reached into her black leather handbag and handed a yellow envelope to the girl.
Her friend took a sip of Mountain Dew and opened the envelope. ‘I need to count it.’ She set to work, carefully counting the money.
‘It’s all there,’ the woman assured her, tearing her eyes away from the baby for a moment. ‘And the contract for you to sign.’
Her friend looked up from the money with cold eyes. ‘She’ll sign when I’ve counted the money,’ she snapped.
The woman was rocking the baby. The girl looked, and saw the baby’s feet poking out of the pink blanket.
‘She’ll get cold,’ she said and she tucked the blanket more snugly around the baby.
The woman stared at her.
‘You are going to sign the papers, aren’t you?’ she asked, her eyes searching the girl’s face.
Her voice was filled with fear; something the girl knew well.
‘I am,’ she said in a low voice. She went to the drawers by the bed and pulled out an envelope, and held it out to the woman.
‘This is for her, when she’s old enough, just in case something happens…’
The woman tore her eyes from the baby and nodded, her expression kind, as she took the envelope from her.
‘Can I read it?’ she asked politely. The girl knew the woman would read it later, even if she had said no at this moment.
She nodded and the woman struggled to open the envelope with the baby in her arms. She thought about offering to hold her while she read it but she didn’t trust herself to hand the child back.
She’s not yours now, she reminded herself.
The woman started to read.
She knew the words by heart.
Dear Baby Girl,
I am your momma, and I love you, but I don’t have anything a momma needs to look after a little baby.
I promise you I will come back for you when I can. Until then, be happy with this nice lady, who wants to be your momma for a while. She can take care of you and buy you a four-poster bed and good food and lots of clothes and lots of other things I can’t.
One day, when I’m rich, I’ll come and find you again and give you everything else you need.
Until then, know that I will always love you, my precious little girl.
Your Momma
xoxoxo
The woman folded the letter and put it back into its envelope and she saw her eyes wet with tears, but still she refused to cry.
Crying never helped nobody do nothin’, Grammy used to say.
The old woman had been right. Crying wouldn’t make her rich, or magically give her everything she knew the baby needed. She didn’t have enough money for her own food, let alone to raise a child. How would she clothe her? Educate her? Take care of her in a crisis? God knows she had had enough drama in her own short life to know things happened, terrible things that no child should ever go through.
And there was no way she was going to let her go into foster care, not after what she has been through. There was not a time she could remember when she had felt as though her life was turning out okay. Too many foster homes and too many of her grandmother’s broken promises had shattered her trust that the world was a safe place for a young girl to raise a child alone.
There was no point in crying, no point in wishing. The best thing for the child was to be with someone who could make sure she would be safe, and that she would never go hungry. That she would have the opportunity to go to school, that she would have a packed lunch and shoes without holes and that no one would ever call her ‘white trash’ to her face.
Her friend nodded at her that the money was all there. She picked up the pen and, with a shaking hand, she signed the papers on the table.
All those years of practising her signature for when she was able to make her own decisions instead of the welfare department, and this was the first time she got to use it for something grown-up.
With aching breasts and a breaking heart she pushed the papers over to the woman and nodded to her friend.
‘She’s yours now until I can come back,’ she said dully.
‘Would you like to hold her again?’ asked the woman.
She shook her head.
She knew that if she held her baby again, she would never let her go.
‘No, thank you, you’re her momma for now,’ she said, and the woman who at forty-five had nearly given up on being a mother, blinked and nodded.
‘Please. You should hold her again,’ said the woman as she walked over to the girl. ‘It will help you say goodbye.’
But the girl shook her head and picked up the plastic bag that contained her few personal belongings.
‘There’s no goodbye,’ she said. ‘Just take care of her till I can. I’ll be back for her, I promise, and I’ll pay you back the money and take care of her myself.’ She spoke with absolute certainty.
Without a backwards glance, she left the hospital room, her friend following, with a copy of the adoption documents, thirty thousand dollars and a desperate dream that one day she would have everything she ever wanted, including her baby girl.
Chapter 1 (#ue3922b53-1c39-52b3-a21e-b444c5ff5ebd)
Los AngelesMarch 2015
Zoe Greene checked her reflection in the mirror and carefully blotted her neutral-coloured lipstick. Her tawny hair was blow-dried straight, her make-up flawless but subtle. She never liked to take the attention away from her clients but she was a beautiful woman and men noticed her, although she rarely noticed them in return.
Dating an actor was out of the question, she had yet to meet an actor who wasn’t self-obsessed, and the power-players in Hollywood didn’t want a relationship with a woman who might negotiate them out of their last million.
She heard that familiar sniff in the stall behind her and rolled her eyes at the bathroom attendant. The only drug Zoe ever needed was making deals and the annual Vanity Fair Oscars party was the ultimate place to make the deal of a lifetime.
Picking up her Judith Leiber clutch, she left the bathroom, ignoring the attendant’s offer of a spray of bespoke perfume.
She didn’t need a spritz of perfume, she needed a stiff drink, but that would have to come later. First she had the meeting from hell to get through.
‘He’s ready,’ she heard from one of his assistants, who seemed to come out of nowhere to murmur in her ear. Squaring her shoulders, Zoe followed him into the private VIP room, where the truly famous partied together, away from the merely famous.
Angie and Brad sat in corner, talking intently to Anderson Cooper; Maggie Hall, her best friend and truly famous movie star client, was discussing something at length with Charlize Theron, and Sandy Bullock was sitting on Clooney’s knee, laughing like they were the funniest two people in the room.
Actually they were the funniest people in the room, Zoe thought as she walked towards Jeff Beerman’s table, trying to act nonchalant, but knowing all eyes were on her.
She lifted her head out of pride, as though she were the one accepting the Oscar. This was her moment and she had damn well earned it, she told herself.
She thought of the years of grovelling to men who couldn’t think without being told what to think about, men who dismissed her and asked her to get coffee when she walked into a meeting, men who tried to make deals with her while trying to get her into their bed.
Zoe had never had a formal meeting with Jeff Beerman; she had only met him at industry events and parties, where he would usually have a circle of hangers-on, and an extremely beautiful girl on his arm when he was in between wives.
Although the Oscars party wasn’t really a formal meeting, she still knew it was going to be the biggest moment of her professional life and if she was going to take a gamble, she might as well go for broke.
Zoe’s poker face was the best in the business but a rare smile crossed her lips as she thought of her trump card, or manuscript, as it were.
‘What are you smiling at, Greene?’ Jeff asked with a curt nod of his grey head.
He called everyone by their surnames, as though he was the captain of Hollywood and they were all his junior officers.
‘Nothing, just enjoying myself,’ she said, making sure her poker mask was firmly back in place.
‘You should smile more, it suits you,’ he said, as though this was a certain fact.
‘Thank you, I think,’ she answered, thankful she was wearing a simple yet elegant Calvin Klein black dress. This was not the time for big hair and low cleavage; she would leave that to the starlets. She was there for business and nothing more.
‘Don’t think, just smile,’ he said and Zoe laughed.
‘Isn’t that the standard advice you hand out to all your girlfriends?’ she half joked and then almost gasped at her lack of control.
She was always in control, especially in meetings, but Jeff had disarmed her with that whole smiling schtick. She knew his game and she wasn’t about to play by his rules.
‘Give us a moment,’ he said to his assistant, not taking his eyes off Zoe. The man backed away quickly.
‘Sit,’ he ordered and she did.
‘You wanted to see me?’ she asked, as though she had anywhere better to be than at a private table with studio head Jeff Beerman.
Jeff leaned forward. Maggie and Zoe had always agreed that he was handsome enough to be a movie star, except he loved the business of movies more than the films themselves.
Like Zoe, he loved the deals but unlike Zoe he was a very rich man and, at times, a very despised man.
‘I hear you’ve just signed Hugh Cavell,’ he said, his eyes running over her, and she squared her shoulders and sat up straight.
‘I have,’ she answered, trying to be casual but professional.
‘I want the option to his book,’ he barked. ‘How much does he want for it?’
His presumption annoyed her and fuelled by the thought of Hugh being her royal flush, she smiled sweetly.
‘You could try asking nicely, Jeff. Manners are free, you know.’
‘Don’t fuck me around, Greene. I want the rights to this book!’
‘You and everyone else,’ she answered, meeting his icy gaze.
They stared at each other, neither moving, and then Jeff broke.
‘You’re braver than you look,’ he said, leaning back in his chair.
‘You don’t intimidate me,’ Zoe lied, bestowing Jeff with another smile.
He narrowed his eyes at her for a moment. ‘Good for you. Most people shit themselves when they meet me,’ he said, almost proudly.
‘Should I be impressed or concerned for them?’ she asked. ‘I’m sure there’s an operation for that.’
Jeff’s expression changed from steely to resigned, and he rewarded her with the flicker of a smile. What a shame he was such a bastard, thought Zoe, before his voice broke into her thoughts.
‘Greene, listen to me, I have to have this book. I can make the movie a huge hit.’
‘So can Harvey, Brian or David,’ she said, listing the other studio heads who had all offered her meetings since word had spread that she had Hugh Cavell in her managerial stable.
‘Yeah, but why would you work with those morons? My studio will make the best picture—you know it and I know it—so stop playing games. What does the guy want? Money? A shot at writing the script? Casting approval?’
Zoe sat back in the leather seat and crossed her legs. ‘Yes, he wants all of those things, and the other studios have already offered them.’
‘So, what the fuck else does he want then?’ Jeff looked impatiently at his Breitling watch.
Zoe paused for effect. She might not be an actor, but she knew how to play the role.
‘Actually, Hugh wants me as the lead EP on the film,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t trust anyone to produce it, unless I’m involved.’
‘What?’ Jeff recoiled as if she had just announced she was pregnant with his child.
‘You heard me,’ she said calmly.
A passing waiter placed two flutes of champagne in front of them, but Jeff pushed his away.
‘Scotch, neat,’ he snarled at the waiter, who retreated as though stung.
Zoe, glad for the distraction, picked up her glass and took a sip, trying to not let her hand shake. Show him nothing, she reminded herself, not how much you want it, and certainly not how much you care.
Jeff looked Zoe up and down dismissively.
‘Come on, Greene, get real. You’re a fucking talent manager not an executive producer. ‘
‘Yes, I am.’ Zoe wasn’t insulted. She represented some of the biggest stars in town and could pull a deal together faster than any of her peers. She knew her own worth. ‘But that’s about to change.’
‘You’ve got no runs on the board,’ he said. ‘What else can you bring to this besides the author?’
‘My expertise, my people skills, my industry knowledge. I’m good at what I do.’
