Love is the New Black Read online

  Rose had tried to battle it out alone after Abigail had left and his father went downhill. But it was too much for her to implement any major changes without Patrick there. Despite her best efforts, things had unravelled at Aspire, and she’d finally had no choice but to ask Mason to come back and step into Patrick’s shoes. Mason couldn’t just stand back and let everything his dad had worked for go down the gurgler.

  Mason thought he could help, but at times felt out of his depth. He could see, in a strict business sense, what had to be done: old extravagances needed to go and any dead wood cut away. But it was a tough gig. And being under pressure to make major decisions about a new direction for the mag was nerve wracking. His dad’s shoes sometimes felt like a giant’s.

  ‘They all hate me in there, Sam,’ Mason said. ‘I’m their worst nightmare.’

  ‘You’re not there to make friends. And people always dislike change,’ Sam said reassuringly. He held his left hand out. ‘Business,’ he said, making a fist. Then his right hand shot out. ‘Friends,’ he continued. ‘No need to mix them up.’

  Mason checked his phone. God, he’d been here for forty-five minutes. Forty-five minutes he didn’t have.

  He took a deep breath and started mentally prioritising the million things on his to-do list. He had a meeting with the head of advertising at 11 a.m. Then prep for the board meeting. With all the recent staff cuts, he didn’t even have an assistant. He’d have to ask Rose to lend him someone to help with the figures tomorrow. Jesus. And a direction to secure a new readership? He knew about business strategy, but he knew very little about how to increase a dying magazine’s circulation.

  He had a sudden urge to talk to Kara. She was a gem for stepping into the Dinnigan shoot at such late notice. Aspire was very lucky to have her on board – and for less than half the fee she normally charged. Her agent would probably have her head for this. Or his.

  Mason’s finger hovered over her name in his address book, then he shook his head. The last thing Kara needed was him crying on her shoulder. She had her own problems. She hadn’t been good the other weekend.

  Kara had been fragile for years, but Mason was surprised at how dependent on alcohol she’d become in his time away. He didn’t know how to handle the situation – he knew just being there for her wasn’t enough. But right now, even that was more than he could manage.

  That afternoon, Mason looked up from the figures on his screen and gazed out the meeting-room window, to where the river sparkled in the sun.

  A silver flash on the riverside caught his eye. He saw it was Rose’s little pug in his silver jacket, leaping up and down. With Bruno was the girl – the one who had bumped into him this morning. He could hardly believe what he saw in her hand: a double ice-cream cone.

  It had been a long time since Mason had witnessed a woman eating ice-cream, let alone a double cone. Usually it was a salad with no dressing, and Mason had noticed how even that usually got pushed around plates rather than actually being eaten.

  The dog was using his best leaping techniques on the girl, with a spin at the top of each leap. People on the riverbank looked at the girl and the dog, but she seemed completely unaware of the attention – which was unusual too. Most girls Mason knew were acutely aware of their assets, ready to hawk them for whatever they were worth.

  He watched as the girl took a huge, indelicate bite of the ice-cream, then held a finger up to Bruno, telling him to wait. Her long hair caught the sunlight, and she casually scooped it up and pushed it to the side, exposing the long, delicate curve of her neck.

  Something stirred inside Mason at the sight of her bare neck. He watched, transfixed, as she gave the last of the ice-cream to the pug.

  Focus, Wakefield. He checked himself. What was he doing, staring out the window at some junior? He needed to stay focused. That was how he’d gotten through his MBA, and it was what he had to do now. If he didn’t pull his shit together, this magazine was going to collapse.

  ‘Well, how was it, my darling girl?’ Gaynor asked. She muted the huge flat screen TV and picked up her champagne glass.

  Piper tried to describe her day. Luckily Gaynor was a good listener. Piper worked backwards, from the tasks Vivian had given her when she got back to Aspire after the Langham. That part had been good, actually – just sitting at her computer and filling in stock orders for an upcoming shoot. She’d needed something simple and straightforward like that. Then she gave a brief account of the Kara debacle, and then, finally, Mason’s appearance in the office that morning.

  Piper wasn’t sure why, but she left out the bit about overhearing Anita on the phone to Mason. Probably because she wanted to get the facts straight before she said anything about what she’d heard. But it also was more than that, somehow. Something Piper didn’t want to admit, even to herself.

  All she knew was that the idea of Mason dating Kara and breaking her heart rankled on a number of levels.

  ‘I’ve met Mason Wakefield a number of times,’ Gaynor remarked.

  The mention of his name gave Piper a shock. Like Gaynor had read her mind. Piper bit her lip and waited while Gaynor poured herself another glass of champagne and took a sip. It seemed to take a long time.

  ‘He’s a lovely young man,’ Gaynor continued.

  ‘Lovely?’ Piper said. That was definitely not the word that sprung to mind when she thought about him. Handsome, yes. Intimidating, yes. Arrogant, yes. But not lovely.

  ‘Yes, lovely,’ Gaynor confirmed. ‘I knew his mother, too. She was an amazing woman. Died of cancer, at least fourteen years ago now. Poor Mason was only a boy. It must have been so hard for him.’

  A shiver ran down Piper’s spine. As much as her mum had been annoying and judgemental about her relationship with Dylan, the thought of losing her was too hideous to contemplate.

  It was impossible to imagine her self-assured boss, the man who broke Kara Kingston’s heart, as a vulnerable kid who’d lost his mum. Maybe that’s what makes him so difficult, thought Piper. Or maybe, she told herself sternly, I’m just reading too much into everything again.

  ‘What did you think of Mason?’ Gaynor asked, cutting across her thoughts.

  Piper shrugged, as though he hadn’t made any big impression. ‘He seemed all right,’ she said noncommittally. It was time to steer the conversation away from Mason Wakefield. ‘So, Gaynes, what did you get up to today?’

  Gaynor stretched and walked to the kitchen. Piper wished she wasn’t hearing the tinkle of Gaynor’s champagne glass being refilled. At least she normally waited until 5 p.m. to pour her first drink, unlike Kara Kingston. But it seemed she’d keep on going until bedtime. Her godmother was definitely drinking too much.

  ‘I had a lunch date!’ Gaynor said, coming back into the lounge room and taking her place on the couch again. Piper felt her tone was wrong. A tad too theatrical, even for Gaynor.

  ‘Cool,’ Piper said. ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Yes. Good,’ Gaynor chirped. ‘Well, fine.’ Her next go at the champagne was more of a slug than a sip.

  ‘Okay, from the beginning, please.’

  Gaynor smiled. ‘It’s so nice to have you here, Piper,’ she said, trying to change the subject.

  ‘And?’ Piper giggled, not letting her get away with it.

  ‘Well, we met online,’ Gaynor sighed, giving in. ‘His name was Ron.’ Piper noticed Gaynor’s use of the past tense, but didn’t say anything.

  ‘I was very impressed by the restaurant he chose,’ Gaynor continued. ‘It was quite stunning. I’ll take you there sometime, Piper. It was all white tablecloths and waiters in bow ties. Huge flower arrangements. Truly elegant. He was there when I arrived. Quite a nice-looking man, around my age. Quite cultured too. We had… well… I thought we had a lovely chat about a play we’d both seen.’ Piper couldn’t help noticing a little sigh before Gaynor resumed her tale. ‘He had the ocean trout and I had a lemon-tarragon lobster roll, which was lovely.’

  ‘Gaynes, that’s great,’ Piper s
aid encouragingly. There was definitely something odd in the way Gaynor was phrasing things, though. ‘Where’s the but?’

  Gaynor shook her head. ‘There was a little glitch at the end,’ she said with a shrug. Piper’s heart sank.

  ‘A little glitch or a glitch with a capital G?’

  Gaynor rolled her eyes. ‘Well, when the bill came, the waiter put it in front of Ron,’ she said. ‘And Ron immediately pushed it over to me. Then he said …’ Gaynor’s voice transformed, so she sounded just like a man. ‘It’s been lovely to meet you, Gaynor. Of course, you will understand that I’m looking for someone quite a bit younger than yourself. But I do wish you luck in your endeavours.’

  ‘Oh my god,’ Piper cried. ‘Bastard! But I’m sure you will understand that Ron is a loser. With a capital L. I’m sorry, Gaynes.’

  Gaynor downed the rest of her champagne. ‘No matter,’ she said. ‘I’m a trouper, don’t forget.’ When she stood up again, Gaynor was unsteady on her feet. ‘There’s always tomorrow, Piper,’ she said majestically. ‘Goodnight, darling.’

  Piper put on her pyjamas, fluffed the pillows and sat back in bed with her phone. Gaynor’s bad date swirled around in her head, along with all the other things that had happened that day. What she needed was to speak with her boyfriend.

  She scrolled to a picture of Dylan on her phone. Classic Dylan, in his navy singlet and work overalls, standing in the frame of a half-built block of flats. His hair was sandy and sun-bleached from surfing. He was waving to the camera, grinning. God, she missed those muscular arms holding her. Those hands. Her skin tingled as she thought about what those hands had done for her. She dialled his number.

  ‘Piper? Hey hon. How’s my best … hey, turn it down, can ya, Loftie?’ There was a little scuttle in the background and then the volume of the music in the background went down.

  ‘How’s my best girl?’ Dylan asked.

  ‘I’m fine. I think,’ Piper said. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Just home with the boys,’ Dylan said. His voice was languid and thick.

  ‘Getting stoned?’ Piper asked. She felt a niggling sense of annoyance, and made a mental note to call him earlier in the evenings in future. He sounded okay, not really high, but she knew he was somewhere on the way. He normally didn’t smoke on Monday nights. It would’ve been good to have a proper conversation with him.

  ‘Yeah, no, just a few cones, a couple of beers. That’s all, babe.’

  Piper sighed quietly to herself. She would have to talk about it with him sometime. Dylan worked really hard, and smoking was his way of relaxing. But it was getting too full on. Right now wasn’t the time to talk about it, though. Not on the phone, while they were both adjusting to being apart.

  ‘Who’s there, Dyl?’ she asked, her voice even.

  ‘Ah, you know. Loftie. Animal. The usual suspects.’ He paused. Someone laughed in the background. ‘Hang on,’ he said, ‘I’m gonna take you somewhere private.’

  Piper smiled. She could imagine Dylan traipsing through the flat, trying to find a place to sit that wasn’t occupied by empty pizza boxes and beer cans. Loftie and Dylan’s flat might be a bit ‘junky’, like her mum said after picking her up from there once, but those guys did pretty well for themselves as far as Piper was concerned. If her mum just got to know him a bit better, gave him a chance, she’d see that Dylan was mature in a lot of ways. He worked. He paid his own rent, his own bills, with no help from his parents. He was totally independent. Not many of Piper’s friends could say the same.

  ‘Orright, got you,’ Dylan said finally.

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘In the loo,’ Dylan laughed. ‘The quietest place I could find.’

  ‘Nice,’ Piper laughed. It was so weird to think of him in there, especially after today. On the bathroom door, Piper knew, was a Sports Illustrated poster of Kara Kingston in a skimpy yellow bikini.

  ‘Miss you already, babe,’ Dylan said. ‘How was your first day?’

  ‘Pretty good,’ Piper said. She wanted to tell Dylan what had happened, but she could tell he wouldn’t really follow it all right now. She could catch him up another time. Anyway, she was practically talked-out after her chat with Gaynor. ‘See that model in the yellow bikini on the loo door?’ she asked instead. She couldn’t resist.

  ‘What, Kara Kingston?’

  ‘I met her today.’

  ‘No way!’ Dylan shouted, sounding like he’d snapped out of his stoned state and was listening properly. ‘Jesus, she’s … man, she’s …’

  ‘I know,’ Piper agreed. She couldn’t blame him. If there was a litmus test for hetero males, Kara Kingston was it.

  ‘But she’s not as hot as you, babe,’ Dylan said quickly. Piper smiled. She really had to stop testing Dylan. He didn’t deserve it. He’d never given her any reason to feel insecure, but she still did sometimes.

  ‘Thanks, Dyl.’

  ‘It’s true, babe. So, you reckon it’s a goer? The job?’

  ‘I think so. It’s too early to tell, really. But I miss you. Have you booked a plane ticket yet?’

  ‘I’m onto it this week,’ Dylan said. ‘Promise. So, where are you right now?’

  ‘In my new bedroom,’ Piper said.

  ‘Mmmm, what’s it like?’

  ‘I’ve got a king-sized bed. Amazing sheets. Mirrors.’

  ‘Oh my god, you’re killing me. I’ll book the tickets tomorrow. Hang on, sweet.’ Piper waited. Dylan must have gone back into the lounge room. The music had been turned up again.

  ‘Is that Beyoncé?’ Piper asked. Loftie usually controlled the iPod at the boys’ place, and he was definitely not a Beyoncé kind of guy.

  ‘It’s the radio,’ Dylan said. ‘Anyway, sweet, I’m feeling pretty chillaxed. Going to go and get some z’s. ‘Night.’

  Piper frowned. Dylan seemed to be in a hurry to hang up. But then again, it was pretty late, and Dylan’s workday started at 6 a.m.

  ‘Love you,’ she said.

  ‘Love you more,’ Dylan cooed.

  A warm feeling washed over her at his familiar reply. She hung up the phone, turned the lamp off and settled herself in the giant bed. She really had to take a leaf out of Dylan’s book. Get chillaxed. She was probably overstimulated because of her weird first day at work.

  She let herself drift, thinking of Dylan’s arms around her. She was so lucky to have him in her life.

  Love you more.

  And then she slept. Like a babe.

  The three receptionists looked just as exquisite on Tuesday morning as they had the day before. In fact, it seemed to Piper that they’d taken glamour to new, soaring heights. Underneath the desk, Piper spied three pairs of killer-high black stilettos that she wouldn’t have even been able to stand in, let alone walk. But then again, Piper reassured herself, looking down at her grey pinstripe skirt and red Mary Janes, they probably don’t have to get around the building very much.

  On the plasma screen behind them, a funny-looking older man with white hair and big black sunglasses was being interviewed.

  ‘Karl Lagerfield,’ Piper said aloud, quite proud that she recognised the designer.

  The black-haired receptionist looked at Piper with raised eyebrows. ‘Karl Lagerfeld,’ she corrected, running her hand over the silver lapels of her black jacket.

  It was too good an opportunity to resist. ‘Best and Less,’ Piper joked, running her hands down her own outfit.

  The receptionist’s face broke into a grin as she answered her next call. It made her look human.

  ‘Hello, Angela speaking,’ she said into the phone, making eye contact with Piper as she said her name, by way of introduction. Piper waved. Walking towards her office and dodging the hallway scrum with a bit more grace than the day before, she felt like she’d cracked the code, or at least part of it. It was a good feeling to know that there was a way to break down barriers with most people – you just had to figure out what it was.

  When Piper reached the fashion department,
Vivian and Lucy were already there. Vivian was looking over Lucy’s shoulder, pointing something out on her computer. In a sequinned black singlet, a skin-tight red pencil skirt that came to her knees and black patent leather pumps, Vivian looked as formidable as ever.

  ‘Morning, Lucy, morning, Viv,’ Piper said.

  Vivian turned around and gave Piper one of her dagger looks. Behind Vivian’s back, Lucy screwed up her face. She held her index fingers together and drew them apart, nodding at Piper like she was doing a charade that told Piper to extend a certain word.

  ‘Ah, I mean, morning, Vivian,’ Piper said, hoping she’d interpreted Lucy’s gesture correctly. Vivian dimmed her glare just a little. Apparently Rose was allowed to shorten Vivian’s name, but that right didn’t extend to Piper. God, Piper was glad Lucy was around to give her the heads up. She had a very strong feeling that Vivian might be an exception; there might not be any way to break down her barrier.

  Just then, Bronwyn appeared at the doorway, struggling her way around a stack of prop boxes that had been parked in the middle of the bustling hallway. She was wearing an unusual red linen dress with a drop waist that seemed to have a bit of the Japanese influence Bronwyn apparently liked to thread through her clothes. Lucy had told Piper how keen Bronwyn was to talk to Vivian about her creations but, so far, she hadn’t built up the courage. Which wasn’t a wonder. No matter how many times she’d been told, Vivian refused to even use the intern’s name. Without even turning around, Vivian clicked her fingers over her shoulder and barked at her. ‘Coffee.’ Even under the shoulder pads, Piper could see Bronwyn’s shoulders sag as she backed away.

  ‘Today I want you,’ Vivian said, clicking her manicured fingers at Piper, ‘to research and collate which celebrities have jumped on the sheer bandwagon in any couture label in the past three months. I want dates, events, locations. You have until noon. Got it?’

  Piper nodded, trying to look serious and sure of herself. She had no idea what a sheer bandwagon was, but she wasn’t going to admit that aloud.