“A horse,” she answered.
Poof. Like magic. A Shetland pony with a silky white mane.
A dollhouse? Poof. The size of a bungalow, it was fit for a princess, the daughter of a king.
Fireworks? Poof. Rockets soaring from the front lawn, turning the neighborhood into a carnival.
Until it all went to hell, to use her mother's expression.
How could it have happened? Lord-Griffin Construction Company was booming. Her father and his partner, Harold Griffin, were building high-rise condos on both coasts of Florida, making tons of money, living in a pate and white wine world. The two couples-Harold and Phyllis Griffin, Nelson and Irene Lord-were best friends. Their two children-Hal, Jr., and Victoria-were inseparable from the time they were toddlers. The future seemed preordained. Private jets, Caribbean villas, a life of privilege and comfort.
“Until your father cracked.”
Another one of her mother's expressions.
There had been a grand jury investigation. A scandal in the Broward County Building and Zoning Department. Allegations of code violations and payoffs, bribery and extortion. Nelson was subpoenaed to testify.
Then, one horrible night, the call to Victoria at boarding school. Her mother's voice: “Your father's gone.”
Gone where? For how long?
Gone forever.
The fall was twenty-two stories from the roof of a condo under construction in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea.
Now, thinking back, Victoria realized how those experiences pushed her toward a man of moderate sensibilities. A clearheaded man, and if he was a tad boring, well, that was the trade-off. We don't get to choose our fathers, but we can learn from them in choosing our husbands, she believed. Of one thing she was certain: Bruce would never bail on her or himself. He was as safe and comfy as a terry-cloth bathrobe. She didn't need fireworks on the lawn, and as for fireworks in the bedroom, that never lasted, anyway, right?
In Bruce, she had a man of solid normalcy. A straight-arrow of a man who adored her. So even if he didn't comprehend how getting fired had crushed her self-confidence and wounded her pride, even if he didn't say precisely the right things, she forgave him.
Victoria banged the palm of her hand against the side of the printer. It didn't say “Ouch,” and the green light still didn't come on. Dammit, she had to get her resumes out. How long could she go without a paycheck? She was afraid to look at the monthly statement from the bank.
No problem. I can always find the hidden diamonds.
The thought brought a rueful smile to Victoria's face. It's what her mother always said when money was tight. The “hidden diamonds” reflected The Queen's dreamy personality, Victoria thought. Her apartment-now Victoria's-was on an upper floor of the first high-rise built on Brickell Avenue, overlooking Biscayne Bay. Victoria remembered her mother telling her tales about the apartment's first tenant, long before the building converted to condo and the street turned into a forest of ritzy skyscrapers.
“Murph the Surf lived here,” her mother had said, with a tone of awe.
She explained that Jack Murphy was a surfer, violinist, tennis pro
… and amateur jewel thief. Victoria listened with wide eyes to the tale of Murph pulling a massive heist- breaking into a New York museum and spiriting away the Star of India, the world's largest sapphire, plus a bunch of diamonds.
“They caught Murph, got back the Star of India and most of the other jewels,” her mother told her. “Most, but not all.” This is where The Queen would lower her voice, as if people in the next apartment were listening through the walls. “He hid the rest of the diamonds right here, right in this building. If things get tough, no problem. I can always find the hidden diamonds.”
From time to time, usually after a bit of sherry, The Queen would chisel holes in the stucco walls, pop open recessed ceilings, and pry the covers off old light fixtures. But the diamonds, if they existed at all, seemed destined to be hidden longer than the treasures of King Tut.
These days, Irene Lord's diamonds came from a succession of wealthy, older suitors. She chose not to marry any of them, content to be escorted to various glam spots around the world. The last time she had called, The Queen was happily ensconced in a fancy spa in Johannesburg, recovering from her latest installments of plastic surgery. She informed Victoria she wouldn't be home for Christmas, something about a side trip to Zurich for injections of sheep hormones.
Victoria believed she had a more practical streak than her mother. At least, that's what she told herself as the TROUBLE light on the printer flashed red.
Damn the printer and damn the legal profession and damn Steve Solomon.
Yep, thoughts of Murph the Surf had morphed into thoughts of Steve the Sleaze. He'd gotten her fired.
No. Strike that. It wasn't Solomon's fault. He had warned her, even while he taunted her for her inability to act spontaneously.
“Sometimes you have to wing it.”
And he'd been right, damn him. If only she had a second chance, she could handle it. She would slough off his stunts with a patient smile and a wry comment. The judge would admire her aplomb. The jury would sympathize, poor girl having to put up with such an obnoxious prick. But there would be no second chance. What was it about Solomon that so provoked her?
The ringing doorbell interrupted her thoughts.
“Who is it?”
“George Clooney!” cried a woman's voice. “Naked and bearing gifts.”
Victoria unlatched the door. “With a three-day beard?”
“Just enough to chafe your inner thighs.” Jacqueline Tuttle laughed and breezed in, carrying a cardboard tray from Starbucks. “Which reminds me, do you have any Monistat in the medicine chest?”
“I don't think so.”
“Damn. Last time I sit in the Jacuzzi for three hours.” Jacqueline placed the tray on the kitchen table. “Frappuccinos, extra whipped cream, carrot cake with double icing.”
“You're a godsend, Jackie. I'm starving.”
“I was in the neighborhood. Got the listing on a penthouse at the Santa Maria. Two million five.”
“Great.”
“Plus I'm showing a three-bedroom at Bristol Tower at noon and checking an open house at Espirito Santo at one. Ever notice that the way Bristol Tower tapers at the top, it looks like a forty-story penis?”
“No, but now that you mention it…”
“Circumcised, of course.” Jackie's laugh crackled like kindling on a fire. She looked around the apartment, which was unusually dark for a bayfront condo. “You ever think about updating this place?”
“I can't afford to update my manicure, and if I don't get my resumes out-”
“That's what we need to talk about. I've got some advice for you.”
Uh-oh, Victoria thought. Jackie Tuttle might be her best friend, but sometimes Victoria wondered what the two of them had in common. Jackie was uninhibited and bawdy and laughed loud and often. Victoria had never seen her depressed, not even when her slime of an ex-boyfriend, Carlos, wrecked her BMW convertible on the Don Shula Expressway while getting head from a Hooters girl he'd picked up at an airport bar.
“No problem,” Jackie had told Victoria. “I get a new car from the insurance. The cop who investigated the accident asked me out. And Carlos' reattachment surgery didn't take.”
That was Jackie, making a Prada purse out of a sow's ear.
She was five-foot-ten and had a wild mane of dyed red hair. She owned a collection of immense dangling earrings, some of which reached her shoulders and enough Blahnik, Choos, and Chanel shoes, boots, sandals, stilettos, flats, pumps, and Mary Janes to make Sarah Jessica Parker jealous.
Today she wore a leather mini with a cropped tank top and knee-high Stephanie Kelian boots in a soft, buttery suede. Most women Jackie's size would have shied away from such an outfit. Jackie didn't care. She was happily, gloriously plump, with natural breasts she called her “bazooms,” which jiggled when she laughed and popped out of her top when she water-skied. Just above her left breast was a small tattoo of Cupid, firing an arrow at whoever happened to be in close proximity.
