Everyone Worth Knowing (25 page)

booth at EJ's after an hour-long wait. I was famished enough to

order one of everything on the menu, but I was enjoying my stillthin

figure too much to jeopardize it now. I'd managed to cut out

all trips to Dylan's and even most of my morning bacon, egg, and

cheeses—with the occasional Slim Jim acting as my only real indulgence—

and it was almost starting to feel normal to police myself

with food. Which only made it all the weirder when Penelope ordered

the way we always had—three-egg cheese omelet with

bacon and hash browns, accompanied by a short stack of chocolate-

chip pancakes and a baby fistful of oozing, melted butter. She

raised her eyebrows when I ordered an egg-white omelet with

spinach and tomatoes and two slices of dry whole-wheat toast, but

she kindly refrained from commenting, with the single exception

of a murmur: "Elisa influence much?" I ignored her wan smile and

changed the subject.

"Is everything okay with you and Avery?" I asked as sympathetically

as I could, wanting very much to draw her out and not

sound critical. I'd helplessly watched them leave Sanctuary, knowing

how upset she was but feeling powerless to do anything but

watch. When she'd called early this morning, I immediately ducked

out of my standing Sunday brunch plans with Will and Simon and

jumped in a cab downtown.

She avoided my eyes and instead concentrated on slicing her

pancakes into small, even pieces. Slice, spear, mouth, repeat. I

watched this cycle three times before she spoke. "Everything's just

fine," she said tonelessly. "Once he explained everything to me, I

could see that last night was just a big misunderstanding."

"I'm sure. It must have been surprising to see him there when

you weren't expecting it," I prompted, hoping to elicit some sort of

acknowledgment from her.

She laughed without pleasure. "Well, you know Avery. Likely

to crop up just about anywhere, any time of the night. It's good

one of us is social, I suppose, or else we'd drive each other crazy

sitting in the apartment all the time."

I didn't know where to go with that, so I just nodded.

"What about you? Looked like you were having fun when I left,

talking to Elisa and Philip. Was it a good night?"

I stared at her, thinking about how awkward I'd felt with Elisa

and Philip, as if I were a trespasser in a members-only world—a

feeling that had become pretty familiar to me since I'd joined Kelly

& Company. I thought about how I'd gotten in the cab and argued

to be dropped off alone and how—much to my surprise—Philip

hadn't argued back, not one bit. I thought about how empty my

apartment had seemed when I got home, and how even Millington

curled up beside me in bed didn't make me feel much better. And

I looked at Penelope and wondered just when, exactly, we had

grown so far apart.

"It was all right, I guess. I was hoping to hang out with you

more . . . " I stopped short when I realized it sounded accusatory.

She lifted her gaze and looked at me sharply. "I'm sorry, I

wasn't expecting the situation with Avery. Also, I would have loved

for it to be us, going out, like we used to, but you were the one

who had us meet up with all your work friends to scout the location.

It seems like they're omnipresent these days."

"Pen, I'm sorry, I didn't mean for it to sound like that. I was just

saying that I'd rather hang out with you any day. After you left, it just

got worse. Philip was babysitting some girl from home and 1 shared

a cab home with them because I didn't want to start a big scene at

the club, but then people saw me getting in the backseat, and I felt

like shit. Oh, and Abby, too. It was just a giant mess and I wish I'd

left when you did."

"So did you go home with him? Where did the girl sleep?"

"No, I just got in the cab because it seemed easier than listening

to him throw a fit. I made them drop me off first, but people

watching would never know that."

"Why didn't you go home with him? And who's 'people'?" I

could tell she was trying to keep everyone straight, but she hadn't

even met all the players.

"Well," I lied, "I'm not sure I'm ready to get involved in Philip's

world. He's tied in to just about everyone and everything at work,

which makes it all even weirder."

"I wouldn't know. You didn't introduce me," she said lightly.

I felt the reprimand and knew she was right, but I didn't want

to turn it into a big discussion. "No? Last night was a little hectic.

Trust me, you're not missing much. He's gorgeous, that much you

saw, but otherwise he's your basic spoiled party kid, just with a

fantastic accent. Damn shame he's so cute, though." I sighed

audibly.

"Well, that little speech sounds all well and good, my dear, but

you should've seen your face when he walked in with that model.

I thought you'd die. You like him, don't you? Admit it."

I didn't know how to say that of course something attracted me

to him, but something simultaneously repelled me. I didn't want to

say aloud how flattered I was that someone like Philip could want

someone like me, even if he didn't seem to be all that great of a

guy. I didn't want to explain the entire situation at work, how I

suspected Elisa might be jealous that Philip was interested in me,

or how Kelly had seemed ready and willing to whore me out to

Philip because it meant good things for the business. I just

shrugged and salted my omelet, making sure to fix my coffee cup

to my lips so I wouldn't have to say anything just yet.

Penelope understood that I wasn't going to get into it then. It

was the first and only time in the nearly nine years we'd been

friends that I could remember both of us sitting at a table and willingly

withholding information from each other. She'd refused to tell

me her real feelings about her relationship with Avery; I'd taken a

pass on commenting on Philip. We sat in a comfortable enough but

foreign-feeling silence until she said, "I know I don't know the entire

situation, and of course I know you're more than capable of

handling everything yourself, but please, for me, just be careful?

I'm sure Philip is a perfectly nice guy, but I've seen enough with

Avery's friends and now your work friends to know that the whole

scene just freaks me out. Nothing concrete, but I worry about you,

you know?"

She placed her hand over mine and I knew we'd get back to

our old selves at some point. In the meantime, we'd have to settle

for thinking about each other from afar.

11

"Okay, kids, quiet down," Kelly announced as she tottered into

the conference room in the high heels she wore every single day.

"Did everyone have a chance to read their Dirt Alerts already?"

"Sure did," piped up Leo from the other end of the glass table

that looked like it belonged more in a W hotel than in an office.

"Seems like our favorite new staffer got herself another mention."

I felt the familiar loopiness in my stomach begin its rounds.

I'd been ten minutes late this morning and hadn't yet read the Dirt

Alert, obviously a major misstep on my part. One of the assistants

specifically got in every morning by six A.M. to create the day's

Dirt Alert for all of us—a sort of survey of all the columns, papers,

and stories that might, in some way, be related to our clients

or industry—and place them on our desks by nine A.M., but everyone

generally scanned all the websites when they first got up in

the morning, skimming quickly between Drudge, Page Six, Liz

Smith, Rush & Molloy,
USA Today, Variety,
New York Scoop, an

assortment of blogs and columns, and a few of the bigger trade

headlines. It's best to know early if something bad happened and

your phone was going to ring off the hook, so the Dirt Alert was

more of a formality than any sort of breaking news. The only really

relevant information we got each morning was the Celeb Alert,

which included information on who's in town, why they're here,

where they're staying (and under what name), and how to best

contact them to bribe or beg them to attend an event. Four straight

weeks of logging on to analyze every imaginable website within

five seconds of waking up—supplemented by a professional report

a few hours later—and the one day I wasn't fully informed

of all the late-breaking gossip, of course, was the only one that

mattered.

"Urn, I haven't had a chance to see it yet this morning. And besides,

I can't imagine what could be in there, considering I was

checking out Sanctuary this weekend—with all of you—right up

until I went home. Alone," I added quickly, as though I owed my

coworkers this explanation.

"Well, let's see here," Kelly said, picking up a printout of the

online column. " 'New Kelly & Company employee seems determined

to fit in with her hard-partying coworkers. Sources say the

event planner's unnamed new girl—supposedly scoping out Sanctuary

on Saturday night as a potential venue for the ultra hushhush

Playboy
party—mixed business and pleasure when she left

with Philip Weston and an unidentified model. Their final destination?

We have our ideas.' . . ." Kelly let the last words trail off and

turned to grin at me.

I felt myself turn crimson.

"What, exactly, is it implying? Because so far I haven't heard

one remotely true statement. And who the hell wrote that?"

"Ellie Insider, of course. There's a picture of you climbing into

the cab with Philip and this absolutely gorgeous girl, so I guess it's

not hard to figure out what she's suggesting. . . . " Kelly continued

smiling. She looked like she couldn't be any happier.

Was it utterly bizarre to be discussing this in our weekly staff

meeting, called today supposedly to discuss work events?

"Kelly, I'm really sorry for any impact any of this stuff has had

on you or the company. Honestly, I don't know why anyone

would care, but in all seriousness, it's just not happening like—"

" 'The newest It Girl, an associate at Kelly & Company.' Do you

realize how huge that is? Hopefully next time they'll use your

name. They probably just couldn't confirm it in time since you're

not on the industry roster yet."

I noticed Elisa was having trouble smiling.

"Not only that, but it says the rest of us are hard-partying," Leo

chimed in proudly.

"And it plugs the
Playboy
party!" Skye added.

"I just don't know who would give them that information," I

muttered. "It's not even true."

"Bette, honey, I don't care if it's true, I just care that it's being

covered. You've done wonderful things for the team in the short

amount of time you've been with us. Plus, Danny will be thrilled

about the plug for the club. Keep up the good work." And with