Beneath the Glitter: A Novel (Sophia and Ava London) (28 page)

Liam grinned and rubbed his head. “You’re welcome, Poprock.”

“Or Corn,” Ava said, but Liam didn’t seem to hear.

Hunter said, “I know you talked about doing it at the shelter or somewhere near there, but what about at my family’s place on the beach? The shelter’s small and not set up for it, but our place, you could have two or three times the number of guests.”

“Are you serious?” Sophia asked.

Hunter nodded. “As a friend,” he stressed. “I don’t expect anything. I just—I care about you and want to see you happy.”

“I’m speechless,” Sophia said. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Say yes,”
MM
urged her. “That house is made for a party like this.”
MM
turned his computer so they could see his sketch of the entry of the Ralston house made over like a Roman temple. “And we call it a Beach Bacchanal.”

Sophia looked around the table. “Okay then, yes. And thank you, Hunter.”

“It’s easy,” he said. “You’re also going to need a bank account. I’ll have my guy handle it.”

“He has a guy,” Ava whispered to Sophia.

“I know. He has a lot of guys,” Sophia whispered back.

Ava looked interested and whispered, “What other kinds?”

“You know the rest of us are still here and can understand what you’re saying, right?” Liam whispered at them.

“Did someone say something?” Ava asked, leaning into Liam with a smile.

Lily tapped the headset on her phone and looked up from her iPad. “Okay I’ve got sponsors to cover the liquor, pass hors d’oeuvres, a
DJ
, and a bunch of doves to set free at the end. I’ve also nailed down two dinner packages, one surf lesson package, one dog massage package, and a weekend in a yurt so far for the auction items. What have you guys gotten?”

Everyone stared at her.

“When did you start working on this?”
MM
stammered.

Lily said, “When did we sit down?” When everyone kept staring she started playing with her pearls while explaining, “This is a contact sport for the women in my family. They will all be watching to see how well I do. My cousin Daffodil got sixty-eight auction items for her last benefit, including three involving private dinners with chefs, seven on boats or airplanes, and one with a clown.
A clown.
I intend to crush her.” Lily put a piece of biscuit in her palm and squeezed, turning it to dust. “And I have a secret weapon.”

“Oh? Really, what?” Sophia asked with some trepidation.

Lily’s jaw was set, her eyes gazing over their heads with the kind of strategic look Ava and Sophia had seen in portraits of generals, or on the faces of women right before the doors at the Barneys Warehouse Sale opened. “Our benefit is going to go where no
LA
benefit has gone before. I’m going to get us a Dr. Janus nose job for the auction.” She gave what could only be described as a cackle. “Eat your heart out, Daffodil.”

“And I,” Sven announced proudly, “will get a bouncy castle.”

There was silence around the table.

“Where will you get that, sweetie?”
MM
asked.

“You do not worry,” Sven said, patting him on the leg and beaming at everyone. “I am like Lily. I know men who know men.”

“And that’s my concern,”
MM
told him.

“I’m not sure the doves are a good idea,” Ava told Lily gently, as though she was worried she might insult her. “Since this is an animal rights kind of event.”

But Lily took it well, nodding vigorously. “You’re right. I should have thought of that. Besides, Daffodil had doves at her benefit.” She paused, thinking, and then announced, “Got it!”

“What?” Ava leaned close.

Lily waved her back with one hand, thumbing through screens on her iPad with the other. “You’ll see.”

“No, really, what is it Lily?” Sophia asked, trying to keep her tone light.

Lily smiled again. “It will be a fun surprise.”

Sophia’s and Ava’s eyes met, with twin looks of deep concern, and next to Sophia, Hunter mused, “Is it just me, or do the words ‘fun surprise’ sound different when Lily says them compared to anyone else?”

“It’s not just you,” Sophia assured him.

*   *   *

They went from Toast to Earl’s Court, to enlist the help of the saleswoman who had tweeted about them when they won the Viewer’s Choice Award, and then headed home. On their way Lily called to tell them she’d secured a private dinner for six at the Getty Villa and an afternoon of paintball as other auction prizes. “Dr. Janus is still being cagey on the nose job but I’m going to wear her down, don’t worry.”

Ava hung up the phone. “I don’t think ‘worry’ means the same thing to Lily as it does to me.”

“I’m not sure breathing means the same thing to Lily as it does to us,” Sophia said. “But what she’s doing is amazing.”

They heard a strange noise when they were halfway up the stairs, like Popcorn was wrestling with something. When they got to the landing they froze. Their front door was wide open.

“Call nine-one-one,” Sophia said to Ava.

“That won’t be necessary,” a voice said from inside their house. Lucille Rexford came toward them, pushed by Charles. “I just got tired of waiting outside so I picked the lock.”

They didn’t know which was more incredible, that Lucille Rexford was in their apartment or that she had picked their lock. Their shock at that erased, for a moment, the thought that Lucille Rexford had probably come to give them a piece of her mind, if not serve them papers in a lawsuit.

But now she was grinning over her shoulder and saying, “Charles bet me that it would take me six minutes. Underestimated me, didn’t you, old man?”

“That I did. And I’m going to pay for it.”

Lucille smiled at them now. “I used to be quite a lock picker in my day. Just relieved I haven’t lost the touch.”

“I’m sure everyone is,” Sophia said. “If we’d known you were going to come over we would have arranged to be home.”

“Frankly if I were you, I would have arranged not to be. Not with the shameful, disrespectful way you two acted yesterday,” Lucille Rexford said, suddenly all business. “Come in here now and sit down. We have things to discuss.”

“Is it too late to run?” Ava whispered to Sophia.

Sophia nodded.

Inside they discovered Cuddles, Popcorn, and the kitten curled into one ball together.

“Cuddles has been very anxious since yesterday,” Lucille Rexford said. “He’s been quite worried about the two of you. I told him you were fine but he—that’s why we came. I felt if he saw for himself he’d be able to get back to sleep.”

Ava glanced over at Cuddles who snored once, and snuggled up more tightly with the other two.

“He looks nearly catatonic,” Ava agreed.

“Sit,” Lucille Rexford ordered and Ava and Sophia both dropped onto the couch.

“You really made a hash of everything,” she said, shaking her head.

“We’re both—”

“Just so very—”

“Sorry,” they said, so eager to get it out that they were finishing one another’s sentences.

“Do you know why I wanted you for my company? It wasn’t because you connect well with people, although you do. It was because you were sisters. Real sisters. Sisters who respected one another and saw one another’s flaws and loved one another anyway. You were a team. Now look at you. You are an embarrassment to sisters everywhere.”

“We were,” Ava said. “But we aren’t anymore. We worked it out.”

“Which I’d say actually puts us in the credit to sisters everywhere category,” Sophia said. “Don’t you?”

Ava nodded. Both girls looked at Lucille Rexford.

She gave a sharp nod. “Good. That is what Cuddles wanted to know.” She paused. “I have heard that you are putting together an event to raise money for the pet shelter.”

“Pet Paradise. It’s so old it—”

“I do not care for the sob stories of buildings. I wanted to say—” Her throat seemed to get clogged and she had to cough half a dozen times. “I wanted to say I’m proud of you. And that—apparently your products have inspired quite a following online. In fact, there’s more demand for them now than we had forecasted if the launch had gone as planned. I was thinking LuxeLife could donate a percentage of the profits to your charity. But I wouldn’t want anyone to know.”

“That is incredibly generous—” Ava started to say but Miss Rexford interrupted her.

“You don’t even know what I am going to offer. No one can be sure how much of the product we actually will sell, but given what we have seen I would say that twenty thousand dollars would be conservative. So,
ahem,
why don’t I write you a check for that right now to get you started?”

Ava went over and put her arms around her. “Thank you.”

Miss Rexford looked conspicuously uncomfortable. “That is really—that won’t be necessary. Again.”

“Of course not,” Ava said.

Lucille looked at Sophia. “But if you must hug me too, I guess you must.”

Sophia did.

Lucille adjusted her glasses and said, “Charles, we’ve dillydallied here long enough. We should be going.”

“Of course, Miss Rexford,” Charles said, grinning.

“Will you come to the event?” Sophia asked as they reached the landing.

Lucille looked shocked, or even, Sophia thought, frightened by the question. Her hand over her heart, she said, “Certainly not. Why would I do something like that?” Her voice was curt, designed to cut off any disagreement.

“But thank you for the invitation,” Charles said.

*   *   *

Sophia and Ava had been sitting in their corners of the couch, each working on their computers for some time after Charles and Lucille had left, when Sophia said out of the blue, “Why do you think she’s so determined to be lonely?”

Ava looked up from her computer. “Who?”

“Lucille Rexford.”

“Maybe because she doesn’t have a sister like you,” Ava joked.

But Sophia had a serious look in her eye. “I’m going to help her. I have a gentleman to set her up with.”

“And I’m going to help myself by pretending you didn’t say that, forcing me now to imagine Lucille Rexford making out hot and heavy in the front seat of a car after a date.”

Sophia gave Ava a bemused look. “That’s not how all dates go.”

“Can’t hear you, busy pretending,” Ava sang from a lotus position, her eyes closed, fingers on her knees, and low humming noises coming from her throat like she was meditating.

“I think when people do that, they tend to hum something spiritual, not the chorus to ‘L.A. Sky,’” Sophia whispered in her ear.

“Still can’t hear you,” Ava hummed.

LonDOs

Great friends

Benefit committees

Knowing a guy who knows a guy

Being able to pick locks in less than six minutes

The double-berry French toast at Toast

LuxeLife Message in a Bottle Sea Salt Exfoliating Mask

Chicken and pesto sandwich from Urth Caffé for dinner

Kitty and Popcorn helping Ava meditate

LonDONT’s

The second order of French toast at Toast

Fun surprises by Lily

Having a lock that can be picked in under six minutes

Not remembering people or pet’s names

Not remembering that you are a dog and dogs don’t eat sandwiches

People who do not take other people’s meditation practice seriously

Getting out of the lotus position

25

fancy meeting you hair

Sophia stood at the desk against the back wall of the Max Houck Gallery practicing her signature, with Ava at her side. From the open door of the office behind them they could hear assistants leaving reminder messages for gallery
VIP
s about the opening that night and the soft tinkling of caterers setting out wineglasses filtered in from the next room. Otherwise they had the large white-walled, concrete-floored place to themselves.

Sophia was wearing skinny jeans, sky-skimming high heels, and a gold sequined top.

Ava watched Sophia sign her name with a looping S, and then again with a more reserved forward one. Ava was wearing a long gunmetal-gray silk sheath with a horse silk-screened on the front in silver and a black leather arm cuff studded with gems
MM
had made for her. No one seeing the sisters would have said they were bland. But the most important thing about them wasn’t anything they were wearing. It was a new sense of maturity and confidence about them and between them, as though they’d been through an ordeal together and were stronger, more solid than they had been before.

And having more fun.

“That reminds me of when I was younger and I used to practice writing ‘Mrs. Liam Carlson’ all over my notebook,” Ava said. “Swirly or not swirly? Heart over the I or no heart?”

Sophia jokingly dotted her name with a heart.

“I dare you,” Ava said.

“No way,” Sophia said, writing her name again, this time in a more severe, up and down architectural style. “How is Mrs. Liam Carlson looking these days?” When Ava didn’t answer, Sophia glanced over at her. “Are things with Liam okay?”

Ava nodded slowly. “We have a lot in common.”

“I’m betting well over five hundred things now.”

Ava elbowed her. “That’s not what I meant. But yeah, that too.” She stopped. “Although I’m starting to worry I have attachment issues.”

Sophia kept practicing, not quite happy yet. “Have you been reading the
Psychology Today
Web site again? Remember last time you did that, you diagnosed Popcorn with early onset dementia.”

“He has many of the symptoms,” Ava pointed out, enumerating them on her fingers. “He forgets whether or not he’s eaten, he spends a lot of time revisiting places he’s just been, and his attention wanders when you’re talking to him. You could be in the middle of a sentence and
wham,
he’s off sniffing your shoe. Just because those are also the symptoms of being a dog doesn’t mean I wasn’t right.”

“Excellent point, your diagnostic skills are unchallenged. So tell me about your attachment disorder.”