SIXTEEN

Reese gripped the newspaper and savagely tore it to shreds, throwing the small pieces to the floor as if she were a bratty two-year-old. The only thing stopping her from having an all-out meltdown was a blistering headache, which was also the by-product of too much cheap red wine consumed the night before. Any sobbing and heaving would only add insidious pressure at her temples, thus more pain, and since last month she’d had enough.

Reese figured that Chris had sat on the scandalous story and photo to strategically leak it as a negotiating ploy, sending a message to her and her attorney that they needed to settle on his terms. Given the prenuptial agreement, the fact that Reese was caught in flagrante, and her less-than-stellar track record as a mother, Chris definitely held all the cards and was now playing his trump.

In a few short weeks she’d slid from her lofty perch atop the world, down a slippery slope right into the depths of hell, and she’d never even seen the precipice that loomed before her. In this deep abyss, she was without money or credit cards; Chris had cut them all off. She had no fancy house, and even her lover, Shaun, was gone with the wind; he hadn’t returned any of her urgent phone calls since that fateful night.

She’d had to beg Paulette to let her stay at her New York loft apartment. When begging didn’t initially work, she’d resorted to a subtle form of blackmail; after all, she had caught Max, Paulette’s cousin’s husband, tipping out of their love nest. She didn’t come right out and blackmail her, but the insinuation was so clear that Stevie Wonder could have seen it clearly.

“What the hell are you doing?” Paulette walked in from the airport to find Reese ruminating amid her ruins, a smorgasbord of empty doughnut boxes, discarded tissues, and partially eaten plates of food. “I agreed to let you stay here, but I didn’t say you could trash the place. Hell, I just bought this apartment.” She tossed her brand-new Louis Vuitton carry-on onto the leather sofa.

“I’m finished,” Reese cried, grabbing fistfuls of hair. “Did you see today’s Post?” She was half hoping that Paulette would say no; then she could hold out some hope that she wasn’t the butt of jokes for all of New York.

“Yeah, I saw it,” Paulette said, shaking her head in disbelief. “That shit’s pretty fucked-up.” Her summation was proclaimed without any emotion or empathy for her suffering friend.

Reese rolled her eyes and barked, “Like I don’t know it?” The scintillating story, detailing how superstar Knicks player Chris Nolan’s wife was busted at a Midtown hotel with another man, had leaked to the press, along with a most unflattering picture of Reese looking like a drowned raccoon washed up outside of the Four Seasons Hotel. The headline read, “Baller’s Wife Caught Way Out of Bounds.”

Reese wasn’t sure which was more upsetting to her; the sordid story, or the horrid picture. She looked a dreadful mess. Certainly it was one thing to be caught up in a seedy scandal, but quite another to look bad while doing it. It was morbidly unfair, since Reese was never seen in public looking less than fabulous, and the one time she’d been forced to, because of a faulty hotel alarm, it had ruined her life.

“You’ve gotta stop sitting around here feeling sorry for yourself and come up with a plan.” Paulette plopped down on the sofa. Truth be told, things were going so well for her that it was hard to feel sincere sympathy for Reese. Plus, she was sick and tired of picking up the pieces for these spoiled-rotten divas. Both Reese and Gillian had always strutted around as if they were holier-than-thou, yet both were now living under her new roofs.

Paulette wasn’t telling Reese anything she didn’t already know, but it was a tad difficult to come up with a solid plan when the world was crumbling down around you. “I know; I’ve gotta get a new lawyer.”

The Post article had the desired effect. She’d just gotten word from her old one that without payment, which she didn’t have, he wouldn’t be doing any more work. Undoubtedly he had little faith that she’d end up with anything worthy of his time. “And I need you to work on my publicity again. My image has to be scrubbed clean before I can ever dream of a decent settlement,” she said.

“How can you afford my monthly retainer when you have no money?” Paulette cruelly reminded her.

Reese wanted to slap her, but remembered that she could attract more bees with honey than with vinegar, and right now she needed a whole colony. “I know that I can’t pay you right now, but after the settlement I’ll pay your fee, plus a bonus,” she said sweetly.

Just the thought of her divorce settlement ramped up Reese’s headache. The no-cheat clause in the prenup applied to both of them, so her little rendezvous with Shaun could cost her the millions that she had been sure to get if she’d simply divorced Chris. Of course, now she wished she’d done just that, rather than bothering to try setting him up to get more. This shifted her thoughts to Kira; she was still missing in action. She hadn’t heard from her friend since the night before all hell broke loose.

“So, will you do my PR?” Reese implored.

Paulette leaned back, kicked off her Chanel pumps, and carefully considered the situation. Though they were friends, this was business. What exactly did she have to gain from helping Reese? The answer wasn’t money, at least, not at the moment. The woman didn’t have any, and frankly her prospects weren’t looking so hot for the future either, especially now that Paulette was independently wealthy herself. Besides, there was no prestige in representing the whore wife of a superstar ball player. On the other hand, she needed to get Reese on her feet so that she could march her right out of the door, but she couldn’t push her, or, knowing Reese, she might slip and tell Laura about Max, and it was too soon for that. In a matter of seconds, all of these permutations sifted effortlessly through Paulette’s calculating brain, and she came to a rapid conclusion. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll do it, but let’s leave it off the record.” What PR person needed a famous ball player as an enemy, especially when she wasn’t getting paid for the trouble?

This gave Reese a glimmer of hope, so she allowed herself to take another leap. “What about Max—you think he’ll help with my legal work?” When she saw the word no about to form on Paulette’s lips, she pressed ahead. “Think about it; The sooner I get a cash settlement, the sooner I’ll be out of your—and his—way.” This was a slick way of extending her extortion to Max’s side of the ledger.

Paulette did not miss the thinly veiled threat. “I’ll talk to him about it, but for either of us to be able to help you, I need to know exactly what happened.” Paulette’s well-honed PR instincts told her that there was much more to the story than she’d heard or read, and to help Reese, she’d have to know all of the skeletons that rattled around in her closet, not to mention that she was just plain old nosy.

“Chris and I had been having some problems, and I met someone else—”

Paulette quickly interrupted her; she didn’t need to hear a canned speech. “Tell me what really happened.”

Reese weighed her options, just as Paulette had minutes earlier. She could hide the sordid details, which would probably not gain her anything, or she could confide in Paulette and Max and, with their help, figure out some way to get out of the mess she’d gotten into.

“I can’t help you, nor can Max, unless we know everything,” Paulette lectured. “And you have to realize that some things that you may not think are important could be crucial. So tell me everything.”

After careful consideration, Reese made a decision. She took a deep breath and jumped in, telling Paulette the whole sordid tale.