Philadelphia Noir - Carlin Romano [42]
She turned to Leah, who appeared stricken, and hissed, “You’re so jealous, you can’t stand to see me happy. You’re toxic.”
Beth didn’t mention the ridiculous accusation to Alex. They’d spent the evening in bed in her cramped apartment, and now she straddled him, teasing him, bringing him closer and closer to climax and suddenly stopping. She pushed his hands down with her hands.
“I want to go to Paris.”
“Let’s talk later,” he said, breathless.
“I. Want. To. Go.” With each syllable she pushed his hands down harder.
Alex shook his head no, shutting his eyes tight and scrunching his face, but finally opened them.
“You can be independent?”
She nodded.
“You can see the most romantic city in the world on your own some of the time?”
She nodded.
“You can spend some nights alone if need be?”
She took her hands out of his to slam her fists down on the mattress in protest, but then nodded with a pout.
Alex shook his head as if unable to believe the words coming out of his mouth: “Come to Paris with me.”
Beth shrieked and threw her arms around him again.
“Come to Paris, Beth.” They kissed, and between kisses Alex spoke with some desperation. “Please, just don’t stop what you were doing before.”
Beth smiled. “No?”
“No.”
“No?” She started rocking back and forth on top of him.
“Never,” Alex said. “Never.”
They made a plan not to spend their own money for Paris.
“We’d do best hitting someone who can take a substantial cash advance,” Alex advised.
This involved knowing someone’s PIN, however, and there was only one person whose code either of them knew: Leah. She’d mentioned to Beth once that she used the last four digits of her childhood phone number, which Beth remembered. So Beth gave an Oscar-worthy performance—actable objective: to make up with a friend. Then she took Leah’s card and scored a $5,000 advance.
Alex was impressed. “With friends like you, who needs thieves,” he said one night over dinner, contemplating Beth with what seemed like wistfulness. “You really are amazing. A quick study, I might add. A cut above the rest.”
Alex was handling the tickets, taking some of the cash to New York when he went on business and going through an old friend, a trusted travel agent. He’d get back on the 22nd or 23rd and they’d leave December 24th.
Beth had never been happier. She bought gifts for family and friends, including Leah, who was dealing with the headache of identity theft, and gifts for herself. More dresses, more shoes, even a cute fox-trimmed jacket from Jacques Ferber.
“Wow. Are you moonlighting to buy all these clothes?” Valerie joked on their last day at work before the holiday.
“Trunk sale,” Beth answered without looking up from her computer screen. But then she got scared. Police showed up at Morris, Kent, and Fleischer around noon and Beth had no idea what they were investigating. Valerie’s card? Gerald Mitchell’s? Someone else’s? At one point the cops questioned Beth and Valerie together. A young blue-eyed officer with a mustache leaned toward them with an air of confidentiality.
“Notice anyone around the office who’s been acting different lately? Dressing different?”
Beth’s chest tightened.
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Valerie said, then looked intently at Beth.
The officer looked at Beth too, waiting for her to speak.
“Nothing unusual,” she confirmed, adding, “I’m famished. Could I go to lunch now?”
The cops left, but the bad news didn’t stop.
“I’m stuck in New York another day,” Alex said when he called. “Possibly two.”
“But we leave in two days!”
“There’s nothing I can do. Family stuff. I’ll explain later. In Paris, mon amour.”
That night Beth stole the show with her performance as Princess Kosmonopolis, in a state of nervous collapse when Chance threatened to leave her for his true love, the younger Heavenly. The acting teacher loved it. Everyone had drinks at