Fall from Grace Read online

“No, not as a salesgirl. I’m designing. Not at your level, of course. I can’t expect that. I’ve been out of the business for a long time.”

  “So for whom?” Sabrina tried to get her to the point, but she thought her mother seemed guilty and uncomfortable, and she hadn’t looked them in the eye.

  “I know you won’t approve, either of you. But beggars can’t be choosers. And that’s what I am now. The employment agencies I went to had nothing for me, and said I’ve been out of the industry for too long. I took the only offer I got, at a very decent salary. For Paul Zeller. I wouldn’t have told you, but I’m leaving for Beijing to see their factories in three days. And I didn’t want to just disappear.” She felt better having gotten it off her chest, and Sabrina gasped, sat back in her chair, and stared at her with a fierce expression.

  “Oh my God, why didn’t you talk to us first?”

  “I did before I called Paul. And you both jumped down my throat. I need a job, girls. I have to work now. I don’t have a choice, and he gave me a good one, and is paying me more than I deserve after being out of it for so long. No one is going to hire me to be a head designer, the number two, or even an assistant at a major house. And I don’t care what you say, there’s merit to what he does. And his head design consultant is fantastic. I’m going to China with him. His name is Ed Chin and he’s from Hong Kong. We’re stopping off there on the way back.” She had a whole new life now, and hadn’t consulted them. It upset them both.

  “Do you have any idea how embarrassing this is for us?” Sabrina said in a belligerent tone. “It reflects on us to have you work for a crap house like that.” Sophie didn’t appear quite as upset, just disappointed. But Sabrina was furious.

  “It’s not a crap house,” Sydney insisted, “and he might let me do some signature pieces, using my old name.”

  “Of course he will. He’s exploiting you, and trading on your name and the house you used to work for to lend cachet to the garbage he sells.” There was no convincing them, and Sophie looked almost as unhappy as her sister. Sabrina just had a faster, sharper mouth, and had jumped in first, speaking for them both.

  “I’m sorry you don’t approve,” Sydney said simply. “This is what I’m doing and I thought you should know. I’ll send you my itinerary before I leave.” Her daughters sat at the table in glum silence, although they insisted on paying for dinner. The evening had ended on a very sour note. She kissed the girls when they left one another.

  In the cab after dinner, Sabrina was beside herself. “You have to give her credit for finding a job,” Sophie said generously.

  “Do you realize what it will look like if someone at Women’s Wear Daily finds out? Her name will be mud and ours by association,” Sabrina said, looking desperate.

  “Don’t be so self-centered,” Sophie chided her. “She has to pay her rent somehow, and she’s being very brave. She’s not sitting home crying. She’s out working. You’ve got to admire her for it.”

  “I don’t admire her judgment,” Sabrina said sternly, with a worried expression. “Let’s hope no one finds out, or makes the connection to us.” She dropped Sophie off first, and then went to her empty apartment, still angry at her mother. She didn’t like the idea of her going to China either. It would be dangerous and exhausting for her, and anything could happen.

  Sabrina sent Sydney a blistering email telling her what a terrible idea it was for her to work for Lady Louise, and what a fool she had been to fall into Zeller’s trap. She said that their mother was disgracing both her daughters, and they would be mortified to tell anyone where she worked. They used to be proud to tell people in the fashion industry that their mother was Sydney Smith, and now she was debasing herself and them. She read the email with tears in her eyes.

  When she thought about it, Sydney wasn’t just angry at her daughters, she was even angrier at Andrew than she had been until now. No matter how vicious his daughters were and how easy it was to focus her anger on them for throwing her out of her home, it was Andrew who had put her in this position, by not writing a will after he married her. It came back to him. The twins couldn’t be her only scapegoat anymore. Andrew had a part in this too. It had started with him and his failure to provide for her. She was furious with him, as she lay awake in bed. It was his fault that her own daughters were angry at her now. She had no allies left, and no friends, no money, and no one to turn to for help. All she had was a job. Her girls hated her for it. But at least she had that, no matter what the girls thought of it.

  Sabrina was angry at Andrew too. After doing so much for them, he had behaved irresponsibly and left their mother in a hell of a mess. And now look at what she’d done. All because of him. She was far angrier at Andrew than at her mother, who was being naïve about Paul Zeller, and thought of him as some kind of hero for giving her a job. None of them were heroes in Sabrina’s eyes, and Andrew least of all, for leaving her mother unprotected in a world of sharks. And from all she had heard in the industry, Paul Zeller was the king of sharks, and her mother had no idea what she was doing by working for him. And the last thing Sabrina wanted was for her mother to get hurt, even more than she already was.

  Chapter 5

  The plane took off from Kennedy Airport for Beijing, and Ed and Sydney were in business class together. Paul provided business class to his top executives for long trips, and Ed always upgraded his ticket to first class at his own expense on the New York to Hong Kong leg of the trip. But he had graciously decided to fly business with Sydney, and they chatted for a while as they ate a meal, and then Ed watched a movie and Sydney fell asleep. She woke up after several hours and Ed was working on his computer, getting ready for their meetings. He briefed her on some of the people they would meet. Ed thought about work all the time, and liked to be prepared for every possibility, which was why he was so good at what he did and why Paul trusted him so much.

  “Did you tell your daughters about the trip?” he asked her when they were finished, and she nodded. “How did that go?” He knew she had been worried about telling them about her job.

  “Not so well,” she sighed. Sophie had sent her an email the day after Sabrina’s. It was more gently said, but the underlying message was just as harsh. Their conclusion was that by working for Lady Louise, she was an embarrassment to them both. But they weren’t paying her bills, and there had been no other options for a job. “They’re fashion snobs. They don’t approve of what we do.” Sydney had had no part in the knockoffs so far, but it was what the house was famous for, and she didn’t try to deny it. But she still insisted that there was a valid market for what they did, and women with small budgets had a right to good fashion too.

  “Maybe they’ll come around,” he said kindly. He liked her. She was smart, sensible, easy to work with, and a good designer. And even though she hadn’t worked in a long time, she was talented and professional to the core. He could also sense that she was an honorable woman and loved her daughters, and their disapproval was painful for her. She worked hard, she had turned out to be even more dedicated than he originally thought she’d be. She was willing to put in endless hours, just as he did, and wanted to learn as much as she could about the business.

  “I doubt it,” Sydney said, looking sad about her daughters. “They can be very stubborn, and they’re backing each other up on this. My older daughter says it could even impact her job if someone finds out I work for Lady Louise. I would hate for that to happen. But I don’t want to give up this job just to please them.” And she couldn’t afford to. The money in her checking account had almost run out. She needed the job desperately.

  “I hope you don’t quit,” he said fervently and meant it. “They’ll calm down. Some people are such purists and elitists about fashion, especially at the high end of the industry. It’s ridiculous sometimes. I saw it at the other houses I worked for. And everyone told me I was crazy when I took this job. I was afraid they might be right, but I love it, and it’s been a great experience. I learned a lot I wouldn’t
have otherwise. Paul and I don’t always see eye to eye, but he’s a good person to work for, as long as you set clear boundaries about what you will and won’t do. He respects that. He’s a very fair boss. And he listens when I tell him I think we’ve gone too far copying someone’s designs. He always pulls back.”

  Sydney was relieved to hear it and that Ed thought her daughters were wrong. She had come to respect him in the short time she’d worked for him, and she was convinced her daughters would like him too, if they ever met, which seemed doubtful now. They wanted no part of her job or her new life, or the people in it.

  —

  They’d been booked on a flight to Beijing with a three-hour layover in Hong Kong. Sydney was tired after the sixteen-hour flight but had slept for half of it, and did some shopping in the airport before they took off again. They were booked into the Fairmont Hotel in Beijing, where Ed usually stayed, in the Chaoyang District. They spent a night there to recover from the trip, and then flew a half hour to Shijiazhuang the next day, where Lady Louise’s factories were. The hotel there was a lot less pleasant and less comfortable, and not a single person spoke English. Sydney was completely dependent on Ed, who spoke fluent Mandarin. But at the factories, which were impeccably run, there were a few people she was able to speak to, and she asked many questions to better understand the volume they dealt with, the problems they faced, and what they needed from the designers. She wanted to learn the business from the ground up, and Ed was impressed. They spent two weeks in Shijiazhuang, going to the factory every day, and then traveled to a different city to look at another factory Paul wanted to buy. Ed wasn’t enthusiastic about it, and said it would cost them a fortune to bring it up to their standards. After two and a half weeks in mainland China, they headed for Hong Kong, which was a whole different world.

  The moment they stepped off the plane and walked through the airport, Sydney knew she was in a fascinating place that was an intoxicating mix of cultures: British, European, and Chinese, with a million subtle variations. The people were sophisticated, the stores fabulous, it was easy to communicate, and Ed’s family had sent their Bentley and driver to pick them up. He had invited her to stay at his parents’ house with him, and insisted it would be no trouble and that they were anxious to meet her. Their home was enormous and in the Victoria Peak area of town, with beautiful views of the harbor and the city. There was an army of servants to tend to them, the house was magnificently decorated in a combination of English, French, and Chinese antiques, and the guest suite they put her in had a spectacular view and was the most elegant, comfortable room she’d ever stayed in. Seeing it all, she couldn’t understand why Ed wanted to live and work in the States, and she said as much to him. He smiled at her when he answered.

  “It’s easy to get spoiled here, and my parents still treat me like I’m twelve.” He was an only child, and his father and two uncles ran the family empire. His mother was a beautiful, cultured woman who had studied art history in Paris. She was one of the most stunning women Sydney had ever seen, and she had a long rope of imperial jade beads around her neck. Everything about her was exquisite. “I’ll come back here to work with my family eventually, but I wanted to see more of the world than just this.” But realizing what his family could offer him, and coming to understand the magnitude of their business, she couldn’t imagine Ed staying away for many more years. There was too much to draw him home, although he seemed to enjoy his independent life in New York, where he didn’t have his family looking over his shoulder all the time, and they were well known in Hong Kong. In New York, he could be anonymous, and he loved it. He had told her that his family had no problem with his being gay. One of his older cousins was too. He said his mother occasionally regretted not having grandchildren, but he thought he might adopt a child one day, when he came home to Hong Kong. But he wasn’t ready for that yet, any more than Sydney’s own children were ready to settle down. Marriage and children were the farthest thing from their minds. They were completely focused on their work, and so was he. He had a lot in common with her girls, although he seemed more mature.

  They spent two days with Ed’s family in Hong Kong, and were treated to sumptuous meals, went to stores she wouldn’t have found otherwise, and Ed gave her a tour of the city himself. It was extraordinarily civilized, and exciting at the same time. One of his uncles took them to Macao to gamble late one night, in a private speedboat. It was a life of comfort and luxury that reminded her of everything she had lost, but it was even grander, in the best Chinese style. It was easy to deduce that Ed’s family fortune was vast. He had a lot to look forward to in the future, and on the plane on the way back to New York, he told her that sometimes he dreamed of creating his own line, but he wasn’t sure about it. It was very tempting, and for a minute, Sydney envied him the ease he had. He could do anything he wanted, and he said his family would back him up. It was a rare position to be in. And yet he was modest and discreet and never showed off or bragged about his family and their circumstances. She admired him even more after their trip, and felt they were becoming friends.

  They had been on the plane for an hour, as she thought about the trip and savored the memory of everything they’d seen and the private, harder-to-find places Ed had showed her, when the pilot announced that there was a minor electrical problem on the plane, and they were deciding whether or not to return to Hong Kong. He said the passengers would be advised in a few minutes.

  Sydney looked nervous when he said it, and groaned as she glanced at Ed. “Oh, shit. Not again.”

  “What do you mean ‘again’?” He was puzzled by what she said. He wasn’t normally a nervous flyer, but he didn’t like announcements about mechanical problems while he was on a plane at thirty-five thousand feet.

  “That’s how I met Paul,” she explained. “We almost crashed into the Atlantic, and made an emergency landing in Nova Scotia. He held my hand when we thought we were going down. We were stuck there for fifteen hours. We felt like old friends by the time we landed in New York.”

  Ed rolled his eyes. “It’s your fault, then. You have bad airplane karma. I wouldn’t have flown with you if I’d known.” He was teasing her, but they were both concerned. The plane circled for half an hour, and then the pilot came back on and said they were able to fix the problem, and would be continuing to JFK. “I forgive you this time,” Ed told her, and she thanked him again for letting her stay with his family in Hong Kong. After the arduous trip to the factory, and two weeks of hard work, it had been an enormous gift for her.

  “We’ll be going back again,” he told her. “You’ll have to come for Chinese New Year. It’s a lot of fun then.”

  “I still don’t know how you can stay in New York when you have so much waiting for you there.”

  “It’s not going anywhere, and I’ve had a great time living in London and New York for the last five years.” She had loved seeing Hong Kong for the first time and sharing it with him. It had been very special. She and Andrew had never been to Asia. They usually went to Europe, and South America a few times. Ed had introduced her to Hong Kong as only a native could.

  —

  When they landed in New York, she thought of her girls immediately. They had exchanged texts several times during the trip. Sabrina’s were a little chilly, and Sophie’s warmer, but she hadn’t spoken to either of them since she left. The time difference was always wrong at hours that were convenient for her, and she had the feeling they were both avoiding her and punishing her for taking the job, which wasn’t fair, but how they felt about it. She wasn’t about to give it up for them. She couldn’t.

  “What are you doing this weekend?” she asked Ed as they shared a cab into the city. It was a far cry from the Bentley his family had sent for them. But nothing about the way he looked, dressed, or behaved suggested that kind of wealth, and she respected him for it.

  “I have a date.” He smiled at her, looking faintly mysterious. She knew he didn’t go out often, and was happy for him. “Wha
t about you?”

  “I hope I get to see my girls, if they’re speaking to me,” she said ruefully. She had missed them during the trip.

  “They should be over it by now,” he said with a disapproving look. She was a wonderful woman, and he had grown fond of her. She didn’t deserve her daughters giving her a tough time, after everything she’d been through. He didn’t know the whole story, but knew enough to be sympathetic. She had briefly talked about her stepdaughters, who sounded like a nightmare to him. And he didn’t know they’d gotten the money too, just the house. She was too proud and too private to tell him the rest.

  “We’ll see how it goes. They might be busy.” She hadn’t seen them for three weeks, and hoped they had gotten over their anger at her.

  She called them as soon as she got home. Sophie picked up, Sabrina didn’t. But Sophie was with her boyfriend and said they had plans the next day. She promised to see her mother for dinner in the coming week. And Sabrina called her back later and seemed to have calmed down, but she had things to do too. She said she was up to her ears in fittings for their show during Fashion Week. These were always frantic days for her, and she promised to see her mother as soon as she got a break, which her mother knew wouldn’t be till after her show and after they’d shot the photos for the lookbooks buyers used to place orders.

  “How was the trip?” Sabrina asked her mother politely.

  “Fascinating. We stayed with my boss’s family in Hong Kong. It was amazing, and the time at the factory was interesting too.” She knew that Sabrina had put on a fashion show in Beijing two years before and had hated it. Everything possible had gone wrong. The air-conditioning had died in the hall they rented, three of the models had fainted on the runway from the heat, and she’d gotten bronchitis from the pollution. Sydney’s trip had been a lot smoother, mostly thanks to Ed, and it made everything easier because the language wasn’t a problem for him.