by ROCFanKat

Disclaimers: See Chapter 1.

Chapter notes: This chapter has been updated since first posting, and there's a new section at the end now. Thanks to Rocky for (what else?) the squirrel idea.

•••

Sunglasses and attitude got me to my office without challenge in the morning. I was counting on the attitude--and a thermos of espresso from home--to get me through the day. Cassie had counseled courage, in the form of stonewalling. Nobody would know for sure what had happened, she said, and what nobody knew wouldn't hurt us. Besides, she reminded me, J/J/G was full of squidbrains who were lucky to remember their own names.

True enough. But no sooner did I walk through the door than my local line buzzed. It was Jenner's admin, Sanchez, with the news that at least one squidbrain had remembered last night, and that he wanted to see Cassie and me right away.

Cassie was out on client calls all morning, so that left me. Filling the biggest mug in the office with espresso, I went upstairs to face whatever there was to face.

Sanchez was on the phone when I got to Jenner's suite, looking as though she'd been on the phone for days, and it wasn't even 9:15 yet. Genuinely feeling her pain, I put a hand on her shoulder in passing. She smiled, but wanly.

Drawing a long breath, I knocked on Jenner's closed door.

"If that's another lawyer," I heard him roar, "wring his balls!"

"Yes, sir," Jack said. Then he shouted at the door, "Who is it?"

"Not a lawyer!" I shouted back.

The door flew open. "About time," Jack growled. "Where in hell have you been? Why isn't Wolfe with you?"

"She left me for a palomino. The weird part is, it was a girl."

He didn't even smirk.

"Well, dammit, asking a question like that is just asking for trouble. Now, am I supposed to come in?"

"Kerry's here, sir," he called over his shoulder.

"Where's Miss Wolfe?" Jenner asked.

"I don't know. Should I ask her?"

"Ask who?"

"Kerry."

"I thought you said Derry was here."

"She is, sir. Her name's Kerry."

"Kerry who?"

A line from a Marx Brothers movie flashed through my mind: Everybody knows there's no such thing as sanity clause. Wearily, I leaned against the doorjamb and waited.

"We could have her come in," Jack said, "and see if the sight of her jogs your memory."

"I don't want to be jogged. I want to see Miss Wolfe and Derry."

"Brain-damaged mothering sonuvabitch," Jack muttered, standing aside to let me in the office.

Jenner was pacing the carpet like a pinstriped tiger, looking crazier even than usual. When he spotted me, he stopped pacing long enough to point a finger. "Derry, you're late."

"Not very, sir. It's only seven aft..."

"Where's Miss Wolfe?"

What was I--her keeper? "Working, sir. She had some clients to see."

"Page her again, Miss Sanchez!" Jenner yelled through the open door. Promptly, Jack closed it again.

I shook my head and then noticed Vanessa parked on Jenner's couch, looking right at home. Very likely she was. Her skirt was hiked halfway to Nome, at any rate, and she seemed not to care who saw what. It was a flip of the coin whether she'd been in the process of dressing or undressing when all this commotion had started.

She gave me a sly smile, as though she knew something that she wanted to tell, and patted the couch cushion next to her. As coldly as possible, I turned away.

"We'll start without her, then," Jenner said. "We have no choice. Look at that, Derry."

"Look at what, sir?"

He pointed at something on his desk. It could have been anything--the stuffed baby alligator, the Malay dagger, the temple bell...

Jack saw the dilemma. "Here. Take my copy." He handed me the Metro section of that day's Herald, folded over and open to an inside page. "Did you see this?"

"Didn't have time to read the paper this morning. What am I looking at?"

"It's right in front of you."

"What--the jewelry ad? That's not our account."

"Right above it."

I scanned up.

Saying there is "a moral crisis in our living rooms," the Family Foundation is announcing a campaign against indecent advertising in the metroplex area.

Family Foundation Chairman Howard Abner said the group intends targeting local advertising agencies that "expose our young people to degeneracy, deviancy and depravity." He said two of the worst examples are J/J/G Advertising and Ad House, known for their "edgy," sexually suggestive advertisements.

A boycott of all of the clients of these agencies is possible, he said.

The foundation will hold a press conference about this matter Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. at its headquarters, located at 11911 S. 115th St. in Greenville. The general public is invited to attend.

Persons wanting information can call the foundation's offices at 555-1050.

"Well?" Jenner demanded.

"Terrible writing," I said, seriously.

Overcome by some great emotion, Jenner pointed a trembling finger at Jack. Then he started pacing again.

"Mr. Jenner, I don't see the problem," I said. "They're targeted us before. In fact, you personally have tried to get them to target us, for the publicity. Remember when you wanted to send them the work tape of Rumours? And speaking of Rumours..."

Jenner wheeled around, one foot still in the air. "Ha!"

"Ha, sir?"

"I'll translate," Jack said impatiently, snatching the paper back. "This story is way behind the curve now. That press conference got called before the little accident with that spot last night. Before you and Wolfe became prime-time TV stars."

We were down to it now. For courage, I swallowed most of the contents of my mug--and remembered a split-second too late that it was espresso, not regular coffee. The room began to vibrate slightly as all that caffeine slammed into my system.

Then Cassie stormed into the office, coat still on, car keys still out, and fire in her eyes.

"The next time I get that many pages in 15 minutes," she said direly, "I'm going to get a great big stick and start taking people down with it. The client is not happy. Why am I here?"

If Jenner had heard a word of what she'd said, he heard it only as sound. He'd stopped pacing and was openly studying her legs, with a wild gleam in his eyes.

Cassie's temper rose visibly. "I had to agree to have lunch with the client. I also had to reschedule two other appointments. This trashes my day. What did I get called back here for?"

While Jack explained, I took a seat on one armrest of the couch--the one farthest from Vanessa. The room was still vibrating, and what I really wanted to do was lie down, but there was always the carpet if matters got desperate.

"So?" Cassie asked, when Jack finished.

"So you and Kerry were all over TV last night, and that puts us in a really bad position."

"Puts you in a bad position?"

"Vis-à-vis Howard Abner."

She told him, using very definite language, what he could do vis-à-vis Howard Abner, the Family Foundation, every client on J/J/G's list, and the family dog.

"Another thing," she said. "I want to know exactly how that tape got on the air. That was your fault, Jack."

Damn, she was good. She and I both knew what had happened, but he didn't, and the doubt could work to our benefit. I was so proud of her that I could have died, had I not been dying already.

"We don't know yet," he said irritably. "We're working on it."

"How hard?"

Vanessa laughed, startling all of us. Cassie glared at her, then suddenly noticed my presence. She smacked the paper into Jack's chest and made straight for the couch. As hard as I tried, I couldn't figure out which one of her to watch; there appeared to be two all of a sudden.

"Hi," I said to the one on the right.

"Over here, Devvy," the other one said. "What's the matter with you? You look terrible."

"Oh, I don't know," Vanessa remarked. "I think she's kind of cute."

The Cassie on the left gave her the worst look I'd seen in a while. "Nobody asked you."

"What's going on over there, Harper?" Jenner asked.

"Quiet, sir," Jack snapped, "or we'll miss something."

Cassie ignored that. She put a cool hand on my forehead. "What have you been doing?"

"Caffeine poisoning," I said. "Here."

Suspicious, she took the mug, sniffed it, and then took a sip. "Espresso. How much?"

"All of it."

"I saw her," Vanessa said helpfully. "She chugged it. Maybe it was hot. That would hurt."

"If you were actually good for anything," Cassie told her, "you would go find her some Advil or something. But I don't suppose..."

"Is somebody sick?" Jenner asked Jack.

"With any luck, sir," he said, "all three of them are. Maybe we'll get to watch."

Dying or not, I wasn't going to stand for that sort of thing. I shook Cassie off and wobbled up onto my feet. "The minute I feel better, Jack, your head comes off."

"Which one?" he asked, in his best choirboy tone.

"Stop it," Cassie said, steadying me. "Vanessa? Advil? Now?"

Vanessa got up, smoothing her skirt. "Oh, all right. Do you want some ice, too?"

"Ice would be good," Cassie replied. "Right away would be even better."

For a second, I thought Vanessa was going to talk back. But then she shrugged, smiled, and gave Cassie a pointed once-over. "I'll be right back, then."

Both Vanessas sashayed across the carpet and to the door. Both Jenners and Jacks watched every step. Both Cassies saw that I was watching, too, and sat me down on the couch, none too gently.

"If it's not proprietary information, Mr. Jenner," she said, "I'd love to know what that she-beast is doing here."

"Is she a beast, sir?" Jack asked, interested.

As best I could tell, Jenner winked at him.

"Never mind," Cassie said. "Dev isn't feeling well. Why don't we just get this meeting over with, and then..."

"Meeting. Yes. We were meeting." Jenner gave his lapels a businesslike tug. "We were talking about that press conference. We were deciding what to do about it. Isn't that right, Harper?"

"As rain, sir."

Cassie snorted, but only loudly enough for me to hear. She perched on the arm of the couch and started massaging the back of my neck with one hand. Grateful, I closed my eyes, leaning back into her touch.

"Derry?" Jenner asked.

"Sir?"

"Are you ill?"

I pried my eyes open. "A little."

"Can you think?"

"More or less."

"Good," he said. "I pay you for that. Think about what we can do."

"All right." I thought. It hurt a little. "Mr. Jenner?"

"Derry?"

"You were saying something about lawyers when I came in. Are we having lawyer trouble over this?"

"Tell her, Harper," Jenner instructed.

"You won't mind if I listen," Cassie said coolly. "Of course I wouldn't have any ideas of my own, but..."

"Of course not, Miss Wolfe."

Cassie's grip tightened, making me wince. "Excuse me?"

Hazily, I saw Jack lean over to whisper to him. "I mean, of course I don't mind if you listen, Miss Wolfe. Go on, Mr. Harper."

"God, I love this job," Jack said. He might have elaborated, but one look from Cassie got him right down to business.

Closing my eyes again as she resumed her massage, I tried to follow whatever logic there was in what he was saying. Apparently, there'd been all kinds of lawyer trouble. The station managers were upset; the traffic managers were upset; the clients whose ads were supposed to run in those slots were beyond upset. I guessed we were talking several thousand dollars' worth of make-goods, not to mention a lot of impossible explanations to other agencies. The only party not injured by the situation was Rumours; the owners had called Jenner overnight to thank him for the publicity.

And then there was the Family Foundation. Jenner had heard from about that crowd overnight, too. It seemed that J/J/G was going to get all the free publicity it could handle. According to a friend of a friend of a friend of Jenner's who had connections inside the foundation, Howard Abner was already working on a new speech for tomorrow's press conference. The friend of the friend of the friend heard that Abner had asked for research material, including Indigo Girls CDs and tapes of "Ellen."

"Christ, it was 2 seconds tops," I complained. "You can hardly see anything. Besides, the last segment goes a lot farther, and that's obviously a girl and a boy."

Jack smiled big. "People can see a girl and a boy any time, Kerry. They can see that at the mall, even. But a girl and a girl...well, people would pay money for that."

"People who live under a rock," Cassie said scornfully, as the door opened. "And speaking of..."

"Welcome back," Jenner told Vanessa. "Here--let me help you with that."

She favored him with a little smile as he relieved her of her terrible burden: a packet of Advil and an ice bag.

"Who are these for?" he asked.

"Devvy," Vanessa said.

Cassie bristled. " 'Devlin,' to you."

"Who are they talking about, Harper?" Jenner asked.

"Derry, sir," Jack said happily. "Have I mentioned lately how much I love this job?"

Vanessa resumed her place on the couch while Cassie took the ice and Advil from Jenner. "Here," she told me. "Take these. No, not with that." She took the mug away and handed it to Vanessa. "You forgot water."

"I'm not a gofer," the woman said.

"Not a very good one," Cassie agreed.

"Miss Hudson?" Jenner said. "They want water. As a favor to me?"

Vanessa sighed, got back up, and made a show of smoothing her skirt again before she left to find water.

"So she does have a last name," Cassie remarked to Jenner, pressing the ice bag against my neck. It was startlingly cold, making me jump. "Hold still, Devvy....Does she also have a job description, Mr. Jenner?"

Jenner settled on the couch. "Special assistant."

"I see. Exactly how special?"

He frowned slightly, not sure he'd heard right. "Excuse me, Miss Wolfe?"

"You've got Rita Sanchez for an admin. She's the best in town. What else can you possibly need an assistant for?"

"This is so great," Jack said to himself, leaning comfortably against the wall.

Jenner glanced at him, uncertain. "Special projects?"

"I see." Cassie shifted the position of the ice bag slightly. "Well, this situation sounds like a very special project. Maybe we should give Vanessa a chance to demonstrate her many talents."

If we'd been alone, I would have kissed her. Damnation, the woman was good.

"Interesting," Jenner mused. "I think you have something there, Miss Wolfe. I think Miss Hudson might just be uniquely qualified for this one."

"I thought she would be," Cassie said. "Oh, look, there she is again."

We all turned to watch her come back. She took the attention as her due and handed me a small paper cup without comment. Then she simply stared at Jenner.

"Chivalry, sir," Jack prompted.

Just that once, Jenner understood something; he shot up off the couch and offered her the vacant space.

"Thank you, Mr. Jenner," Vanessa cooed. "Always the gentleman."

Cassie almost lost control of the ice bag, which nearly went down my shirt. "Sorry." With her free hand, she handed me the Advil. "Down the hatch with those. Right now."

I was starting to feel a little better, but knew that tone and took the caps anyway. Everyone watched, as though they'd never seen anything like it before.

"Stop that," I told them.

Vanessa smirked, letting her eyes travel.

"Especially you," I told her.

She laughed out loud. "I don't think they like me very much, Mr. Jenner."

"They don't like anyone very much," he assured her. "Now, where were we, Harper?"

"Special projects," he said.

"That's right. Thank you, Harper. You know the situation, Miss Hudson."

"I do."

"We've decided to give you a chance to handle it."

Her eyes lighted up. "Really?"

"Really," Jenner said. "We'll give you an office and an admin. Whatever you need. Just come up with something brilliant."

"That doesn't cost a lot," Jack added.

He nodded. "That doesn't cost a lot, and that we can have by the end of the day."

"I'll get right on it, Mr. Jenner," Vanessa said. "Thank you so much for the opportunity."

Cassie cleared her throat significantly. "Well, if that's all, why don't we leave this in Miss Hudson's capable hands?"

"My pleasure," Jenner said. "That'll be all. Harper, Miss Hudson, stay after."

"Thank God," Cassie muttered, getting up off the armrest. "Come on, Devvy. Hold the ice bag there for me, and I'll help you down to your office."

"I'm not a child," I told her, starting to resent the coddling a little.

"Of course not," she said. "You're a responsible grownup who just drank five or six cups of espresso all at once, just to see what would happen. I'm sure it was all in the interest of science. Give me your arm."

"I thought you said they were lovers, Jack," Vanessa said.

He laughed. "You'll get used to it....Have a nice day, ladies."

"Have a massive coronary," Cassie said sweetly, and led me away.

•••

Cassie called her doctor from my office, to tell him what had happened and to find out whether I was going to live. Reassured that I would, she left for her next appointment, but not before she told Heather to keep me away from coffee for the rest of the day. Or so Heather reported when she came in to check on me.

"By the way, Troy and I tried to call you all night last night," she said. "What happened? How in the world did that tape get on TV?"

"I have no idea," I lied. "But I don't want to talk about it. Jenner's letting Vanessa handle it."

"Oh, Lord. That's trouble."

"I don't doubt it. Where's Kurt?"

"At the Hairport shoot. He was up half the night trying to call you too." She smiled. "You'll like this, Dev--he said to tell you that he didn't do it."

"I'm not accusing him." A thought occurred to me. "Yet. What do you think?"

Heather looked over her shoulder, to make sure the door was shut. Then she leaned forward, confidentially. "I think he might lose his job if he did it. I'm not trying to suggest anything, though."

"No. And I didn't hear anything." We exchanged conspiratorial smiles. "Well, if he's out of the office today, we should be able to get some work done. How are you coming along with..." The local line buzzed. "Hold on a second....Kerry."

Sanchez said a few words and then hung up. I listened to the dial tone for a second before doing the same.

"Something wrong, Dev?"

"We'll find out. Vanessa just handled the Family Foundation thing."

"Trouble," Heather said darkly.

•••

It was really very simple, Vanessa said. If another model tries to embarrass you by telling stories behind your back, you tell worse stories to her face.

"I don't understand," Jenner said, plaintively.

It was like this, Vanessa explained. If she says you have implants, you tell her she does, too, and they're pointing in different directions. If she says you had your butt done...

"I still don't understand. Besides, I don't think Howard Abner has implants. Does he, Harper?"

Jack glowered at him. "I wouldn't know, sir."

Here was the deal, Vanessa said, losing patience. We would send people to the press conference, and if Abner's people said embarrassing things about us, our people would say even more embarrassing things back, like who died and made them God, and when was the last time they got laid, and...

"I see. Yes, I see now. I like it," Jenner said.

Vanessa wasn't quite finished. Models were vicious, she said, so you could never rest easy; you always had to be planning your next attack. We'd have to do the same.

"Of course," Jenner said, nodding sagely. "We can't let the scheming bastards sneak up on us. What will we do?"

She was still working out the details, she said, but she thought it would be fun to do an ad campaign for ourselves.

Jenner's face clouded again. "I don't understand."

Vanessa consulted the little notepad she'd brought with her. Not for ourselves exactly, she said, but for (her lips moved silently, testing the word before she tried it) diversity. We could do a few public-service announcements, maybe.

"PSAs?" Jack asked, disbelieving. "At our rates?"

Well, she said, too casually, if he didn't believe in the First Amendment...

For the first time all meeting, I raised my head out of my hands. Either there was still too much caffeine in my blood, or the woman was a lot sharper than she let on. Maybe the squirrel that ran the wheel that turned the gears in her brain was working overtime.

"Never mind what Harper believes, Miss Hudson," Jenner said quickly. "Go on. What kind of campaign?"

"I'll leave the details to the experts," she said, looking at me. Proactively, I scowled back.

Jack noticed, and laughed. "That would be Kerry, all right. Why don't we let her and Wolfe handle it, sir? They're pretty diverse."

I resented that some. "Now, just a goddamn min..."

"I've got it," he continued, fighting to keep a straight face. "We'll do a whole series. We'll call it 'Rainbows for Peace.' What do you think, Dev?"

I didn't have to think--I hated it--but Jenner seized on it as though it were Microsoft stock. "Outstanding, Harper. Derry, you're on it as of today. Miss Hudson, excellent work. Outstanding. You have all of our resources at your disposal."

"As long as they don't cost much," Jack cautioned.

"Money be damned," Jenner said. "What do you think you'll need, Miss Hudson?"

She turned on that feline smile. "I already have what I'll need, Mr. Jenner. But could I make a suggestion?"

"Of course. Please do."

"I think Devlin and Cassie should be the ones to go to the press conference."

For a moment, I was glad Cassie wasn't there; she would've made a scene. "Not a chance," I told Jenner.

"I think she's got a point, sir," Jack said. "They're both pretty disruptive."

Jenner nodded--perhaps in agreement, perhaps because his meds were wearing off; it was hard to tell these days.

"Sir, we can't do that," I protested. "Someone might recognize us from TV."

"Oh, don't worry about that," Vanessa said. "We'll have you two go in disguise. Just like Halloween."

Jack almost cracked a rib laughing.

"Not just like Halloween, Derry," Jenner said, very seriously. "And take a couple of normal people with you."

I excused myself then, just barely containing the urge to throttle Vanessa's squirrel on the way out.

•••

(c) 1999, ROCFanKat

Continued - Part 10