The Matzo Ball Heiress (27 page)

“Yes, but I also told you that,
in the house
I’m going to be kosher. That’s the agreement. Outside the house, I do things my way. Do you listen to a word I say, bitch?”

“Occasionally,” she says, and with a big grin, adds, “Bitch.”

I grab the crab roll and grin right back at her.

“So tell me this. How is it you can make up your own rules like that?”

“Jared’s not too happy about it, but he agreed.”

“How did you convince him to cut you a break?”

“We negotiated. We live in America, I told him, and like it or not, that’s the way Americans do things. We improvise.”

As I sneeze loudly from my spring allergies, Vondra gasps. “Holy mackerel! Have you read this?”

“What is it? Read it to me.”

You better sit down. “It’s in the
New York Observer
under the headline ‘Next Year in Jerusalem.’”

“It’s not about—”

“‘We heard it on good authority that the two dames behind Emmy-winning production company Two Dames will be celebrating two unusual unions soon. First up is Vondra Adams, tying the knot with Egypt’s magnetic United Nation’s spokesman Mahmoud Habib in front of the Pyramids. And if that isn’t Power Wedding enough, the team will then travel to Israel for what some are dubbing the Jewish Wedding of the Century.’”

“What?” I scream from my seat.

“‘Last Passover brought the Food Channel some of its highest ratings when the Greenblotz family’s Passover seder was broadcast nationally. It wasn’t just the nation who was watching: the cameraman who shot the seder, Jared Silver, the quietly dashing heir to—Can you believe it?—Silver’s Horseradish, will be married to cutie beauty Heather Greenblotz in Jerusalem shortly after a joint family seder. Among the special guests of both the seder and the wedding will be a bevy of award-winning filmmakers and representatives of every major kosher-food company in New York.’”

Vondra laughs uneasily when she is finished. “What is going on? Who is their
authority?
Is it one of your friends?”

“Couldn’t be. Although that was scarily detailed.”

“Could your mother have sent it in? You’ve been closer to her these days.”

“Not a chance.” And then it hits me. “The words
cutie beauty
have the scent of my therapist. This has to be a clip for her success-story file. Bettina has important clients in media that could have placed that for her.”

“That bitchy English lady? I thought you stopped going to her.”

“She’s Australian. And I called her last week just to give her an update. I thought I owed her that after our sales report and my engagement.”

I have to hand it to Bettina. Her methodology worked. I get along pretty damn well with my folks these days, and of course there’s Jared in my life. And Marcy and Rebecca are withdrawing their knee-jerk lawsuit over the Greenblotz name at the seder without their permission. They’re seeing more money in their silk-lined pockets because there was a sales increase of twenty-five percent in our family business immediately after the broadcast—nothing like hard cash to soothe hurt feelings. After all the figures from this year’s busy season are in, Jake expects to announce an even greater boost at the next board meeting.

With HBO and Cecilia Neville’s industry muscle behind us, Vondra and I garnered two more Emmy nominations for
The Grand Ladies of Sex
. We lost out to a former fast-food worker’s scathing exposé on the industry’s evils: the exploitation of children through advertising, cruelty to animals, anti-union low wages and deception of the public when greasy burgers and milk shakes are promoted as nutritious. But this loss was good for me and Vondra. After the Emmy ceremony was over, we agreed that
The Grand Ladies of Sex
didn’t really have as much bite as the winner’s project, or our own Riker’s Island film for that matter.

I hate to bark at Bettina again, but she can’t keep meddling in people’s lives this much. I’m flattered by the article, but the spilling of news about Mahmoud’s trip to Israel is a worry. We were keeping that quiet for security reasons. Doesn’t Bettina believe in running anything past her clients? Even if I’m not officially her client anymore.

I call her number, which I find most unexpectedly is disconnected. Her beeper also gets no response. Where is she? I just spoke to her last week. I call the phone company. There’s no forwarding info. I even call Oprah’s production company and ask to speak to a booker.

“Sorry,” says the show’s booking intern. “My boss has the same number you have.”

Maybe if I took a cab to Bettina’s office I could ask her why she did this. Somehow in my gut though, I know she’s gone. Did the weathercock point east as it did for Mary Poppins, a signal for this odd bird to vanish?

“No luck?” Vondra asks.

“This is bizarre. I can’t find her anywhere.”

Could Bettina have gone back to Australia, or maybe to another city where the very wealthy congregate?

I’d never know. But like Jane Banks after hard-ass Mary left with the wind, I knew I’d be fine without her.

THE MATZO BALL HEIRESS

A Red Dress Ink novel

ISBN 1-55254-423-0

© 2004 by Laurie Gwen Shapiro.

All rights reserved. The reproduction, transmission or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without written permission. For permission please contact Red Dress Ink, Editorial Office, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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