Roz laughed. “By all those ways, yes,” she said. “But thank you.” She extended her hand.
Mick took her hand, and held it, and didn’t want to let it go. Because he still wanted her. He wanted her so badly he was getting aroused just feeling her little hand in his. But he didn’t like the intensity of his feelings for a woman he barely knew. Because Roz, despite her strength and toughness, was fragile in his eyes. She was like that warning at the Pottery Barn: you break it, you own it. He wasn’t at all sure if he wouldn’t break it, and he was certain he was not ready to own it. He knew what he had to do.
“Goodbye, Rosalind. Take care of yourself, as I know you will.”
“You better know it,” Roz said with a smile.
He released her hand. And left.
When Roz entered her apartment, she found herself hurrying to her living room window to watch him leave. He walked out of the building, got into his limo, and without giving her or her apartment a backward glance, drove away.
She turned away from the window, leaned against the frame, and found herself in tears. She always did it wrong. When he wanted her, she nearly took his head off and accused him of being some heartless sex pervert, and then even worse, a psychopathic cannibal. When she decided she might just want him, he was understandably no longer interested. She shook her head. Typical Roz. She was always going when she should have been cumming. She couldn’t get it right if her life depended on it. At least that was what her mother used to say. And she knew that was what everybody else was going to say when she finally left New York, and her dream deferred, behind.
She even thought about Mick’s offer to backdoor her into Barry Acker’s play. Although she didn’t feel bad about turning him down, mainly because such a move would be wrong on every level, she knew most people, including Betsy, would disagree. Get in however you can get in, they’d say, and prove yourself later. But the problem was in the proving. Because Mick was right. She was the weakest dancer on stage today, and could have easily been the weakest actress too. And despite what Mick said, thirty-two wasn’t the time for an actress to still be hustling to break through. Thirty-two was the time for her to be long past her debut, and in her prime. Not just starting up, but starting to wind down.
Ten years of hustle. Ten years of blood, sweat, and tears. And what did all of those years net her? No breakthrough, not even a career anymore. Just more hustle. Just a satchel filled with hopes and dreams and other men’s schemes.
She pushed away from her window frame and headed for her bedroom. Forget Mick. Forget Barry and his rejection. Forget fucking Broadway. She was going to bed. She was getting off a stage nobody was inviting her onto in the first place. This day had been long enough.
CHAPTER FIVE
Three weeks later and Mick was back in town. The limousine he owned and used whenever he came to town was now repaired and was pulling in front of the luxurious Carson-Benning hotel just as he was walking out. The valet hurried to open the limousine door for him, and he got into the backseat. It had already been a long day of business, and wasn’t looking like a particularly fantastic night, but he had promised Barry. That was why he was taking this long-ass drive out to Jersey for dinner with the Ackers.
Deuce McCurry, his driver, was thrilled to no longer have to drive his boss around in that Town Car loaner, in what he considered to be a toy car compared to what he was accustomed to driving, but Mick wasn’t giving it a second thought. He wasn’t giving his business commitments a second thought either. He wasn’t even thinking about the Ackers. As he sat in that backseat, as Deuce drove past iconic symbols of New York City like snapshots of familiar places, Mick couldn’t stop thinking about Rosalind.