But Kitty didn’t give up, she kept on fighting, moving first to Shenzhen to work at a KTV bar where she had to do unspeakable things, and then to Hong Kong, landing a bit part in a local soap opera, transforming it into a recurring role after becoming the director’s mistress, dating a series of rather inconsequential men until she met Alistair Cheng, that cute, clueless boy who was much too sweet for his own good, going with him to the Khoo wedding and meeting Bernard Tai, running off to Vegas with Bernard to get married, meeting Jack Bing at Bernard’s father’s funeral, divorcing Bernard, and finally, at long last, marrying Jack, a man who was truly worthy of all her efforts.
And now that she had provided him with his first son (Harvard Bing, born in 2013), she could do anything she damn well pleased. She could fly to Paris on her own private jumbo jet with one French translator, two children, three fabulous girlfriends (all as toned and polished and expensively dressed as she was, and all wives of rich expats in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Singapore), four nannies, five personal maids, and six bodyguards and rent out the entire top floor of the Peninsula Hotel (which she did). She could order the entire Chanel Automne-Hiver couture collection and have every piece made in triplicate (which she did). She could take a personal guided tour of Versailles with the chief curator followed by a special al fresco lunch prepared by Yannick Alléno at Marie Antoinette’s hamlet (which was happening tomorrow, thanks to Oliver T’sien, who set it all up). If someone wrote a book about her, no one would believe it.
Kitty sipped her champagne and glanced at the ball gowns that were being paraded before her, feeling a little bored. Yes, it was so beautiful, but after the tenth dress, it was all beginning to look the same. Was it possible to overdose on too much beauty? She could buy up the whole collection in her sleep and forget she ever owned any of it. She needed something more. She needed to get out of here and look at some Zambian emeralds, maybe.
Luka recognized the look on Kitty’s face. It was the same expression he had seen all too often in some of his most privileged clients—these women who had constant, unlimited access to everything that their hearts ever desired—the heiresses, celebrities, and princesses that had sat in this very spot. He knew he needed to change direction, to shift the energy in the room in order to reinspire his high-spending client.
“Ladies, let me show you something very special that Giamba has been toiling away at for weeks. Come with me.” He pressed against one panel of the boiserie walls, revealing Giambattista’s inner sanctum—a hidden workroom that contained only one gown displayed on a mannequin in the middle of the pristine space. “This dress was inspired by Gustav Klimt’s Adele Bloch-Bauer I. Do you know the painting? It was purchased for $135 million by Ronald Lauder and hangs in the Neue Galerie in New York.”
The ladies stared in disbelief at the artistry of the off-the-shoulder ball gown that transformed from ivory tulle at the bodice and into a shimmering gold column, with a cascading train-length skirt embroidered with thousands of gold chips, lapis lazuli, and precious gemstones, painstakingly scattered into a swirling mosaic pattern. It truly looked like a Klimt painting come to life.
“Oh my God! It’s unbelievable!” Georgina squealed, running one of her long manicured nails over the gem-encrusted bodice.
“Ravissement!” Tatiana commented, mistakenly trying to show off her secondary-school French. “Combien?”
“We don’t have a price on it yet. It’s a special commission that’s taken four full-time embroiderers three months to assemble so far, and we still have weeks of work to go. I would say that this dress, with all the rose-gold disks and precious stones, will end up costing more than two and a half million euros.”
Kitty stared at it, her heart suddenly beginning to pound in that delicious way it did whenever she saw something that aroused her. “I want it.”
“Oh, Madame Bing, I’m so sorry, but this dress is already spoken for.” Luka smiled at her apologetically.
“Well, make me another one. I mean another three, of course.”
“I’m afraid we cannot make you this exact dress.”
Kitty looked at him, not quite comprehending. “Oh, I’m sure you can.”
“Madame, I hope you will understand…Giamba would be happy to collaborate with you on another dress, in the same spirit, but we cannot replicate this one. This is a one-of-a-kind piece made for a special client of ours. She is from China also—”
“I’m not from China, I’m from Singapore,” Kitty declared.*3
“Who is this ‘special client’?” Wandi demanded, her thick mane of Beyoncé-bronzed hair shaking indignantly.
“She’s a friend of Giamba’s, so I only know her by her first name: Colette.”
The ladies suddenly fell silent, not daring to ask what they wanted to ask. Wandi finally piped up. “Er…are you referring to Colette Bing?”
“I’m not sure if that is her surname. Let me check the spec sheet.” He turned over a leaf of paper. “Ah yes, it is Bing. Une telle co?ncidence! Is she related to you, Madame Bing?” Luka asked.
Kitty looked like a deer caught in headlights. Was Luka kidding? Surely he must know that Colette was her husband’s daughter from his first marriage.
Tatiana quickly jumped in. “No, she’s not. But we know of her.”
“Do we ever.” Wandi sniffed, wondering whether she should tell Luka how Colette’s bitch-from-hell video tirade had gone viral in China, logging more than thirty-six million views on WeChat alone, making her such a notorious poster child of fuerdai*4 bad behavior that she was forced to flee to London in disgrace. Wandi decided that it was better not to bring it up now.
“So this dress is for Colette,” Kitty said, fondling one of the gossamer-like organdy sleeves.
“Yes, it’s going to be her wedding dress.” Luka smiled.
Kitty looked up at him, stunned. “Colette is getting married?”
“Oh yes, madame, it’s the talk of the town. She’s marrying Lucien Montagu-Scott.”
“Montagu-Scott? What does his family do?” Wandi asked, since everything in her universe revolved around being part of an incredibly rich Indonesian family.
“I don’t know anything about his famille, but I believe he’s a lawyer?” Luka said.
Tatiana immediately began googling his name, and read aloud from the first link that popped up: “Lucien Montagu-Scott is one of Britain’s new generation of environmental lawyers. A graduate of the Magdalen College—”
“It’s pronounced ‘Maudlin,’?” Georgina corrected.
“Maudlin College, Oxford, Lucien sailed across the Pacific on a catamaran made out of 12,500 reclaimed plastic bottles with his friend David Mayer de Rothschild to highlight the problem of global marine pollution. More recently, he has been involved in publicizing the environmental crisis in Indonesia and Borneo—”
“I think I’m going to fall asleep,” Tatiana scoffed.
“He’s a charming gentleman—comes with her to every fitting,” Luka remarked.
“I can’t imagine why Colette Bing of all people would end up settling for this guy. He’s not even an M&A lawyer—his annual salary probably wouldn’t even pay for one of her dresses! I guess she must be desperate to have mixed-race babies,” Georgina said, glancing covertly at Kitty, hoping she wasn’t too upset by the news. Kitty just stood staring at the dress, her expression inscrutable.