Sun-kissed (The Au Pairs 3)

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trajectory had seemed to go higher and higher. For years, it seemed she was unstoppable. Thinking she could conquer all, she set her sights on reinventing the intellectual mag market. She proposed a magazine that was equal part Harper's and In Style that would make "smart people sexy." She did this by putting Nobel Prize winners in skimpy outfits and having actresses review the latest literary tomes. The high point had come when a reality show host summed up a Pulitzer Prize-winning book on famine in Africa as "making her hungry for more." The magazine folded after three issues, her multi-year contract was canceled, and as quickly as she had been the toast of the town, she was a laughingstock.

Hence the exile to the Hamptons. She swore it was to get back in touch with her family (she worked sixteen-hour days, her staff reported, even while her five-year-old son was in the hospital with a brain tumor) and to enjoy the slower pace of Hamptons reporting (garden shows, horse shows, show-offs). But New York knew the truth--she was over.

But not out. Sam Davis was eager to put her personal stamp on Hamptons and shake things up once again.

Mara waited eagerly while Sam was on the phone harassing her assistant about her coffee. "Haven't I told you a thousand times? A dry cappuccino has no foam!"

She still couldn't believe she'd landed such a sought-after gig. The speed of it still made Mara's head dizzy. All her life, she'd been told getting ahead was the result of hard work and discipline, but how could she believe that when with one simple

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phone call--one connection---she'd landed the job of her dreams? It didn't seem quite fair. What about all the other girls who had applied for the position but weren't lucky enough to have once worked for Sam Davis's college roommate?

But thoughts like that were "lame" according to Eliza. The world operated on the Rolodex system. It was all about whom you knew-- the more important and worth knowing, the better. At seventeen, Mara was surprised to find she knew quite a lot of those people.

"Yes?" Sam asked, finally acknowledging Mara's presence. She was a solidly built woman of thirty-six with a hard, lined face. Her jet-black hair was meant to look punk, as was the dog collar around her neck, but somehow, stuffed into a too-tight Vivienne Westwood sweater and thigh-hugging bootleg Shagg jeans, Sam Davis still managed to looked like any other suburban mother of three but one who was desperately--and vainly--trying to hold on to her rebellious youth.

"I'm Mara Waters. Your new intern. I filed the story on the benefit at Cain last night."

"The what?" Sam asked. She whipped her feet back onto the floor, her pink shoes disappearing in a lurid flash. "Oh. Right. Got your copy. We cut it."

"Oh," Mara said, stung and disappointed. All that work, leaving Ryan, and the piece hadn't even run. Plus, it proved her worst fear--she wasn't a writer. She couldn't even make a society gossip column exciting. This was seriously depressing.

That morning, Mara had woken up in bed alone. Ryan had

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left a note saying he'd gone off to surf. He had a habit of waking up at dawn to catch the waves. She'd felt a little sad--last night they'd been too tired to hook up, and then they hadn't even been able to spend the morning together. She'd planned on making them a romantic breakfast in the galley kitchen but had had to settle for a cold bagel alone by the television.

"I thought about running it next week, but by then it'll be old news. And we don't do old news at Hamptons," Sam Davis declared pompously.

"Of course." Mara nodded. She began to put her notebook back in her bag. It was obvious she was about to get relegated to the keeper of the office supplies. Her shoulders slumped.

But to her surprise, Sam gestured for her to take the seat across the desk, and, after Mara removed the piles of manuscripts, magazines, envelopes, and FedEx boxes lying on top of it, she did.

"Listen, it's not a big deal. Happens all the time," Sam said, rolling her eyes. "It was a little heavy on the puns--but otherwise not a bad read. A little wordy. You buried the lead by putting the polo player hooking up with the NBC star in the fourth 'graf. But you'll learn."

Mara perked up. "Really?"

Sam shuffled through some papers on her desk and found a hard copy of Maras story. She skimmed it quickly. "There are some nice things here--'celebrity math'--that's funny. I like that. We need more of that."

Mara glowed. She'd thought that was a cute turn of phrase.

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"Tell you what, the managing ed hired another intern, some favor to the publisher's sister-in-law or something. So it turns out, we don't need you to intern," Sam said.

But before Mara's face could crumple, Sam finished her sentence. "But I do need someone to fill in the Social Diary column regularly. Courtney von Wilding called. She's spending the summer sailing the Mediterranean on some Greek prince's boat and won't be back in New York till the fall." Sam sighed. "That's what I get for hiring some junior socialite to write the Diary column. It's almost impossible to get those girls near a keyboard. Ruins the manicure."

She pulled out a few old issues of the magazine and threw them across the desk in Mara's direction. "You're going to cover fashion shows, the polo, benefits, dinner parties, who's in, who's out, what they're wearing, who they're sleeping with, who got snubbed at the fireworks this year. Let's shake it up a little! Give them something to read between all the Cartier ads."

Mara nodded, scribbling furiously. Who in/out, read btw Cartier ads.

"Sydney Minx is opening his new boutique tomorrow. I want you there; make sure you get

an interview with him. Let's do a full profile. More of that outsider-turned-insider stuff you do. Maybe we'll do it as a cover. See what the old bitch has got up his sleeve. I want three thousand words by Monday."