A Dress to Die For Read Online Free PDF Page B

Laura called. When Mom turned, she said, “What time? I’m going with you before you get us into trouble.”
    “Five. After work.” Mom wore a sly smile as if she knew that was Laura’s midday.
    **
    Bernard Nestor was not a man to be taken lightly. Curating Dressed for Infamy had not been for the fainthearted. It required a thorough knowledge of history, politics, fashion, and high society. The connections involved went from the White House to the assistant librarian at the Fashion Institute of Technology and back around to anonymous art collectors. The job required a deft hand at social interactions and knowledge of relational webs in high society that would relax well-known people enough to allow their clothing to be associated with their most infamous moments.
    The Brunico Saffron gown had been the star piece. The Brunican princess, Philomena, had worn many gowns and dresses, but none could be found in the hands of a single collector or university since her death, six months previous. The current high prince of Brunico, Salvadore Forseigh, had to be called from a hunting expedition on the far side of the island, but nothing of her was left. Everything was gone with nothing at the cleaners or a friend’s, not a stitch, sock, bead, or belt. People who collected famous gowns and dresses lamented the loss.
    So when the Brunico Saffron dress, designed by Scaasi with parts sewn by Mom, was discovered, a hullabaloo ensued. More than the only gown of a beloved princess to be found anywhere in the world, it was also the bit of formalwear she’d donned on the night of Salvadore’s inauguration from prince to high prince of Brunico. The feasting had gone on for the weekend and its bookends, with fox hunting taking up the days, and providing the raw materials for more than a few fur coats, and dancing and gambling taking up the nights. The dress had been verified partly by a lump of beluga caviar found between two beads at the bust.
    “I’m sorry. I can’t do dinner,” Laura told Jeremy on her way out of the office. “I have to make sure Mom doesn’t say anything she shouldn’t.”
    “How are you going to stop her?”
    “I can spin whatever she says. I don’t know. But she’s freaking me out.”
    “I know how you feel.”
    She wrinkled her nose at him. “I hope you don’t expect a Christmas present with little remarks like that.”
    “I’m on the wrong list for presents. Are you meeting me at my place later?”
    “Yes.”
    He checked behind him, then kissed her and stroked her cheek with his thumb before saying, “Call first. I may be here.” And he was off to meet with his designers about New Sunny and the prep for the China trip.
    **
    Mom waited on the corner of Madison Avenue and 50th Street, lit by the colored Christmas lights twisted on the lampposts, hugging herself against the cold.
    “Why didn’t you wear a scarf?” Laura asked when she was in earshot.
    “I didn’t have anything nice.”
    Laura unspooled hers and passed it to her mother. They walked a block east to an old stone building with arched windows and a beveled glass door. Mom stomped right up and rang the bell.
    A bald man in a black suit answered. “You must be Mrs. Carnegie?”
    “A Mrs. and a Ms.,” Mom said.
    The butler smiled. Laura hadn’t realized her mother was charming.
    Bernard Nestor was slim, almost waifish, with small feet and short stature for a man. He had olive skin, and his tight curls were cropped close to the scalp. He walked straight and tight, giving new meaning to the word “ramrod.” He wore the air of a man who did important things with important people during important events, yet still had the earthiness of someone who wanted to be your friend, no matter where you lived or what your social class. That aura put Laura at ease, because even though she currently made more money than she knew what to do with, she still felt like the kid whose mother scraped up sofa change to pay the rent.
    Bernard’s