So she did know about me-I'd wondered about that. Bea wasn't easy to fool. And she didn't care at all about reconnecting with me. All that mattered was the con. Nothing had changed.
When Jay died, she told me that I had to get back in the game and prove that I could still do it. It was the only way I'd ever get over my fears. But without him around, everything was different. I did my part and gritted my teeth through the cons, but I kept my eye on a different goal: getting out.
Then, four years later, I saw my opportunity. Bea, Elle, and I did a con that netted a big pile of money. As usual, Bea was going to stash it all in her locker, but I beat her to it. I took it all and ran, sending some of it to Elle. I was done with Bea, done with my cheating life, and done with all the lies.
Flush with cash from that con, I moved to New York City and found a place in Chelsea where I hid out for months, waiting to be found. But nobody came looking, because I knew how to stay off the radar. The first thing I'd done when I got to New York was change my hair to make it short and white, a total reaction to the years spent hiding my looks to please Bea. Then I forged new documents for myself, and Dee Kirkland ceased to exist. Now I was Dee Frank, just another jobless kid on the streets of New York.
I became friends with the woman living across the hall from me: Wanda Petrillo, the hat-lady of Manhattan. Wanda had so many hats that she could have kept every New York City milliner in business.
So with Wanda and a few other friends, I made a new life for myself. We floated through the New York scene without ever looking forward or back. The present moment was all we cared about. My new family might not have been as together as some, but we were way better than a family of con artists.
Everything was going well until Wanda discovered I could paint. We went to one of those pottery places where you do your own painting, and I decided to do something fancy. Everyone else just got drunk and slopped on the paint. But I hadn't done any art in a while, so I had some fun and really put in the effort.
Wanda went nuts over it-she wouldn't stop telling me how impressed she was. She kept it up until I finally quieted her down by giving her the pot. Then, much to my dismay, she showed it around and got people to order more of my work, offering me an embarrassing amount of money for each one. And that was the beginning of my strange ride. Wanda made me into a New York art sensation before I could stop her.