by Sarah Hegger
New plan, one involving boots and a raincoat. She went back into the hall. The damn hat stand stood skeletal beside the door, artfully draped in a couple of silk scarves and a tiara left over from dress up this afternoon. And beneath the scarves, an umbrella.
Thank you, Lord. Pippa snatched it up and went back into the kitchen. A glance at the kitchen clock told her what she already knew. It was I-should-be-sleeping o’clock. She loved Phi, really she did, but would it kill her grandmother to have something practical lying about, like a coat? Pippa cracked open the top half of the kitchen door. Wind whipped the door out of her hand and sent it thundering into the wall.
Three very wet hours—okay, maybe twenty seconds—later, Pippa wrestled the damn thing closed again. On to her third plan, which was nothing. She could sleep in the salon. On satin Louis XVI furniture.
The message light on the phone lit up the dark hallway outside the kitchen in eerie red blinks.
Instead of dreaming stupid hot, sweaty dreams about Matt, she should have gotten him to fix the roof. Matt, dry and at home, probably fast asleep. And that pissed her off so much, it made her head spin. She marched over to the phone and snatched it up. His number was right where she’d programmed it on speed dial. Phi wasn’t the only diva in this house, not tonight.
He answered on the four hundredth—make that about seventh—ring. A sleepy, husky drawl that hit her straight in the girl parts. “Hello?”
“Hi, Meat, it’s Pippa.”
“Pippa?” Some of the sleepy drifted out of his voice and shuffling noises from the other side had her picturing him sitting up in bed. Was he alone? God, she hoped so.
“I’m wet.”
Deep silence. “Pardon?”
The way he said it made her face heat. “I mean I’m getting wet because there is a hole in my bedroom ceiling.”
He laughed. Deep-roasted and raspy and so damn gorgeous she clenched her thighs together. “I guess you called to tell me the roof is leaking.”
“Yup.”
“You know”—the phone crackled in her ear as he moved—“some people wait until morning to call the contractor.”
“It is morning.” A smile crept up her face. She’d dialed on impulse, never a great idea, but he was so good-natured about it. “And I was pissed off.”
“Tell me about wet.” Oh, he was bad and naughty. “Where is the roof leaking?”
“Um, it seems to be right above my bed.”
“That’s what I thought. I warned Phi about it the last time I was there.” He yawned. “Want me to strap on a tool belt and rush right over?”
She closed down the Matt Pinterest board building in her head. “Nah, that’s okay. I shouldn’t have woken you up. I don’t wake up cheerful at the best of times.”
“Maybe that’s because you don’t go to sleep happy.” He did great phone voice.
Her imagination took over the journey. Matt in a low-slung tool belt and not much more. Matt in a bath towel and not much more. Matt in bed, in absolutely nothing. Stop already. “Do you go to bed happy?”
“Sometimes.” He chuckled, low-down and dirty. “Do you?”
“Not lately.” As in years. As in the closest she could get to going to bed happy, was mildly contented. “Not in a long time.”
“That’s a pity. We should see what we can do about that?”
Her knees loosened and she leaned against the wall for support. The receiver slipped in her sweaty hand and she tucked it between her shoulder and her ear. “That sounds like you’re offering.”
“What if I was?”
Standing was overrated. She slid down the wall until her ass hit the cold floor. “I told you before. You have to ask first before I give you an answer.”
“I’m asking now.”
Did he just proposition her? And was she giving it way too much thought?
“Have dinner with me?” he said.
A tight curdle of disappointment gripped her gut. Dinner with Meat Evans was good, dinner would be . . . nice. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
“I am.”
“Do you always proposition women so fast?”
He laughed again. “Pippa, I’ve been trying to ask you out for years. You don’t leave a guy a huge window of opportunity. And last time you were here, you disappeared to LA before I could get to you. So, in this case, I’m coming on strong.”
“Oh.” What had she been hoping for? “I’ll think about it.”
“What’s to think about, it’s only dinner.”
It was only dinner, and she felt horribly let down. This warranted a stern talking-to. Pippa St. Amor didn’t feel let down over men, because she didn’t let them under her skin. And she had a crappy life to get back on track. She didn’t have time and energy for relationships. Or dinner. “I should let you get back to sleep.”
“Where will you sleep?”
“I’ll grab a spare blanket and use one of the spare rooms. June doesn’t make them up when there’s nobody here, but it’ll do for the few hours left.” That should have been plan three. “I could have done that before and not called you in the middle of the night.”
“I’m glad you called.”
Her heart gave a leap. Keeping a cool head might be easier if he quit saying things like that. “I woke you up.”
“It doesn’t matter.” More rustling from his side. “So have you had enough time to think yet?”
Crazy man. “No.”
“Got an ETA on that?”
“Nope.”
“Ah, I see, playing hard to get.”
“Would you chase?” Something about Matt made this stuff come out of her mouth.
He chuckled. “I hadn’t got that far in my thinking. We could always find out.”
Pippa propped her bleary eyes open and winced at the volume Phi put out. Another sleepy morning bath left her feeling half alive. She’d gotten dressed on autopilot, and made it into the kitchen about thirty seconds before Phi launched.
“We will shop.” Phi had an armful of bangles on this morning that clashed through Pippa’s head like the anvil chorus.
“Shop for what?”
Phi’s eyes widened. She went green and sparkly this morning for eye makeup and it made the effect even more dramatic. “Your bedroom. Fate has interceded and encouraged us to redecorate that room.”
A little extreme there. Some good sense was called for, if she could get her sluggish brain to come up with some. “Phi, all we need to do is dry out the mattress and wash the sheets. And it wasn’t fate, it was a leaky roof.”
Phi let forth with a trill to make the glasses vibrate in the cabinet. “Darling, you lack vision.” Her bracelets crashed. “We will create a space in which you feel your heart can mend.”
Seemed a lot to ask of some bed linen and a few pieces of furniture. And her heart wasn’t really the problem. Ray had hurt her, for sure, but to break her heart, he’d have had to have held it in the first place. “Phi, I won’t be here for long. Just until I can get this Ray crap sorted out.”
Phi gave her a crafty smile.
“I know that look, Phi.” Pippa wasn’t as clueless as Laura. Her grandmother had something stewing in that fertile brain of hers.
“Ma petite!” Phi batted her sparkly green lashes. “You are too suspicious. It makes the skin wrinkle between your eyebrows and will give you horrid lines when you are my age.”
“And besides.” Pippa sucked back her coffee. “I am probably America’s most hated television personality right now. Do you really think going out and about in public is the best idea?”
Phi smacked her hands down on the kitchen table. “It is the perfect idea. Never let them see you sweat, darling. Never. Now come along, grab one of those marvelous purses of yours, and let us away.” With a flourish, Phi exited stage left, sweeping out the kitchen door and into the yard. She stood beside the car, tapping her foot.
Pippa downed her coffee dregs, snatched up her keys from the counter, and grabbed her purse. Th
is was so not a good idea, but you could never tell Phi anything she didn’t want to hear. It was going to be a damn bloodbath. The things she did for her grandmother.
Of course, Phi didn’t want to shop in the meager offerings of Ghost Falls but insisted on driving an hour and a half farther to Salt Lake City. As they parked under a downtown mall, Pippa prayed her viewership in Utah was low.
Phi chattered the entire time. Sitting beside Pippa like a visiting princess. Wasn’t the sky the most sublime shade of cerulean? What did that woman think she was wearing? Watch out, Salt Lake City. Pippa locked the car and followed in the wake of Hurricane Philomene.
They made it into Macy’s on an empty elevator, Phi bobbing her head to the Muzak as they rode.
Pippa kept her head low as they wove through the women’s section and into home goods. Thank God, it was quieter in here. Fewer people to turn and gawk. And gawk they did. Phi moved through a crowd like a radioactive ripple, leaving nobody undisturbed. People’s gazes flitted right over her and locked onto Phi. If Pippa stayed in the slipstream, she might make it through this in one piece.
“Darling.” Phi lighted on a display, arms pinwheeling. “Don’t you just adore this?”
Pippa blinked to be sure she was seeing the right thing. “It’s snot green.”
“Snot green.” Phi’s voice reverberated off the ceiling. For the woman who could fill La Scala, Macy’s on a Friday morning was a cinch. “It’s olive.”
No way in hell was she sleeping on that. “It went past olive several shades back.”
“I can see you are going to be difficult to please,” Phi said with a happy little titter, and charged on. “Stop.”
Heads whipped around to stare.
Phi’s hands went straight up in the air. “I have found it.”
“Not if it’s that horrible mustard thing you haven’t.” Pippa stayed well in the shadows as people’s gazes tracked Phi around the store.
“Mustard.” Phi snorted. “It is definitely old gold.”
“It’s mustard and those orange things all over it are even worse.”
“Well, then.” Phi jammed her fists on her hips and did a slow three sixty. “Miss Impeccable Taste, you pick something.”
“Excuse me.” A quiet voice came from behind Phi.
Phi whirled to reveal a slim twentysomething woman peering at Pippa. “You’re her, aren’t you?”
“I—”
“Of course she is, darling.” Phi boomed across the store. “Are you a fan?”
“I am.” The woman nodded, her mousy brown hair bobbing around her thin face. “I was wondering if you could . . . I mean if you’re not too busy, and I’m not interrupting . . .”
“Speak up, dear.” Phi increased her volume as if to make up for the other woman’s quieter note.
The woman’s cheeks went pink. “I was over there shopping for a dress and I . . .” She shook her head and went even pinker. “No, never mind, it’s nothing.”
“She has superb taste.” Phi leaned forward and stage-whispered to the woman. “You would like to ask Pippa’s opinion, wouldn’t you?”
Was she not standing here? Had she disappeared into the comforters behind her? “I’m not sure—”
“Lead on, dear.” Phi patted the woman’s arm. “Let us choose for you the most exquisite of gowns. Something to highlight your exceptional good looks.”
“Oh, well, I . . .”
Pippa had to give it to Phi. She had the magic. The woman seemed to shimmer, sparkle, and glow in front of them. Her rather plain features took on a light that had been missing before.
“Let’s look at the dress,” Pippa said before she changed her mind. “We were only arguing over sheets anyway.”
The woman led them back into the women’s section. “I’m Carly, by the way.”
“Carly?” Phi pursed her lips. “Is that short for Carlotta, or Charlotte perhaps?”
“Umm . . . no.” Carly’s gaze flickered in Pippa’s direction, a silent plea for help.
“Come on, Phi.” Pippa tucked her arm through her grandmother’s. “Nobody but you insists on naming people after operatic characters.”
“Well, they should,” said Phi, with a nod that indicated the matter was settled. She found an armchair in the fitting room and settled herself like a queen about to hold court.
“What’s the occasion?” Pippa turned back to Carly.
The next hours reminded Pippa of why she loved this so much. When she’d first started out, it had been all like this, that great moment when someone looked at herself and saw the potential come to life. Watching a woman find her mojo right in front of her. There was nothing like it. When she was working with a woman on her show, she had been able to forget the feral behavior that surrounded a career in television. The women on the show made everything worth it.
Carly ended up with a lovely, simple cocktail dress, a pair of jeans, two shirts, and a great little skirt that she could dress up or down.
The fitting room filled as they shopped and talked. More women poured in from the main floor, clutching all manner of items and standing patiently chatting with Phi while they waited for Pippa’s attention. An attendant popped her head in for a while, and went away with a happy smile. She returned with a bottle of water for Pippa and a steaming latte for Phi.
Phi was in her element. Sitting in her chair, chatting to everyone around her.
“Not the black.” Pippa replaced a top with another for a middle-aged woman.
Two young girls peered around the corner.
“What’s going on?” The one behind craned her neck to get a good look.
“Looks like some sort of makeover thing,” the one in front said.
Her friend looked at Pippa, and her eyes widened in recognition. Her mouth popped open and then she giggled. “Hey, it’s that chick who spazzed out on YouTube.”
Pop. The magic bubble imploded and reality whaled in like a prizefighter. Around her, women stopped, stared, whispered, as if they’d just received the same bitch slap. Like a smelly old dog, her reputation as America’s most hated personality slunk back into the room.
“I think I’ll take the black.” The woman snatched back her top, and stepped away from Pippa as if she was contagious.
The eyes on her turned hostile, speculative, searching. For a time there, nobody had thought of her as the bitch who ripped into Allie. They’d been talking to the old Pippa. The real Pippa. God, this morning made her want that back even more.
Phi rose to her feet in a rustle of fabric. “Well, then, I think we will get to our own shopping.”
Pippa followed Phi out of the fitting room like a criminal. It had been too easy to forget when she was doing what she loved best. Ray owed her big for this, and she was done taking it. Damn it, these women lapped up what she did. Lots of them needed it. Ray had no right to take that away.
“I think we should lunch in the village.” Phi’s name for Ghost Falls, and granted, the town was small, but not that small. Then again, it had been nothing more than a dusty outpost in the mountains when Phi grew up there.
“No.” This crawling was old already. “We’ll go to Lamb’s, you love it there. But before then, we have some bed linen to buy. Only let’s leave the butterflies on the bed curtains, I like those.”
Pippa was done hiding.
Chapter Eight
“Woman spazzing out on YouTube.” Who would have thought you could type that in and find anything. It might have been mildly amusing if that woman hadn’t been her. Sweet Mother of God, how many hits had the damn thing received? Surely that comma in the views tally was in the wrong place.
After lunch with Phi, they’d picked out some bed linen without too much more fuss. A woman shopping for pillows had given her a glare, but that was about it. Pippa waited for Phi to go and have her afternoon nap before she braved YouTube. She’d stopped watching the clips and reading the articles after her abortive early attempts to set the record straight.
Pip
pa hit play. Five minutes later she was ready to puke. Seeing it again brought it all back. Shit, Ray had stitched her up good. He’d always been a skillful editor but this shit was masterful. No wonder women reacted like they did. She wanted to slap herself. Ray made her look hard, callous, and ruthless. She looked like she’d stripped Allie of her dignity and made her crawl. No great surprise that Allie didn’t want anything more to do with her.
Pippa watched it again. And felt even sicker. She paused the clip and studied her face. The camera caught her looking bitter and angry. Her eyes slitted and her mouth contorted viciously.
Someone had to have that original footage, and be prepared to give it to her. Flipping through her contacts, she weighed them up as she went. Maybe one of the cameramen? She tried texting this time.
“Hey.” Matt stood in her bedroom doorway in jeans and a plain green tee. Her pulse did a weird flip thing as he smiled, soft and gentle and glad to see her. “What you doing?”
“Watching the woman who spazzed out on YouTube.” She pushed her laptop across the bed toward him. “Have you seen it?”
“Yup.” He stepped into the room, making it shrink around him. Pushing the computer closer to her, he perched on the end of the bed. They couldn’t teach what he did to denim around the thighs. “You didn’t say it, that’s all I need to know.”
Damn, if that didn’t make her chest warm and tears prick the back of her lids.
His strange, lion eyes held her gaze. Honest, true, steady. Men like this were rare, nonexistent in her life of the last ten or so years. Her voice came out all gummed up and she cleared her throat. “Thank you.”
He stroked her cheek with the back of his fingers. “It wasn’t meant to make you sad.”
“It was nice.”
“Yeah.” He shrugged and dropped his eyes. “So, I’m here to look at your ceiling.”
“Oh.” She stared up at the ceiling. A muddy stain oozed over the plasterwork. “It’s not leaking now.”
“Hmm.” He tilted his head, the suntanned column of his throat inviting a girl to bury her face there. “It’s not raining, either. Do you think there could be a connection?”
“Smart-ass.” She laughed, and it lifted some of the nasty fog in her head. Matt could always make her laugh. “I haven’t watched it since the first time it aired.”