Aurora waited a beat, let the tension in the room shift from a boil to a slow simmer, then said, "I'm sure we can do just that. And because I'm fully part of this endeavor, I want you to know you have the full power of Glass Slipper behind you. Whatever we can do." She paused then and brightened considerably as part of the solution came to her. "One thing we can do is move you and Gaby out of that hotel and move you in here. Sir Robin would love to have more company, I can assure you, and you'll have complete privacy and a private court."
Tess didn't say anything right away, but she didn't look immediately thrilled with the solution. She was probably tom between giving Gaby the privacy she needed and having Max underfoot for the next few weeks. Well, it was a big house, a very big house. All of them could retreat to their own wings, if necessary. For Aurora's part, she was quite pleased with that unexpected little bonus. If they had to be in each other's way every day, maybe they could get past this silly antagonism and see what was becoming quite plainly apparent. Well, it was to her, anyway.
"That's a very generous offer, Aurora," Max said, sounding mostly sincere. "But I doubt Sir Robin would be thrilled with the idea of media stomping around his gates and fences, or worse, camping out."
"Are you kidding?" Aurora laughed. "You don't know him like I do. I'll be surprised if he doesn't change his plans and jet home just to be part of the excitement. He'll be tickled to play a role in subverting the press in any way. Trust me on this." She laid a hand on Max's arm. "But, of course, I will run this by him, just to be certain. You can speak with him yourself if it would make you feel any better." She turned and walked to an intercom unit that was tucked next to the service dolly and pressed a button. "Phillip, could you be a dear and call over to Glass Slipper for me? I'll need a car sent to the Fontaines' hotel." She looked at Max. "Would an hour give you enough time to pack? I think it's best we move quickly, on the off chance Tess is right and they do run this story on the evening news.''
Max just sighed. Tess downed the rest of her drink.
Aurora took that as a yes. "In an hour, Phillip. Thank you, darling." She looked at her two houseguests and beamed. "Don't be such worrywarts. It'll all turn out splendidly." She slid her arm through Max's and ushered him to the door. "You best head out and get to Gaby. You can pack all your suitcases into the limo and bring your car, or better yet, why don't I have the limo sent here and you can just leave your car here. Stay completely under the radar. We can spirit you in the back way and—"
Max waved a hand. "Aurora, please, I don't think we need to go to quite those lengths; It's not like she's Elvis or something. I'll be fine. And while I appreciate your offer, I really think—"
Finally Tess spoke up. "Just do what she says so we can all have some peace, okay? And to be honest, she's probably right, Let's err on the side of caution here. For all our sakes. Especially Gaby's." She walked to the parlor doors and opened them.
"I'll have chef prepare us a lovely dinner," Aurora added. "We can discuss how we should handle this, come up with a game plan, as it were. Then get a good night's rest and be ready to tackle the day tomorrow."
Max looked at them both, then finally blew out a long breath. "Fine. At least for now." He leaned down and kissed Aurora's cheek. "Thank you. I'm sorry for all this."
"No need to apologize, dear. We do what we need to for friends."
As he passed through the parlor door, Tess called out from behind him. "And to think, now Gaby will have access to me twenty-four-seven."
"Tess," Aurora hissed, reprovingly. She loved the girl dearly, but she did have a little problem with impulse control.
Max just kept on walking to the front doors.
"Just one big happy family," Tess went on, trailing out behind him.
Aurora stepped to the open doorway, unsure whether to shake her head in exasperation… or pat herself on the back. Tess just couldn't leave the poor man alone. And it made her wonder why. It wasn't that she didn't know how to go after a man. Lord knows she'd plucked them like grapes off a vine over the years. When she saw something she wanted, she just went after it. She was a lot like Vivian in that way.
Aurora folded her arms and leaned on the doorframe, observing the little ritual mating dance unfolding in front of her. Wondering why Tess didn't just take what she wanted this time. What was it about Max that was so different it had her behaving like something of a fifth-grade boy who tossed out taunts to the girl he had a crush on because he didn't know how to handle what he was feeling?
And that's when it hit her. Tess knew all about stalking her prey, but it occurred to her that, this time, Tess had no real idea what to do with a man like Max, who was so different from her usual conquests. And connected, as well, to a teenager that Tess was coming to care about, no matter what she said. In fact, it was her immediate insistence on diminishing that role—mentor instead of coach—that gave her away. Much like her constant baiting of Max was giving something else away entirely. Even though she'd bet money Tess wasn't quite aware of it.
Yet.
Chapter 13
"You know something else?" Tess followed Max into the foyer.
Max ignored her and kept on his straight-arrow path to the front door. "Straight arrow" being the key phrase there, she thought. He was so damn exasperating.
For whatever reason, probably because she just couldn't resist the challenge of trying to direct that straight arrow off course a little, she didn't say what she'd been about to, which was that Gaby needed a female influence in her life, and that time spent with someone as maternal as Aurora would be a good thing for her right now.
No, instead her mouth opened and what came out was, "A.s I noted earlier, for being such a tight ass, yours really is quite fine."
Max paused at the door, his shoulders were so tense she half-expected him to just rap his forehead straight on the mahogany panels. "You might want to take all this a bit more seriously." Without looking at her, he gripped the doorknob and slowly turned it.
"You worry too much. We'll handle the press. Hey, who knows, I'm yesterday's news now that I'm retired. We might have blown this way out of proportion."
"You didn't see Fionula's face light up like a shark at feeding time."
" 'Fionula'?" Tess swallowed the string of curse words, "As in Fionula Hust?"
"The very one."
"Jesus," she muttered under her breath, but quickly recouped. "Well, look at it this way, if Gaby's goal was to put this out there in a big way, she picked the right mouthpiece. Key word there being 'mouth.' "
He turned a little then, looked at her over his shoulder. "My point all along."
Tess shrugged off the pointed insult. She was too busy mentally scrambling, considering all the possible ways tomorrow was likely to play out. Fionula had been a major thorn in her side during her later years on tour. When she'd been busting her ass to come back after her first couple shoulder surgeries, Ms. Hust liked nothing more than to write opinion pieces on how she should just accept that her career was over, take her titles and big paychecks and go home. Maybe Tess should have thanked her. It was largely op-ed pieces like hers that had kept Tess focused through physical therapy and driven her to return to tour in better shape than when she'd left it.
She doubted Fionula was going to be kind to her now, which meant this wasn't going to be fun for Gaby. She'd just have to do what she could to minimize the fallout. But she'd be lying if she said she hadn't already started thinking how she could play this to her advantage. She'd been trying to get press since landing at Heathrow. Here was her perfect opportunity. She wouldn't throw Gaby to the wolves, but then, Gaby had pretty much made that decision. She was old enough to start learning the hard lessons of reaping the seeds she sowed. Tess was the first to admit she'd done some stupid things in her life, but she'd always owned up to them.
"We'll get through the next couple of weeks," she told him, then raised her hand as if taking a pledge. "I'll help her through this. I know you don't want to hear it, but I'm
good at this."
"For all the wrong reasons."
"Hey, I wasn't the one shooting my mouth off in the interview today."
Max's jaw flexed. You know, he really had a decent profile. She caught herself wondering what she could say to make him smile. He'd looked pretty damn hot that one time she'd caught him at it.
Shaking that thought off, she said, "She's going to shoot her mouth off, Max. She would whether she ever met me. It's who she is. You know it, I know it. Hell, if anyone was going to influence that out of her, it would have been you. And you've had years to give it a shot."
"A running battle, to be sure. Which is why I don't need you coming in here and giving her any ideas. You're right, I have my hands quite full as it is, thanks."
Tess laughed. "I don't think she needs my help with ideas. She seems to be doing just fine on her own."
Max scowled. "You don't have to look so damn—"
"Proud of her? I wouldn't go that far. But if she operates on the idea that she wants to have a hand in what's said about her, then now is her opportunity to learn how to handle the results of her little bait-throwing expedition."
So much for getting a smile out of him. She wondered if he ever eased up. And she thought she was stressed out. Sheesh.
He'd shifted and was looking at her directly now. "Something tells me having the two of you under the same roof is going to make that damn near impossible."
"Such a pessimist." She couldn't have said what made her do it. The tension screaming between them every time they got within spitting distance of each other was hardly sexual in nature. But all of a sudden, or maybe not so sudden, she wasn't looking at him as Gaby's older brother, stick in the mud, thorn in her side. She was… well, she wasn't quite sure what she was doing. But whatever it was, it made her take a step closer. Mostly, she told herself, just to see what he'd do about it.
Surprisingly, Max held his ground. She knew he had an edge, but perhaps she hadn't given him quite enough credit for it. Because in that little instant of time where she had to decide whether to back down… or go into her tried-and-true mantrap mode, she seriously considered the former. Which wasn't like her at all. The hard truth was, she wasn't a hundred percent certain she could pull it off. It was a rare thing for her, that uncertainty.
But when had she ever backed down from a challenge?
"I'm beginning to wonder about something," she said, purposely dropping her voice to something closer to a husky whisper.
"Which would be?" he asked evenly. He held her gaze rather easily.
Hmm. The surprises kept coming. But he might as well have waved a red flag in front of her. No longer thinking about Gaby, or her own greater good, her focus had zeroed in on one thing and one thing only. She shifted an incremental step closer. "Are you more worried about my negative influence on sweet, young Gaby?" Another incremental shift and she was almost breathing the same air he was. He was taller than her own five-eleven, which was nice, she found herself thinking. Really nice. She reached up and toyed with the collar of his polo shirt. "Or are you more worried about my possible negative influence on terse, not-so-naive you?"
Without breaking their gaze, he took her hand and moved it away from his collar. "Don't be mistaken. Only one member of the Fontaine family is starstruck."
"That's not exactly what I asked."
Shockingly, his mouth twitched the tiniest bit. "I know." Then he let himself out the front door and shut it abruptly between them.
Tess stood there, mouth hanging open, before turning and leaning back against the door. She let out a short laugh. "Dammit." Who knew he had such an exit in him? "Point to the tight ass."
She glanced up to find Aurora standing in the parlor doorway, arms folded over her flowing caftan, a knowing smile beaming from her expertly made-up face.
"What?"
"Don't give me that innocent look," Aurora said.
Tess merely smiled. "Yeah, I guess it's been a few years since I could pull that off." She could see Aurora was ready to pounce on her little interaction with Max—wasn't it just her luck she'd had a witness?—and she wasn't about to let her. Hell, Tess didn't even know what had just gone on there. She clapped her hands together. "I guess we'd better prepare for our guests."
"Don't worry, dear. I'll take care of that. Is there anything we should do to try and counter Fionula's interview? What do you think she's going to do with it?"
"Well, no one knows I'm staying here, so moving Gaby here tonight is. a good move. The story will break tomorrow morning when the papers come out. She writes for Good Day and they have no direct media outlet."
"You seemed concerned earlier that it might go that way."
"With her, you never know. If I was still an active player, I'd be more worried. But, frankly, this is gossip, not news. The Brits worship their gossip rags, but this will make a little splash, then they'll move on to something else, something more sensational than a retired player helping out a rookie."
Aurora tucked her chin, "Come now. At any other time of the year, that would be true. But we're on the eve of the British Championships. It might be a blip in the gossip rags for a day or two, but it will most definitely be chewed on quite thoroughly by those in the tennis world. Every announcer will analyze it to death, and every sports journalist is going to want a quote or something. From you, from Gaby."
"I know, you're right.''
"It's going to be a flurry of attention for her, the likes of which she hasn't seen yet."
"She's going to have to learn to deal with it sometime. Consequences, there's always consequences. Nobody knows that better than me."
"Whatever the case, I'm glad we can give her some respite from what will surely be, at the very least, a major distraction for her, right when she needs it least."
Tess smiled. "Maybe next time she'll think twice before playing an angle like that, with a journalist, of all people."
Aurora laughed lightly. "Darling, I know you don't believe that any more than I do."
"True," she said, looping her arm through Aurora's as they walked back into the parlor. "But look at it this way, at least she'll get her 'Handling the Hounds of Hell' tips from the best."
* * * * *
"Gabrielle!"
"Miss Fontaine, this way!"
"Give us a smile, Gaby!"
"Where is Tess?"
"Well, this was a mistake," Max muttered beneath his breath as he drove slowly through the small throng of reporters milling by the side entrance gates to the grounds of Wimbledon.
"Oh, lighten up," Gaby said from the passenger seat. She went to put down the window.
Max threw his left arm across her body. "What are you doing?"
"They just want a wave. What is the harm?"
"They'll swarm the car. Let's get on the grounds and get you to the practice court, okay?"
Gaby slumped back in the seat. "I don't know why you're being such a stick about this. We could have just trained back at Sir Robin's today."
Which was exactly what Tess had advised them both to do this morning. She'd suggested it was best if Gaby laid low today, focused on her practice. She'd offered to come down to the grounds and take on whatever press or media that had shown up after the story came out in the morning paper. "It will all blow over in a day or two if we handle this right," she'd told him. "Let me handle it."
But no, he hadn't listened. He'd thought it best to tackle it head-on. Tess had said the night before that Gaby should be responsible for the consequences of her actions, and after laying awake all night, he'd come to the same conclusion. When he'd mentioned that to Tess that morning over breakfast, she'd looked at him like he was insane.
Women.
He'd never professed to understanding them, but he most definitely didn't understand this one. Like, what in the hell had that little display in the foyer last night been all about? Yeah, and why in the hell did you respond like you did, his little voice wanted to know. Stupid little voice. That had kept him a
wake last night, too.
Well, he knew better than Tess Hamilton what was right for his sister. He tapped the brake when a more enthusiastic photographer stepped in front of the bumper and snapped a picture straight on. "Dammit, come on!" At least, he thought he knew. He was having serious second thoughts at the moment. "Dear God, there are more of them on the inside."
His hope that the hallowed grounds of the All England Club would provide them with a safe, secure haven was quickly dashed. With the Championships beginning the next day, the quaint little village of Wimbledon had already taken on a circuslike atmosphere. The roads leading down to the grounds were filled with spectators, many of them browsing along the row of vendors crammed into the various driveways of the homes lining Church Road. He'd expected that part. They'd been here for juniors, he knew what it was like. In fact, he'd been counting on the gathering fans and autograph seekers already on line for tickets to act as a shield. Deal with a handful of reporters and photographers, then get lost in the crowd, get inside. That had been his plan.
He hadn't counted on the media with grounds passes lying in wait for them.
"That wasn't too bad," Gaby said, giving him a smug little smirk. "I told you they weren't going to care about me. Yet," she added under her breath.
Max ignored her. They parked and he got out. He retrieved her gear bag from the boot while she did a last-minute check of her hair in the rearview mirror. God save him. "You look fine. It's a practice session. Come on." As he lowered the cover on the boot, he saw several people walking directly toward them. One of them had a television camera. "Gaby, stay in the car."
Not So Snow White Page 17