by Amber Brock
Kitty swallowed a sigh. Not riveting conversation, but his accent was pretty. Now here was a guy who could get by only on appearance. “I guess it would be,” she offered.
Sebastian glanced across the room to where Max and Hen sat. He must have decided they were too far away to hear him, because he leaned in to Kitty and spoke under his breath. “I’m sorry Max came up with us. I know you didn’t invite him.”
“It’s fine, really.” She shook her head, hoping she looked as if it was, indeed, fine.
“He thought I’d sneak up here anyway. Said it was easier to come with me.” Sebastian’s smile could have melted butter. Kitty’s face warmed.
“Is that the sort of thing you’d do?”
He stared into his glass, failing miserably at looking guilty. “Well…I might have been a little bad once or twice. With girls like you. He thought he needed to keep an eye on me.”
“I see.” Kitty’s stomach quivered. Girls like you. Her conversation with Hen about Charles’s parents’ objections came back to her. Kitty and Hen were evidently not the first white girls to find Sebastian charming. She knew segregation was more of a formal institution in the South than in New York, so he’d likely found himself in real hot water before. Hen broke into Kitty’s thoughts, calling her over, and Kitty crossed the room back to where Max and Hen sat.
At least Hen had relaxed somewhat. Kitty couldn’t say whether Hen’s change in attitude was more the result of the heavy cocktail Kitty had poured for her or the realization that this little private rebellion had almost no chance of making it back to Charles’s parents. Either way, Hen’s tinkling laugh had gotten louder, and her initial worries about their companions didn’t seem to concern her anymore.
Kitty’s attention was diverted when Loco ran in. At the sight of the dog, Sebastian lit up. He settled on the braided rug, delighted when Loco climbed onto his lap.
“What is her name? She is a beautiful dog,” he said. Loco licked his hand, her whole body wiggling, and he laughed.
“Her name’s Loco,” Kitty said.
He startled. “You named your dog Crazy?”
She shook her head. “No! She’s named after Betty Grable’s character in How to Marry a Millionaire.”
“But she’s a girl, isn’t she?”
“So’s Betty Grable.”
Sebastian smiled. “Loc-a. If she’s a girl, the name should be Loc-a.”
“Why is that?”
“Everything in Spanish is either boy or girl. Girl is a. It’s a softer sound, more feminine. Better for girls.”
“Loca.” Kitty cocked her head. “I’ll never get used to calling her something different now. Guess she’s stuck with a boy name.”
“She’s still beautiful, though.”
“Yes, she is.” Kitty clicked her tongue and Loco settled on the chaise longue beside her.
“How to Marry a Millionaire?” Max leaned in. “You know that wasn’t meant to be an instructional film, right?”
Kitty wondered if that was supposed to be funny, but the lame attempt at humor must have landed with Hen. “It’s Kitty’s current favorite. She’s already dragged me to see it about twenty times.”
Kitty lifted her chin. “Don’t exaggerate. And you liked it too.”
“Not as much as you.” Hen turned to Max. “When her father gave her Loco, he’d already named her Peanut. After Kitty saw the movie the first time, she insisted on changing the name. The dog hadn’t been Peanut long anyway, so she didn’t seem to care. She just comes no matter what Kitty calls her.”
“I take it Kitty gets what she wants,” Max said.
Hen flipped a hand. “Oh, always. That’s her specialty.”
“I don’t get what I want all the time; no one does.” Kitty took a cigarette from her case, and Sebastian took a match from the table to give her a light.
“I don’t know,” Hen said. Her drink sloshed as she gestured. “You always find a way out of the things you don’t want to do. Like with your Andre problem. I bet you’ve already got a plan for him, don’t you?”
Max and Sebastian looked from Hen to Kitty, but Kitty cut off their questions. “I’d rather not talk about that while I have people over.”
Hen’s eyes widened. “Oh. Oh, right. Sure.”
Kitty didn’t want Max, and especially not Sebastian, knowing about her father’s mandate. Now, at least, she had a suitor picked out, which would help her avoid pairing up with Andre. But to get Charles, she had to force the breakup. She’d been trying to puzzle that out for too long with too little success. The others turned their conversation toward music, while Kitty sat back on the chaise longue and let her mind wander. She did her best thinking when she wasn’t trying to think.
She almost laughed when she noticed that Hen kept staring at Sebastian. Hen would gaze at him until her eyes lost focus, then catch herself and snap her head back up. Kitty could hardly blame Hen for that. His smooth skin, strong jaw, and dark brown eyes made it hard to look away. Still, for all Hen’s fretting about what Charles’s parents would think of Sebastian’s skin color, it sure didn’t seem to bother Hen herself much.
Kitty opened her mouth to tease Hen and froze. Her solution was sitting right in front of her; Hen had practically gift-wrapped the answer for her. She had to get Hen away from Charles and throw her at someone else. For all Charles’s escapades, he’d never want anyone to think his girl had run around on him. From the way Sebastian’s mere presence was now making it hard for Hen to keep up with her side of the conversation with Max, it wouldn’t be too difficult to engineer a romantic situation…or at least the appearance of one. After all, Hen would never cheat. It only needed to seem like she could.
Kitty snapped out of her daze when she noticed Hen was no longer staring at Sebastian but at her. “You look like the wheels are turning,” Hen said, a note of apprehension in her voice.
“No, no.” Kitty yawned theatrically. “Goodness, it is late, though.”
“Maybe we’d better go,” Max said.
Sebastian raised an eyebrow at Kitty. “Maybe you just need another drink?”
“I like his plan better,” Kitty said with a nod in Sebastian’s direction. She stood and stretched. “So how much longer are you boys in town?”
“Only another week,” Sebastian said.
Kitty spun around, leaving her half-poured drink on the bar. “No. But you just got here.”
“It’s a two-week engagement. We’ve got to get back, save the Miami club from the amateurs they’ve got down there right now,” Max said.
“It’s a pity, that’s all.” Kitty turned back to finish mixing her cocktail. “We’ve barely gotten to know you.” And I need Sebastian to make my plan work, she thought.
“Andre is coming to Miami, isn’t he?” Sebastian asked. “When was the last time you visited?”
Kitty sat back down beside a now-sleeping Loco. “Papa took me once when he first opened the Imperium. I was only nine or ten. I barely remember it.”
“That’s a real shame,” Sebastian said. “You ought to come down. You would have a wonderful time, don’t you think, Max?”
“Oh, yeah. Sure.” Max sipped his drink, eyes locked on Kitty.
“Then you must come,” Sebastian said. “You too, Hen.”
Hen’s eyes lit up, and Kitty nearly choked on her drink. She could have kissed Sebastian. Maybe she would, one of these days. He’d made a perfect plan even better. She and Hen could accompany Andre to Miami. Everything fit so beautifully. Her father would be pleased with her “interest” in Andre, Hen would be over a thousand miles away from Charles and her mother, and Sebastian would be close at hand to provide an enticement into trouble.
“Now that you put it that way…” Kitty couldn’t suppress her smile. “I’d say it’s too good to pass up. Hen? What do you think?”
H
en’s head bobbed up and down. “Oh, yes.”
Oh, yes. Kitty could absolutely make Miami work.
Max shot a look at Sebastian. “Hey, you know, we should go. Practice is early. I don’t want you sleeping through it.”
“Are you sure?” Kitty directed the question at Sebastian.
“Yeah, we are.” Max stood and picked up his glass from the coffee table. “Should we put these in the sink?”
Kitty waved him off. “Leave them. The maid will get them in the morning.”
Max tilted his head and looked at her for a long moment. He exhaled hard and set his glass back down. “Come on, Sebastian. Bye, girls.”
“Good-bye, Kitty. Hen.” Sebastian patted Loco on the head. “Buenas noches, Loquita.”
“Let me walk you to the door.” Kitty started to follow them, but Max spoke without turning around.
“We know where it is, thanks.”
She wasn’t sure if it was her imagination, but it seemed like he shut the door a little harder than he needed to. Hen’s wrinkled brow confirmed it.
“You think he’s all right?” Hen asked.
Kitty sank back onto the chaise. “Oh, who cares?”
Hen giggled and crossed the room to rifle through Kitty’s record collection. Kitty scratched Loco’s ear and pondered Max. At first, he’d seemed merely indifferent to her, but now he seemed to actively dislike her. He also seemed determined to stick close to Sebastian, which wouldn’t make her plan for Hen any easier. If she was going to make sure Hen and Sebastian had time alone, something that at least looked scandalous, it would mean separating him from his self-appointed chaperone. She sighed. In Kitty’s experience, there was only one surefire way to distract a man from his mission. She would have to be her own bait and seduce a guy who had just slammed a door on her for no good reason.
Well, she thought, no one could ever accuse me of shying away from a challenge.
To set the trip to Miami in motion, Kitty needed her father’s approval. Though he gave her more than enough spending money, the cost of a plane ticket far exceeded the leftovers in her purse from shopping and trips to the movies. The band would take their bus back to Miami, but Andre bragged that he would fly down ahead of them. She didn’t want to imagine what a multiday bus ride with a bunch of musicians would look like. She had to fly too.
For her father to agree, he’d have to think he’d had the idea first. Kitty called down to his office on Tuesday afternoon, knowing Mondays and Tuesdays were slow days. In fact, for a while they’d had a standing Tuesday night dinner date, although the little tradition had fallen by the wayside some time ago.
Her father answered the phone in an unusually gruff voice. “Kitty? What is it? Do you need money?”
She thought for a moment about delaying the conversation, but Andre was leaving next week. There was no other time. “Can’t I call my own father without some ulterior motive?”
“You? I doubt it.”
“You’re a grouch today.” She kept her tone light and playful.
He sighed. “Got some bad news about a property I wanted to buy in Atlanta.”
“Poor Papa. What do you say we go out to dinner? You need a little distraction.”
“Dinner, eh?” He snorted. “You think that’s going to get Atlanta off my mind?”
“I know a charming dinner companion can.”
This time he laughed. “You’re on. Where do you want to go?”
“I think you can guess,” she said.
“Keens. Nothing but the best.”
Kitty twirled the phone cord around her finger. “Why bother with anything else? I’ll call and get reservations. How does eight o’clock sound?”
“See you there.”
Step one complete. Nothing would butter up her father more than a good steak and a glass of Bordeaux. Of course, she’d already called the restaurant as soon as she had the idea to ask her father. Posing as his secretary, she’d had no trouble securing a table for Tessler, party of two, even with short notice.
She took Loco out for a quick walk before getting ready for dinner. The unseasonable warmth of the week before had faded back into a start-of-winter chill, and Kitty was grateful to climb into the warm bath when she returned to the suite. After washing up, she pulled on a fluffy pink robe and went to her vanity to comb her hair and reapply makeup. The final touch was a navy blue sweater set and white wool skirt. She pulled on her gloves and shoes, checking that they matched her purse, then left the apartment.
The elevator doors opened on the lobby to reveal her father waiting for her. He held out his elbow, and she linked her arm in his.
“You look pretty as a picture,” he said as they walked out onto the sidewalk. The glow of neon signs above the buildings gave everything a colorful sheen. Between the signs, the headlights of taxis, and the streetlights, there was no need of the moon, which hid behind clouds.
“Thank you. You’re not so bad yourself.” Kitty took a deep breath. The smoke-tinged air was brisk, slightly damp. It could mean snow. She pulled her coat tight.
With his free hand, her father adjusted his hat. “Kind of you to say, but I’m coming off a hard day.”
“Yes, what happened in Atlanta?” she asked. They paused at the crosswalk.
“It’s complicated. I don’t expect you to worry about it, though.”
“I’m not worried. I’m curious.”
Her father led her around the corner. The door to the steakhouse was just ahead, under a brown cloth awning. “You really want to know?”
“Sure. It’ll make great dinner conversation.” She knew her father would, at best, end up glossing over the details of his missed opportunity. He always said he was sure the business would bore her, but she suspected he thought she wouldn’t understand. He was probably right. But playing interested would soften him up.
Her father held the door for her, then stepped ahead of her at the maître d’s station. “Tessler, party of two.”
“Of course, sir. Do you have a table preference?”
“A booth, please. In the corner.”
The maître d’ led them through the dark rooms to a booth on a back wall. When Kitty was younger, she liked to crane her neck up throughout the meal and try to count all the ceramic pipes on the ceiling. Her father would list names of all the important men who’d taken part in the restaurant’s unique tradition by purchasing a pipe for a postdinner smoke there. The pipes were hung from the ceiling when not in use. By the end of the night, her neck would ache from staring up, and she never got an accurate count. She smiled at the memory as she slid into the booth.
“What’s got you so cheerful?” her father asked.
“I’m always cheerful.” Kitty glanced over the menu.
“Well, I’m happy to be here with you. It’s been a long time since we had a chance to go to dinner together, hasn’t it? I thought you might not want to be seen on the town with your old man anymore.”
“There’s no one I’d rather be out with, Papa.” A twinge in Kitty’s heart surprised her. She enjoyed spending the evening with her father. Why had it been so long since she’d made the time?
“So, what are you softening me up for this time?” The corners of his mouth twitched.
“To pick up the check.”
He laughed. The waiter came over to get their drink orders. He started to list the specials, but Kitty and her father always got the same meals: lamb chops for her, a steak medium-rare for him. After the waiter left, her father asked again about Kitty’s motives.
“You know me too well.” She sighed. “I wanted to talk to you about Andre.”
Her father crossed his arms over his chest. “I won’t change my mind, Katarina.”
“No, that’s the thing…” She picked at the edge of her napkin, her gaze drifting to the wall beside them. She had to keep
her performance subtle to set the trap. He wouldn’t buy that Kitty had fallen madly in love with Andre overnight. After a sufficient pause, she said, “You were right. He is a nice guy.” She hesitated, and her father took the bait.
“What? What’s the matter?”
“You’ve got him going to Miami so soon. We’re just getting to know each other better.”
Her father smiled. “Is that all? Oh, you girls are all the same. He’ll be back in a month.”
“A whole month? Doesn’t that seem a little long? What if he meets a girl in Miami, what will you say then?”
“I don’t think he’ll meet anyone.” But worry clouded her father’s eyes.
Kitty sat back, still fiddling with the napkin. “You’re right. I know you’re right. And he’ll be back…let’s see, next week is the first of December…January? New Year’s?”
“The first week of January.” Her father shifted a bit in his seat.
“Oh.” Kitty drooped. “I was hoping he might be back for the New Year’s parties. I’ll need a date. I’m sure Hen can find me someone, though. Going alone would be too embarrassing. Andre would understand, don’t you think?”
The waiter delivered their cocktails, giving her father a moment to think. Kitty played with her swizzle stick and tried to look appropriately forlorn.
“Sure. He’d understand. Can’t go alone.” Her father stared at the ice in his drink, his face lined with effort.
“Oh, good. If you think so, then I know it will be okay. And a month really isn’t that long.” Kitty perked up.
Her father regarded her critically. “I have a thought.”
“Oh?” Kitty prepared her look of surprise.
“How would you like to go to Miami?”
Kitty’s mouth rounded into an O. “Miami?”
“Sure. You haven’t gone out of town in ages. A beach trip would be a treat for you.”
“I don’t know, Papa. A whole month? I don’t want to be away for that long. And Andre will be working all the time. What will I do by myself?”
“You occupy yourself pretty well here.”