by Christa Wick
"Bujo," she called out as she forced that and another swig down. Melanie had the feeling she would need an ally before the night was over. Declan and Roger certainly wouldn't fill that need and she assumed her mother's allegiance was pledged to her new husband, especially when her daughter was about to turn completely irrational.
"Here boy, c'mon. C'mon Bujo!"
Declan looked at her as if she had grown a second head. Ignoring him, she called again and finally heard a soft canine whine. She whistled then snicked a couple of times out the side of her mouth. A very fuzzy head appeared in the hallway, the coloring and size the black, tan and white of an adult Bernese Mountain Dog, but the texture and length of the fur that of a Chow Chow.
The presence of the men, or maybe just Declan's uptight, glacial attitude, was clearly stressing Bujo. His gaze darted around the assembled humans and he kept dipping his head.
Melanie patted the cushion next to her. "Come up here and sit next to me. Don’t worry, I’ll protect you from the mean, mean man."
Bujo barked once then bounded down the hall, leaping to land next to her. Schnapps sloshed inside her glass but didn't spill as the hundred pound dog began to slobber all over her face. Grimacing, she ordered him down, but not off, and used the sleeve of her hoodie to wipe away all the dog spit.
"That's a good boy," she smiled, petting him with one hand while the other hand lifted the glass to her lips and she drew another long sip of the Schnapps. The burning taste was starting to grow on her.
Ten minutes later, after listening to her mother try over and over again to draw Declan into conversation that consisted of more than one or two words, Melanie returned to the liquor cabinet. Seeing that no one else wanted the Schnapps, she skipped the polite two fingers measurement and filled the tumbler up to half an inch from the top edge then carefully picked her way back to the couch, careful to avoid the long legs of both men and the four furry ones of Bujo as he curled in an oversized ball next to where she was sitting.
Seeing her mother's disapproving gaze on the glass in her hand, Melanie lifted it high in a salute, gesturing first to her mother and Roger and then to Declan, whose gaze narrowed suspiciously.
"Here's to you both and your secret marriage," she toasted and swallowed down a mouthful. Turning to Declan, she shook her head. “No toast for you; you don’t even like me.”
When he simply stared at her strangely in response, she tossed back another. Then another.
An hour later, the bottle of Schnapps was disappointingly empty and Melanie was sliding toward the floor.
7
With a wrecking ball swinging inside her head, Melanie peeled one eye open. She yawned as the lone open eye slowly focused on her surroundings…and a murky tattoo swam into view.
She recognized the outline but had never been able to make sense of it.
Was the tattoo of an octopus? It sort of looked like one, but some of the tentacles ended in spiky shapes. Maybe it was a warrior octopus?
The eye drifted shut and she yawned again.
Sliding one thigh forward, she tried to get more comfortable so she could fall back asleep. Her foot came into contact with a leg, one with a light dusting of hair that was too silky to be her two-day-old stubble or that of any other woman.
Her eyes flew back open with a jolt, her pulse and breathing going from the approximate rate of a hibernating bear to that of a marathon runner with the finish line in sight.
Tattoo… An unknown body in bed with her that wasn’t her dog…
Oh nooo…
Looking over and getting confirmation in the form of the naked torso of Declan Bain right beside her, Melanie shot straight up into a sitting position.
Clutching the comforter to her chest, she unintentionally pulled it off his magnificent body.
To her relief, he had on silky blue boxers.
And nothing else.
The rest of his mouth watering form was exposed to her bleary-eyed gaze. And what wasn't exposed was just barely concealed because a very large tent shaped the front panel of his boxers.
Emitting a small, surprised shriek, Melanie jumped up from the bed, the comforter still clutched to her chest. Her very first step landed on something hard, misshapen and slick. Her ankle twisted, turning her body with it. The bedding tangled around her legs and down she went.
Her shriek startled Declan awake.
Seeing her on the floor, puzzled, but not all that surprised, he slid to her side of the bed, stood and offered her a hand up, the dark gray gaze unreasonably alert for having just been jerked from a sleeping state.
Out of reflex, she reached for his hand.
Then she saw the extremely impressive erection that still poked at the front of his boxers.
"For God's sake," she snapped, yanking her hand back to her chest. "Put that...thing...away."
She kicked at the comforter swaddling her feet to find whatever the hell it was that had made her fall. Seeing Bujo's chewed up rawhide, she exhaled a long groan.
Had she really just tripped over a bone while fleeing a boner?
How humiliating.
"There," Declan said, a fat dose of amusement lacing his voice.
Melanie risked a side glance to find that he’d grabbed one of the stuffed animals that still decorated her childhood bedroom.
"Don’t use Koko to hide your junk!" She snatched the gorilla then dropped it with fresh dread. "Just turn around and stay like that until I leave the room."
He didn't comply, his body language communicating he'd reached his tolerance level for female morning hysteria by the way his legs moved into a spread stance and his hands braced against his hips.
Seeing that the offending member was continuing to salute the new day with unflagging enthusiasm, Melanie pressed a palm against the vein throbbing in her temple. She tried to remember anything that had happened last night after Bujo had finally joined her on the couch, but everything after that point was one big, peppermint flavored haze.
"What the heck were you doing in my bed?" she barked.
"Oh, Melalee, honey..."
Great. Melanie sighed and whirled around to find her mother standing in the open doorway.
The only good thing that came from hearing that old ‘Melalee, honey…’ line was that Nancy’s presence managed to break Declan, prompting him to finally snatch a pillow off the bed and sit down so his erection was fully concealed.
"Declan was going to go to a hotel, but he'd had a second scotch. We didn’t want him to drive. And he was just going to take the couch after you, uhm..."
"Passed out stinking drunk," Declan supplied, helpfully.
Nancy winced but kept on trying to explain. "Yes, that. Unfortunately, Bujo has been a little upset since I got back, what with my extended trip away, and then two new strangers to deal with. And, well, he…urinated on the couch."
"Declan or Bujo?" Melanie asked, blinking innocently at Declan, who simply raised an amused brow in response.
Her mother gasped. "Now, Melanie Lee Archer, that—"
"Stick with Melalee," she corrected. "You're still the one in trouble here, Mom, not me.”
“I didn’t think it would be a big deal if you both slept in the same bed. You’re basically family now.”
Melanie felt her brain almost explode over that last bit. “Mom, he is not my family. He’s barely your family. You don't know Declan at all, and frankly, it doesn't sound like his uncle does either. If you knew his reputation—"
"Don't flatter yourself, Melanie Lee," Declan growled from where he sat, the pillow resting on his lap.
Okay, that hurt. She hadn’t even meant that reputation. She’d meant the one about him being an asshole, which he’d just proven on his own by sounding repulsed by the idea of them sleeping together.
Shooting a quick glare at the awful man, Melanie stood up and threw the comforter on the bed then snatched her robe off the side chair. Shrugging it on, she escaped to the hall bathroom.
She was not going t
o let Declan turn her hangover into an even more painful event.
Opening the door five minutes later, she saw her rolling suitcase propped against the wall, its presence undoubtedly a small peace offering from her mother.
Hauling it into the bathroom, she did a more thorough cleansing of her face and brushed her teeth, the exhaust fan running to mute any sound from the outside world.
Her eyes were surprisingly clear, but her skin was dehydrated. She drank a couple handfuls of water from the sink then applied some moisturizer before looking at the clothes Cammie had packed.
The outfits were casual as directed. And Cammie had picked the newest and most feminine items in Melanie's closet, which was a sweet touch. Picking the sunniest outfit in there to try and offset her mood, she layered a peach and white striped knit blouse over a long sleeve t-shirt, with pale blue jeans on the bottom and blue sneakers.
Dressed and no longer looking like she’d done a Hollywood-worthy walk of shame, she finally took a breath and returned to her now-empty room so she could go over all the new information she got last night.
The wrecking ball from her hangover had nothing on the new headache forming as she reviewed all the facts.
Just how in the hell had all of this happened? Seriously, her mother had been gone six weeks and returned home with some guy who just happened to be related to one of Hollywood's biggest stars. And not related in a normal, healthy way, either. She remembered snippets of last night’s conversation before all the alcohol—something about Declan being Roger’s brother’s illegitimate and unacknowledged child who he’d just found… She also remembered a whole lot of anger and resentment between the two men.
At least this all explained why her mother had been dropping a lot of "Melalees" in the few conversations they'd had over the past few weeks. That was one mystery solved.
The other, she wasn’t quite ready to deal with at the moment.
Staring at the bed she and Declan had just woken up from, she shoved the big, burning question down.
Maybe it’s best if that one remain a mystery…
Thirty minutes later, she emerged from her room to find her mother and Roger in the kitchen—alone. Seeing Roger's grim expression and only three plates set at the small table in the kitchen, she knew Declan was gone and wasn't coming back.
"Where are you going, Melalee?" her mother asked as Melanie started through the swinging doors.
"To grab my phone," she called back, picking up speed before her mother could tell her to wait until after breakfast, especially since it wasn't finished cooking.
She fished the device out of her backpack and checked its battery level. Seeing it at half power, she snagged the charger. Returning to the kitchen, she checked her texts first to find that Cammie had poked her with messages three times, the first time for not letting her know she'd made it to her mom's and twice after that for not responding to the first text.
Sorry, things got crazy last night. Apparently, I have a new stepdad and that's not even the weirdest part. More when I get home—this is all too big for text!
Switching over to her mail app, she found some papers she would need to fill out and take with her to the new studio on Monday.
"Put that thing away and pour us all some orange juice," her mother admonished as she scrambled half a dozen eggs in a bowl.
Melanie complied after plugging the charger into a nearby outlet and connecting the cell phone. She made it three steps away when a warning tone sounded.
"The orange juice," her mother said as Melanie turned back toward the phone.
"That's the weather app—"
"We all know what the weather's going to be," Nancy snapped, her tone uncharacteristic for talking to anyone, let alone her only child. "It can wait until after breakfast."
Melanie froze and looked at her mother then at Roger. He had gone from looking grim to mournful.
"Snow storm this evening," he said, catching her gaze on him. "Big one, although I don't know what that means in this part of the country."
She snatched her phone up and quickly navigated to the weather app. "It's barely even autumn!"
"It's Denver, darling," her mother answered.
"It's freakish," Melanie protested, scrolling through the hour-by-hour forecast. She glanced at Roger and, knowing she absolutely shouldn't, she asked him the question that had been clawing at the inside of her skull since she saw just three place settings on the table.
"Is that why Declan left?"
He shrugged and she could see the hurt inside of him despite the bland mask. Seeing past the attempted indifference was part and parcel of working around actors—she saw simulations of pain and joy, rage and lust, love and agony. And, when she got to work with the best performers, she learned to recognize the feelings better in real life.
Shoulders slumping, she grabbed the pitcher of orange juice from the refrigerator and walked back to the table. Filling the tumblers, she made side glances at her mother and new stepfather. He’d moved over to the toaster and was buttering muffins as they popped up while Nancy shoveled steaming scrambled eggs into a serving dish.
One thing was certain; they were definitely in love. When they looked at one another, all the tension in their faces fell away. Her mom looked a good decade younger when she smiled at Roger. And whenever she did, Roger would smile right back at her and look more like he could be Declan's older brother than his uncle.
Score one for mom, she thought, putting the juice up and carrying the eggs over to the table. Roger followed behind with the toast. Her mother was at the end of the little procession carrying a plate heaped with bacon.
"I need to leave today," Melanie said, denting the lighter mood as she forked eggs onto her plate and passed the dish to Roger.
If she was lucky, her Sunday flight would already be cancelled and the airline would give her a seat in a flight out this afternoon without charging her. Otherwise she was going to lose the first half week of pay at her next job just to get home in time to start it.
Her mother passed her the plate of bacon. "We were hoping you would take a flight after the storm passes, honey."
Melanie put three pieces of bacon on her plate and stuffed a fourth in her mouth then handed Roger the dish. Chewing, she shook her head then took a drink of orange juice to wash the deliciousness down.
"It's daily taping on the soap opera," she started, knowing her mother, who had not once in her life watched a soap, wouldn't understand what that meant in practical terms. "They can't go a day without replacing me. Most sets a day without wardrobe just isn't going to happen, definitely not on a soap opera. And I need the work."
Roger cleared his throat and shifted in his seat but said nothing. Melanie stared at him hard enough that she could practically see words dancing behind his pressed lips.
He forced the corners of his mouth up in a smile she didn't find genuine.
"I'm putting the house up for sale, Melalee—"
"What?" Melanie jerked her attention over to her mom then back to Roger, the bland smile still masking whatever he was feeling at that moment.
She wanted her phone, which was annoyingly still sitting on the counter, so she could look the man up before she had to get on a plane for L.A. Then it struck her that she didn't even know his last name. Declan carried his mother's maiden name. His IMDB and Wikipedia entries only noted that he'd been raised by his mother. Even her parents' names were not listed.
"Are you saying you're moving to…what…Boston?"
"Worcester," Nancy clarified. "Roger owns a number of independent bookstores in Massachusetts."
Reaching over, she covered Melanie's hand and gently squeezed. "We were hoping you'd come with us." She blinked once, emotion flooding her face.
Melanie looked from her mom to Roger. The man didn't look like he hated her or anything, but Melanie was pretty sure her mother was the only one nurturing the hope that Melanie would move to Massachusetts.
"I'm just getting my foot in the d
oor in L.A."
"Honey, you're living paycheck to paycheck out there. Roger can give you an apartment to live in and a part-time bookkeeping or property management job with enough flexibility to look for costuming gigs on the east coast. There's still a lot of stage theater throughout New England and New York City is only five hours away."
"Plenty of stage work," Roger chimed in, an annoying amount of jocularity in his tone. "It's very robust in the summer."
"So you're basically trying to tell me politely that you’re rich? Or extremely rich, rather." Melanie shot the question at him point blank. Her mom's hand squeezed hers again, this time in reprimand.
"Well, a gentleman doesn't talk of such things," he replied.
Mashing her lips together, Melanie tried to stare him into a better answer. When he remained silent, she took another tack.
"Declan's bio says he grew up in South Boston. You should be familiar enough with the city to know that's not where kids with rich kids grow up. If you’re so rich, how come Declan didn’t grow up with at least a few silver spoons as well.” She gave Roger a withering glance, not really sure why she was standing here upset over Declan’s childhood. “Not big on helping family, is that it?"
Roger’s face tightened, but instead of the flare of anger she expected, the look of sorrow returned to his gray eyes.
"That is between Roger and Declan," Nancy chided, her tone sharp and unforgiving. “It is not up for debate or discussion, young lady.”
Yep, just as she’d thought. It was clear where her mother’s loyalty was.
Melanie slid her hand from under her mother's and piled eggs onto her fork.
"Well, mom, the same holds true for my life in L.A.," she said, sticking a knife in the idea that she would ever move to the east coast. “No debate. No discussion.”
8
"Half the proceeds will be yours when I sell the house," Nancy said ninety minutes later as she followed the airport signs to the JetFly terminal. "For now at least, the rest when...well..."