by Lori Wilde
Fool. You ‘re setting yourself up for disaster. You know better than to fall for this guy.
She knew better and yet she could do nothing to temper the sweet, mushy feelings sprouting inside her the minute Mason took his place as her pretend husband.
It’s just lust, she assured herself. He’s one helluva hottie and a crackerjack kisser. Nothing wrong with physical attraction as long as you don’t let it become something more.
When Manny asked Mason the virginity question and he got it right, Mason shot Charlee a look of alarm.
What in the hell ? his expression said.
Charlee shrugged and looked apologetic. How could she explain her need to let the world know she was privy to Mason’s secret when she didn’t understand the motivation herself?
“Skeet, what was your parents’ reaction the first time they met Violet?”
Mason looked uneasy. “Well, Manny, they welcomed her with open arms and even asked when we were going to start a family.”
Ding, ding, ding, went the bell.
“That’s correct, Skeet, earning you another ten points.” Charlee offered him an I’m-so-sorry-I-screwed-up smile. Her stomach churned. Was he mad? Her anxiety level skyrocketed.
“And now, gentlemen. For that all-important twenty-five-point question. The question that can make or break you. What is your favorite meal, Jerry?”
“This is a cinch,” said Jerry, rocking back in his seat and puffing out his chest with absolute self-assurance. “My favorite food is lasagna.”
The buzzer sounded, signaling a wrong answer. Jerry blinked and shook his head. “What? What?” He glared at Francie.
“No, Jerry, your wife Francie says your favorite meal is pizza.”
“Pizza, lasagna, they’re both Italian food. Come on, Manny, cut us some slack,” Jerry begged. “Francie gets pizza and lasagna mixed up. Come on over to our house the next time she makes pizza and see for yourself.”
The buzzer blasted another raspberry.
“Sorry, Jerry, you’re out of the running.”
The next two couples managed to get the answer right, tying them up with Charlee and Mason.
“Skeet and Violet Hammersmitz, if you answer this question correctly, you’ll not only be our grand prize winner but you will have proven you know each other more intimately than any of the other fifteen couples in the contest.”
Please get it wrong, Charlee prayed and clenched her fist. I know you hate hamburgers.
“For a total score of sixty points, Skeet, and a two-night stay at the famous Beverly Hills Grand Piazza Hotel along with special VIP tickets to this year’s Academy Awards ceremony on Sunday night courtesy of Twilight Studios, what is your favorite meal?”
The crowd and Charlee held their collective breaths. She crossed her fingers and her toes and closed her eyes tight.
Say sushi, say Chateaubriand, say anything besides hamburger.
Because her heart hung in the balance. For the life of her she couldn’t imagine anything worse than spending the night with Mason in a luxury hotel.
Just the two of them.
All alone.
In a fancy hotel.
With champagne and room service.
Given those circumstances Charlee knew she was not strong enough to resist him or if she even wanted to. Not when all it would take to get her stripped naked was one flash from those darling dimples.
“Well,” Mason drawled in that sexy Texas way of his that never failed to set her pulse flailing erratically, “Manny, I just love cheeseburgers and french fries.”
CHAPTER 13
Directly following the broadcast, Charlee and Mason found themselves surrounded by news media. In a blur of activity, they were interviewed and then whisked away in a limousine.
As their driver pulled out of the Twilight Studios parking lot, Charlee spied the thugs leaning against the white Chevy Malibu glaring at them.
She nudged Mason in the ribs and nodded out the window at the men. “Winning the contest was one way of getting away from those goons.”
“They’ll just follow us,” Mason predicted gloomily and sure enough, not two minutes later, the Malibu pulled up behind them in the traffic on Sunset Strip. “We’re stuck for now, but once we get to the hotel, I’ll call my family and have them wire money.”
A confident gleam sparked in his eyes as if he had everything figured out. He seemed different, more sure of himself. He sat up straighter and assumed a regal air in spite of Skeet’s hideous tourist clothes. Mason was back in his milieu.
By the time they arrived at the Beverly Hills Grand Piazza he was back to being a Gentry again, the same controlled, calculating executive who’d marched into her office on Thursday afternoon.
Gone were all traces of the open, adventuresome man who had cut loose back there in the desert. The man who had kissed her all night long on the honeymoon bus. The man who said her breasts were perfect as ripe peaches.
That was a good thing. Right?
This way, she didn’t have to worry so much about falling for him. Still she felt sorta sad that Skeet was gone for good and Mr. Straight-and-Narrow was back at the helm.
The minute the hotel valet opened the limo door, a second contingent of reporters and another perky representative from Twilight Studios were there to greet them.
The representative introduced herself as Pam Harrington and bustled them into a reception area.
“Axe all these people for us?” Charlee stared in disbelief at the milling throng gathered in the hotel ballroom and lining up for a lavish buffet.
Pam smiled. “Well, we are waiting for Oscar nominee Blade Bradford. He was supposed to be here to congratulate you on winning the game but I guess he’s running a little late.”
Blade Bradford, huh? Blade was her grandmother’s least favorite actor. She’d done makeup on him back when she worked for Twilight. Even though Maybelline wasn’t one for trashing people, she’d only had bad things to say about the Oscar-winning actor.
And because of Maybelline’s unhappy experiences in Hollywood, Charlee herself had never been starstruck. As her granny was fond of telling her, movie stars put on their pants one leg at a time, just like everybody else.
Pam cast a nervous glance at her watch. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll just go make a couple of phone calls. Help yourself to the buffet.”
“Ah,” Mason said after Pam had bustled away, his tone suggesting he’d just died and gone to heaven. “Caviar.”
He went straight for the black fish eggs.
Fish eggs. She should have known that would be his favorite food.
Blech! She looked at the salmon pâté, the foie gras, the oysters on the half shell, and the sushi rolls spread out across the elaborate buffet.
She was hungry but not that hungry. She settled for a dry wheat cracker and ended up having to guzzle half a glass of champagne to wash it down.
Charlee snagged one of the tuxedo-clad waiters by the arm. “By any chance you wouldn’t happen to have a jar of Skippy chunky peanut butter hidden away somewhere in the kitchen, would you?”
The waiter rolled a haughty expression down the end of his nose. “Madam, this is the Beverly Hills Grand Piazza.”
“And?” Charlee one-upped his hoity-toity look with her own particular brand of a hard-edged stare she’d perfected in the dark alleys of Vegas.
He squirmed under the intensity of her glare but maintained his snooty countenance and added a flippant head toss. “I’m afraid we do not stock Skippy chunky peanut butter.”
Charlee was about to tell the guy to pluck the stick out of his ass when Mason glided over and smoothly intervened.
“But I’m sure you carry some brand of peanut butter. So run off to the kitchen and get some for the lady,” he said pointedly in his most superior tone.
Apparently his commanding voice and the way Mason set his facial features overrode Skeet’s garish outfit. Even when it was disguised in Cheap-o-Mart duds the waiter recognized aristocracy
when he saw it.
“Yes, sir”—the waiter bowed contritely—“I will bring the lady her peanut butter.”
“Thank you.” Mason smiled like a shark on chum patrol.
“You didn’t have to stick your nose in.” Charlie sank her hands on her hips, irritated that he had gotten results from the wormy waiter where she’d failed.
“You looked like you needed the help.”
“It must be nice,” she said sarcastically, “having people fall all over themselves to do your bidding.”
“Why are you mad at me? I got the peanut butter you wanted.”
“I should have been able to get my own peanut butter off that lippy waiter.”
“You’re being unreasonable.”
“Am I?”
“This is Beverly Hills.”
“Meaning?”
“Different things work in different worlds.”
“What are you talking about?”
“If I’d waltzed into Kelly’s bar and ordered caviar what do you think would have happened?”
“Good point,” she conceded.
The waiter reappeared, rushing over with a fat dollop of peanut butter centered on a leaf of butter lettuce and riding atop a fine bone china plate.
“Is Madam pleased?” he asked her, but his eyes were on Mason.
“Madam is very pleased,” Mason assured him. “You will be be commended to your supervisor.”
The waiter nodded and hurried off.
“You’re really great at this greasing-the-palm stuff, aren’t you?”
“Makes the world go round, babe.”
“Babe? Oh, horrors. Better watch out, you’re slipping back into Skeet vernacular,” she said.
“Thanks. I appreciate the warning.” He flashed her an intriguing expression she couldn’t interpret, but it made him look kinda sexy. Charlee downed the rest of her champagne in a desperate hope it would make him look less attractive.
Bad move.
He only looked cuter through the sweet sheen of high-dollar bubbly. When a waiter offered her another glass of champagne, she took it, even though her head was already helium-balloon floaty.
She could quaff a quart of rotgut whiskey just fine but champagne shot straight to her head. The more expensive the brand, the faster she succumbed.
According to Maybelline, Charlee’s mother had been the same way and Bubbles adored bubbly so much she had even named herself after it. Judging from the way her head was reeling, the effervescent stuff must have set Twilight Studios back a pretty penny.
By the time the food was gone and Blade Bradford still hadn’t appeared and the grumbling reporters began to clear out, Charlee was seriously regretting that second glass of champagne.
Pam walked over. “I’m so sorry. It seems Blade can’t make the reception.”
“Probably three sheets to the wind in some hooker’s bed,” mumbled the photographer trailing after Pam.
“But we’re going to take a publicity photo anyway. I’ll just stand in for Mr. Bradford.” Forcing a smile, Pam sandwiched herself between Charlee and Mason and draped an arm over their shoulders for the photographer. Charlee smiled dopily for the camera and held up two fingers for bunny ears over Pam’s head.
“What’s going to happen,” Charlee whispered to Mason after Pam had moved away to ply her public relations skills with the reporters, “when they figure out we’re not Skeet and Violet?”
“We’ll deal with that problem when it arises.”
“Come, come, come.” Pam was back, grinning and snapping her fingers. “Now for the moment you’ve been waiting for. Let’s go see your honeymoon suite.”
She escorted them through the lobby and toward the elevators. Charlee wobbled precariously on Violet’s four-inch stilettos and at first she was grateful when Mason put a steadying hand to her elbow.
But his touch, combined with the dizzying effects of the champagne, made her feel all warm and fuzzy and receptive. And she hated soft, squooshy emotions like those.
Soft, squooshy, girlie emotions only got you into trouble.
Take a note. Remember that.
“Here we are.” Pam slid a card key through the electronic eye sensor and pushed open the door.
Charlee had been in luxury suites many times when she’d worked as a hotel maid, but that was in Vegas where everything was ornate, flashy, and gaudily overdone. This room was pure elegance.
From the cherry wood canopied bed to the eggshell satin duvet to the silver champagne bucket with a bottle of iced Dom Perignon nestled on an antique teacart the place whispered money, money, money.
On the classy bureau sat a gigantic fruit basket. Beside the basket rested an artfully arranged bouquet of colorful spring flowers and a halfdozen flickering candles giving off the scent of honeysuckle.
“Wooo, fancy-schmancy,” Charlee said.
“I’ll just leave you two alone to enjoy your prize. If you need anything, here’s my beeper number and your Oscar tickets.” Pam handed Mason an envelope.
“Thank you.” He stuffed the envelope in the back pocket of his shorts.
“The reporters will be back on Sunday afternoon to interview you before the Academy Awards. And tomorrow I’ll take you shopping on Rodeo Drive for your Oscar ceremony clothes. All courtesy of Twilight Studios.”
“No kidding,” Charlee murmured. “New clothes too. What a kick.”
Guilt needled her. This should be Violet Hammersmitz’s big adventure, not hers, but in spite of herself she was enjoying this Cinderella gig.
“Have fun,” Pam said, looking distracted, and left the room.
Once the door snapped closed behind her, Mason and Charlee turned to stare at each other.
“Wow, Gentry”—Charlee spun around the room, her head swirling—“do you live like this all the time?”
“What do you think of me? I don’t live in a hotel. I have a house, I go to work, I volunteer my time to charities. I have a normal life.”
“Yeah, but do you eat caviar and sleep on four-hundred-thread-count sheets and have people waiting on you hand and foot every day?”
“It’s not that big of a deal.”
“Oh, maybe not to you, but to me this whole thing seems surreal.”
“It is surreal. The fact that you and I are stuck here pretending to be husband and wife has little basis in reality.”
“Hmm, I don’t know about that. I’m real and you’re real and if I pinched you hard on the fanny I bet you would holler.”
“I think it’s time I made a few phone calls,” he said, ignoring her “pinching him on the fanny” remark and heading straight for the white and gold phone centered on the Queen Anne writing desk.
Giggling, Charlee fell backward onto the satin duvet and immediately slid whiz-bang onto the floor. She sprawled on her spine, her neck resting awkwardly against the footboard.
“There’s a trick to lying down on satin,” Mason said without even looking up from punching his calling card number into the phone.
“So I gather.” Charlee stared up at the ceiling and willed her head to stop whirling.
From this angle, she had a tantalizing view of the length of Mason’s leg.
Man-o-man-o-man.
Her eyes tracked a path from his thigh to his knee and down to his muscled calf. An irresistible urge took hold of her. She wanted to scoot across the carpet and sink her teeth into the fleshy part of that calf to see if it tasted as juicy as it looked.
She licked her lips.
A prickliness crawled across the nape of her neck, light and ticklish. She reached a hand around to push her hair away.
The creepy-crawly sensation transferred from her neck to the back of her hand. She pulled her hand down and stared in horror at the black widow spider inching across her skin.
She literally froze.
Her throat constricted. Her tongue turned to cement. Her brain locked.
Help!
The old spider-bite wound in her backside throbbed. Her hand b
lanched pale as bleached linen, highlighting the black spider’s dark journey across her wrist.
She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t scream. She couldn’t move. She was trapped in a terrifying nightmare.
Help! Help!
Mason was staring out the window, the telephone receiver cradled against his cheek. She had to get him to notice her before the deadly spider sank her vicious venom into her bloodstream.
Look at me, dammit! she mentally willed.
No such luck.
Meanwhile Miss Arachnid strolled leisurely toward her elbow.
Help! Help! Help!
Charlee flashed back to that night in the Wisconsin woods. She recalled the painful sting as the black widow bit into her tender behind. She remembered, in vivid detail, the agonizing therapy at the hospital and the skin grafts that followed.
She could not, she would not go through that terrible ordeal again.
Act. Move. Do something.
Mason!
Galvanized by the same fear that a second before had frozen her, Charlee threw back her head and let loose with a bloodcurdling shriek.
Mason came up out of the chair as if he had been zapped in the butt with a blowtorch. He jumped to his feet, flinging the telephone away from him and jerking his head around to find Charlee lying on the floor, the hem of her miniskirt hiked up to her panties, a terror-stricken expression on her face.
“What is it? What’s happened?” He sprang to her side, his blood pumping through his veins like a fire hose in a five-alarm blaze.
“Aaa-aaa-aaa.”
“Charlee, speak to me.” Good God, what was wrong?
She stared him in the eyes, then shifted her gaze to the small black spider crawling up her shoulder.
“The spider? You’re scared of the spider?”
Vigorously, she nodded. Relief washed through him. Thank God. He couldn’t imagine what had caused her to scream like Marie Antoinette at the guillotine.
So the tough P.I. from Vegas was afraid of spiders. He tried not to smile at her fear as he leaned over to scoop the spider into his palm.