Masquerade: a romantic comedy

by Janette Rallison

  “Why did you rip up the clue?” Bella asked.

  “Um, the clue said I was supposed to,” Clarissa answered.

  “Oh,” Bella said. She cautiously picked up one of the strips.

  Clarissa stared at the paper shreds too. If Sherry told Sylvia that Clarissa was threatening to out her, Sylvia would be so mad at Clarissa, who knew what type of story she’d print about her.

  Well, she could at least warn Landon about what type of person Sherry was. Although, now that Clarissa thought about it, she realized she didn’t even know Landon’s room number. And the front desk wasn’t likely to pass out information. Slade knew, but she couldn’t ask him for it without some really good explanation. A really, really good explanation.

  Nope.

  After the way Slade had insisted Clarissa avoid Landon, there wasn’t an explanation good enough to get Slade’s help. She would have to wait until she saw Landon again. He had said he would show up Halloween night—tomorrow night. She could tell him then.

  Bella handed Clarissa the piece of paper she’d been fingering. “What else did the clue say you were ‘posed to do?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Why don’t you write back?” Bella asked.

  Clarissa looked down at Bella, about to put her off, and then realized she had given Clarissa the perfect answer.

  “I think you’re right.”

  She opened her purse, pulled out the green envelope of her own, and smoothed out the folds in the stationery. As she did so, she noticed her cell phone. It was only then she remembered Meredith in the stairwell, still searching for Bella. By this point Meredith had probably reached the eighth floor, told Slade, and enlisted him in the hunt. Most likely they were both half panicked and about to call security.

  Clarissa called Slade.

  “Hello?” He sounded sharp and impatient.

  “Hi,” she whispered, “I wanted to let you know I found Bella.”

  “Found Bella?” he asked. “Was she lost?”

  Oops. He didn’t know, and now she had admitted to losing his daughter again. Why hadn’t she called Meredith instead?

  “We were playing hide-and-seek.”

  There was a pause and then Slade’s voice, sounding tight. “Clarissa, my agent is on the other line, and you’re calling to report the results of your game of hide-and-seek?”

  This wasn’t getting any better. “Well, she plays really well, and Meredith and I were afraid she might be lost. Sorry to bother you.”

  “Clarissa, why are you whispering?”

  Because I’m hiding under a banquet table in a conference room and I’m about to do something devious. “Bella and I are playing spies now.”

  “Great,” he said slowly. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  Clarissa called Meredith next, taking a pen from her purse as they spoke. When she was done with the call, she matched Sherry’s skinny scrawl as well as she could.

  Mob activity is suspected among the cast of Undercover Agents. Several of the cast members wondered why AJ insisted on spending the time, money, and effort to take the cast and crew to a remote Hawaiian location. Now suspicions have been answered. The crate full of assault rifles marked props—the one AJ hasn’t let cast or crew near—are all real. They’re apparently part of an illegal weapons ring, waiting for mob operatives to pick them up.

  Clarissa folded the stationery, put it into her envelope, then used the tape from Sherry’s envelope to stick it back on the underside of the table. She smiled. She wasn’t sure who would face the greater consequence for this story, Sherry or Sylvia, but somebody’s credibility was about to crumble.

  Clarissa quickly gathered up the shreds of torn paper and stuffed them into her purse. Stretching to relieve the cramps in her legs, she took hold of Bella’s hand and whispered, “Come on, Bella. It’s time to report back to spy headquarters.”

  Chapter 27

  Slade had just hung up with his agent when he got a call from AJ. “Let’s meet in the restaurant for dinner and talk about your screenplay.”

  Slade agreed with forced enthusiasm. It was hard to be enthusiastic about a dinner-long rejection.

  He walked to Clarissa’s room to pick up Bella. She, Clarissa, and Elaina had made a tent in the bathroom and the three of them were sitting in the tub discussing spy strategy. Bella didn’t want to leave.

  It figured.

  He was trying to take Clarissa’s advice to spend more time with Bella, and now Bella didn’t want to be with him.

  Still, he dragged her from the room and drove her to the Sea Life Park. He tried to get into the spirit of the thing—buying her dolphin-shaped balloons and a starfish hat. He’d purposely planned time away from Clarissa but found himself incessantly thinking about her.

  He wanted to tell her about the screenplay. Her blue eyes would fill with concern, and she’d try to comfort him. Maybe she’d put her hand on his arm like she’d done the other day in the car.

  He could imagine her fingers against his skin . . . imagine himself taking her hand in his and not letting it go.

  Instead, he escorted his daughter around and grew crosser as the day wore on. He never should have offered Clarissa the job of watching Bella during his next movie. It would be excruciating to see her all of the time. He was bound to do something stupid, make some unwanted advance—or worse yet, a wanted one. Everyone would end up miserable. He should probably do the smart thing: pay Clarissa a fee for breaking his contract, wish her the best, and hire a fifty-year-old nanny.

  How come doing smart things always seemed so hard?

  By midafternoon Slade was snapping at Bella and feeling horrible for not controlling his temper. Finally he decided to call it a day and drove back to the resort.

  On the way there Bella folded her arms and scowled at the window. “I want to go home.”

  “We are going home.”

  “I want to go home to my house,” she emphasized.

  Slade grunted, then considered the idea. “Maybe we should cut this trip short. There isn’t much point in sticking around.” He started mentally arranging the details of leaving the next morning and then remembered Kim.

  Kim.

  He couldn’t leave on the day she arrived. Not after he’d already made plans with her. They were supposed to go to that stupid costume party.

  So it was one more day. He’d endure one more day of this vacation and then go back to California.

  Slade dropped Bella off at Clarissa’s room, told her of his dinner plans with AJ and his plans to leave Hawaii early, and then left before he could spend any time talking with her. She stood in the doorway of her room, looking very much like she wanted to talk to him.

  He didn’t stay, though. The time for conversations with Clarissa was over. Conversations led to familiarity, to intimacy, to him taking hold of her hand and not letting go.

  He went back to his room to work on his lines. They all came out sounding angry.

  At six o’clock he went down to the restaurant to meet with AJ and Natalie. Slade donned a pair of casual slacks, a Christian Dior shirt, and his best acting style. He was acting like a man who didn’t know the outcome of this meeting, who hadn’t had a midnight rendezvous with AJ’s girlfriend, and who wasn’t in love with a woman he couldn’t have. In short, he was acting like the man he was before he came to Hawaii.

  The hostess showed him to the table where AJ and Natalie were seated. AJ wore alligator skin cowboy boots and a western shirt. Natalie wore a tight red dress spangled with sequins. The two of them greeted him warmly.

  After they’d ordered, Slade asked AJ how the Undercover Agents shooting was going. AJ recounted the show’s many problems and the trials of a producer in general until the waitress came with their orders.

  They ate silently for a few minutes, and then AJ brought up the subject at hand. “Well, Slade, you have more writing talent than I expected. Good characters, good dialogue, and a decent plot.” AJ cracked one of his lobster claws. “I see two
major problems with it. First, it’s a nice story, but it doesn’t have enough action to be a movie.”

  “It’s a love story,” Slade said. “People still go to those, don’t they?”

  AJ waved his words away with a flick of his fork. “It doesn’t have enough passion for a love story. When the hero realizes he loves the girl, he has this great epiphany. They’re alone in the waiting room, and what do they do? They talk about life. No way. In real life he takes her in his arms and gives her a kiss that makes the entire audience blush.” AJ took a bite of lobster. “I’m sorry. If you can hype up the story a bit, I might reconsider.”

  Slade took a drink of his water. “Thanks for your time, AJ.”

  “And a shoot-out scene at the end couldn’t hurt.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” Slade put his glass down and noticed Clarissa standing at the front of the restaurant. She held Bella by one hand and Elaina by the other and was talking to the hostess. Which meant at any moment Bella would see him, insist on joining him, and inevitably turn the rest of dinner into a zoo.

  Why in the world had Clarissa brought the girls to the restaurant when he had specifically told her he would be here?

  And then Slade remembered he hadn’t. He’d only told her he was going out to dinner with AJ. In his haste to get away from her room, he hadn’t told her where. She must have thought he meant “out” as in out of the resort.

  The hostess picked up menus and escorted Clarissa and the kids into the dining room. That’s when Clarissa glanced over and saw him. A look of surprise and then apprehension crossed her face. He could tell Clarissa had also anticipated the outcome of dinner and was now rethinking the situation. She called to the hostess, shook her head, and said something while redirecting the girls back out the way they had come.

  They were almost to the door when Bella saw Slade. Over the clink of dishes and hum of conversation, he heard the word, “Daddy!”

  He pretended he hadn’t heard Bella, and a moment later they were gone. Bella would probably wail all the way back to Clarissa’s room.

  “Did you decide on your costume yet?” Natalie asked, bringing his attention back to the table. “What mask will you be wearing tomorrow night?”

  “Batman,” Slade said.

  “Oh?” she asked, intrigued. “Thinking of vying for that part?”

  “No, Kim wanted to be Cat Woman.”

  Natalie smiled. “With a doctor of botany on your arm, I would think the Joker costume would be the most appropriate.”

  AJ poured more butter on his lobster. “Just because a woman is a scientist doesn’t mean she can’t also be charming.” He winked at Natalie. “Although it certainly raises the probability.”

  Slade cut a piece of his fish. “I like smart women.”

  AJ made a shooing motion. “We’re just messing with you. We can hardly wait to meet her.”

  “Oh, yes,” Natalie said. “I’m dying to meet her.”

  From across the restaurant, Slade heard Bella call out, “Daddy!” He turned and saw her running toward him. She climbed onto his lap and threw her arms around his neck. “I knew you were in here,” she said breathlessly.

  Slade looked for Clarissa, expected to see her coming in for the recapture. She was nowhere in sight.

  “Bella,” he said sternly. “Did you run away from Clarissa?”

  She shook her head slowly. “No, Daddy. I didn’t run. I just got out of the elevator.”

  “And where are Clarissa and Elaina?”

  “Still in the elevator,” Bella said.

  Slade tilted his head back. He could suddenly envision the entire scenario. Clarissa had taken the girls into the elevator in an attempt to go back to their room. Bella, in her usual stealth fashion, pulled away from Clarissa’s grasp and stepped off the elevator right before the doors closed.

  “Isabel Jacobson,” he said in a low voice, “that was a very naughty thing to do.”

  Bella’s bottom lip quivered, and he could tell she was on the verge of another wail. In order to salvage dinner he added, “And we will discuss it as soon as we go back to our room.”

  Bella laid her head against Slade’s chest. “I wanted to be with you,” she said sadly.

  Slade gave an apologetic smile to AJ. “This is my daughter, Bella.” To Bella, he said, “Do you remember Natalie from the pool?”

  Bella nodded solemnly and kept her face pressed against her father’s chest.

  AJ bent over to be closer to Bella’s eye level. “I’ve heard about you, Bella Jacobson,” he said. “You seem to have a habit of breaking sets.”

  “You break things too,” Bella said.

  AJ’s eyebrows rose. “Is that so?”

  Bella nodded. “When we were in the elevator, Natalie said she was going to break something with you.”

  “What are you talking about?” Slade asked. “Natalie never talked about breaking things.”

  He realized his mistake too late. Before he could stop her, Bella said, “She did too. She said she was going to break it off with AJ.”

  A silence, the kind that isn’t really silent at all but is loud with the sound of hearts stuttering, descended on the table.

  Slade opened his mouth to speak, to explain. No words came to him. It probably wouldn’t have mattered anyway. AJ and Natalie weren’t paying attention to him. They stared at each other— one turning red, the other turning pale.

  “What did you say?” AJ asked stiffly.

  “I was just joking,” Natalie said.

  “You were joking with a four-year-old about breaking up with me?”

  “Yes,” she said, and Slade could see her acting persona spring to life. “I told her I had the perfect boyfriend and was teasing her about stealing him away from me. It was a joke.”

  AJ eyed Bella. With a sort of forced lightness, he said, “So you’re looking for a boyfriend, huh, kid?”

  “She said Daddy was playing hard to get,” Bella said, “but he wasn’t playing. He was carrying me ‘cause I was pretending to be asleep.”

  Another awful moment of silence ensued. Natalie’s paleness crept back into her face.

  Thankfully no one had to say anything else. Clarissa had pushed her way through the tables and now, holding Elaina, stood before them. “Bella,” she said firmly, “it’s time for you to come with me.”

  Under any other circumstances, Slade would have handed Bella to her nanny and put up with the ensuing scene. Now he saw Bella’s resistance as the perfect excuse for him to exit the restaurant. He started to rise and was about to say, “I’d better take her back to our room.”

  He never got the chance. Apparently Bella thought he was transferring her into Clarissa’s arms. Bella yelled, “No!” then grabbed onto the tablecloth with both hands. As Slade stood, the tablecloth came up with him.

  Plates, glasses, and the rest of AJ’s lobster tail migrated to the other side of the table and then tumbled to the floor.

  AJ jumped out of the way in time to miss most of the food. Natalie wasn’t so lucky. A glass of wine and a plateful of salad splattered onto her sequined dress. She stood up, gasping, and wiped bits of salad dressing off her sequins.

  “I’m so sorry,” Slade said, and then couldn’t say anything else because Bella’s wailing had begun.

  Chapter 28

  The girls were bathed, in their pajamas, and watching TV in Slade’s room when he finally came back. He looked tired, and his hair was mussed, like he’d run his hands through it repeatedly. Without saying a word, he collapsed on the couch, leaned his head back until it touched the wall, and stared at the ceiling.

  Clarissa sat next to him so they could talk. “Did the restaurant manager accept your check?”

  “They’re going to take account of everything and send me a bill.”

  Clarissa nodded. Neither of them said anything for a moment. “I think your big mistake,” Clarissa finally said, “was letting go of Bella’s hand to help Natalie wipe off her dress.”

  Sla
de dropped his gaze from the ceiling and looked at Clarissa. “How was I supposed to know Bella would run off crying underneath the salad bar table?”

  “Experience.”

  “You’d think they’d use a sturdier table for all of that salad stuff.”

  Clarissa shook her head sadly. “It probably would have held up fine if I hadn’t crawled under there to retrieve Bella. But, you know, I was so worried she would bump it and send everything crashing to the floor.”

  “Yes, well, that’s irony for you.” The beginning of a smile tugged at the comers of Slade’s mouth. “How is your head doing now?”

  “Don’t smirk at me,” she said. “I’d like to see you wrestle with a five-year-old under a table and see if you can keep it from toppling over.”

  “She’s only four,” he said.

  “She’s nearly five, and she’s as strong as a wildcat.” Clarissa ran her hand over the top of her head, where a small bump had formed from ramming it into the underside of the table. It still hurt. “Besides, my head is the least of my wounds.”

  His eyebrow quirked upward. “Did you get other injuries when the seafood platter fell on you?”

  “I’m talking about my pride,” she said. “I was covered with cocktail sauce—and by the way, I noticed you didn’t jump over to wipe off my clothes like you did Natalie’s.”

  “I was holding onto Bella,” he said and then added, “besides, the way you were hopping around, I would have been hard pressed to catch you, let alone wipe off anything.”

  Clarissa tilted her head and gave him an aloof stare. “You would have jumped around, too, if you’d gotten shrimp down your shirt.”

  The smile was back on Slade’s lips, but he tried to suppress it. “It’s not like it was alive.”

  “Exactly. It was dead fish, and it was sliding down my back and stuck in my bra.” She gave an involuntary shiver. “I’ll probably smell like a wharf for days.”

  He reached out and patted her hand as though she were a child. “Well, it’s over now, and if the restaurant staff works hard, I’m sure they’ll have the place cleaned up by the breakfast shift.”