Playing By Heart

by Melanie Shawn

  When their mugs had been drained, Alison tucked a collection of bills on the table, over Caroline’s protests. “Caroline, please. You’re my guest.”

  Caroline smiled in her understated way. “A self-invited one.”

  Alison shook her head as they stepped back out into the muted sunlight. “Not at all. I’m shocked, obviously, that you’d hop on a plane to come out and check up on me. But honored.”

  Caroline looked up and down the street. “So, how does this place compare to New York in the single most critical way?”

  Alison tilted her head to the side. “What way’s that?”

  “Shopping.”

  “I have just the place.”

  Caroline headed toward the car but Alison stopped her. “No, we don’t need to drive. It’s only a few storefronts down.”

  The friendly bell chimed over the door of Ella’s shop as they entered—a sound that Alison had very much come to associate with happiness and friendship. Ella appeared through the curtain that separated the showroom from the back storage and workspace. She was wearing paint-spattered overalls and was wiping paint-smeared hands on them as she approached them.

  “Alison! Hey! How are you? It’s good to see you.”

  “Hey, Ella. This is Caroline, my agent from New York. She just flew in.”

  Ella clapped her hands together in front of her chest. “Oh, that’s so wonderful! You and Alison must be such close friends for you to come out and visit. I’m so excited to meet you! I’d give you a huge hug if I wasn’t covered in paint.”

  “Well, small miracles, then, dear.”

  Ella looked unsure again and Alison nudged Caroline and shot her a warning look. The entire encounter was reminding her of why she’d needed to leave New York in the first place—the judgment. She hadn’t been fleeing her career, or the pressure, or any of the other things that people have speculated. She’d been fleeing all of the judgment she encountered from her colleagues after the reality show came out.

  To a lot of people in her social and professional circle—not all, certainly, but many—sweetness was seen as weakness. Kindness was seen as a fault, and showing patience toward someone who wasn’t quite catching on as quickly as everyone else was seen as the ultimate fatal flaw.

  This encounter between Caroline and Ella was a perfect encapsulation of the “New York versus Valentine Bay” dichotomy that was pulling at her subconscious twenty-four hours a day. There was Caroline—elegant, contained, brilliant, and caustic. And then there was Ella—flighty, artistic, loving, and open. The two of them were, of course, going to be oil and water.

  Alison decided that the best thing to do in this situation would be to simply hustle Caroline out of there as quickly as she could. “Ella, it was so great to see you. I think Caroline is really tired after her long trip. We’re going to get out of your hair and let you finish painting that sign.”

  “Oh, wait! How long are you going to be in town for, Caroline? You really should meet everybody—all of Alison’s new friends! Alison, why don’t you throw a dinner party in Caroline’s honor? I’m sure everybody would love to come.”

  “Oh, I don’t know… Caroline is only going to be here a few days—”

  “I think that sounds like a marvelous idea,” Caroline interjected. “I would absolutely love to meet the extraordinary people who have enchanted our Alison so completely.”

  Ella clapped her hands in front of her. Alison shrank a little inside. Ella was too sweet to realize that the only reason Caroline would “love” to meet those people was to figure out how to break their hold on Alison so she could get her back to New York as quickly as possible, return things to the status quo, and continue to make money on Alison’s career.

  It was going to be a fun night.

  Chapter 34

  Troy pressed the button to ring the doorbell, Mila standing beside him and virtually vibrating with excitement. This was not only her very first grown-up dinner party, but it was her first time getting a look inside the house she’d been fascinated by for so long.

  All in all, a pretty momentous night.

  Alison answered the door wearing an understated but still stunning dress of flowing flowered fabric.

  Mila’s eyes widened. “You look beautiful.”

  Troy smiled. “She took the words right out of my mouth.”

  Alison blushed and stepped back, gesturing for them to come inside. “Come on in. You’re the first to arrive.”

  Troy handed her a bottle of wine as they stepped over the threshold. “A gift for our lovely hostess. Thank you so much for having us.”

  She examined the bottle. “Oh, it’s wonderful. We should definitely uncork it.”

  “Um, Alison?” Mila said, sounding a little bit nervous. Troy had a feeling he knew what she was about to ask.

  “Yes, sweetie?”

  “Do you think that we could, uh, have a tour? Of the house?”

  “Mila’s always been fascinated by this house. She’s never gotten to see the inside before,” Troy jumped in to explain.

  “Oh, well, then, I’ll do you one better,” Alison declared. “You can explore on your own if you’d like. The third floor is my bedroom and the guest bedroom that Caroline is using, so no need to go up there. But the first and second floors are just set up for rental. You can wander to your heart’s content.”

  Mila looked at Troy for approval of the plan, her eyes wide and pleading. He smiled and touched her shoulder. “If Alison says it’s fine, then it’s fine with me.”

  She breathed out, like the air itself was too electrically charged to hold in her lungs any longer. “I’ll be back!” she announced and headed down the hallway, looking wonderingly up at the crown molding and decorative ceiling.

  Alison smiled at Troy. “Come on. Let’s head in the kitchen and pour this, shall we?”

  He followed her into the kitchen, and he couldn’t tear his eyes from her as she walked ahead of him. Her ass, of course, was magnificent, but it was more than that. It was her entire body and the way that it swayed so gracefully as she moved. It was the ineffable quality of poise that she personified.

  She was magnificent, plain and simple.

  She uncorked the wine and pulled down two glasses. She poured them each a very generous serving and then they clinked glasses.

  “To us,” she said, “and to Valentine Bay.”

  They drank, and then he put his glass forward, proposing another toast. “To you,” he said, his voice low and husky, “and how happy you’ve made me since you’ve been here.”

  Instead of clinking her glass to his, she put hers down on the counter and stepped toward him, close enough he could feel the heat of her body through his suit. He set his glass down as well, and leaned forward to kiss her.

  Their lips had barely touched when a sardonic voice sounded from the bottom of the back kitchen staircase. “Well. I suddenly see the appeal of this little hamlet.”

  Alison spun around, stunned, and Troy was glad they’d already put their wine glasses down. He’d seen the kind of havoc that she was capable of wreaking when she had something breakable in her hands when startled.

  She flushed like a teenager caught making out in the backseat. “Oh, Caroline. Hello. I didn’t hear you come down. We’re just waiting on a few guests. Can I pour you a glass of wine?”

  Caroline raised one eyebrow, clearly not buying Alison’s breezy I-don’t-care-that-you’re-here-I-wasn’t-doing-anything-anyway manner for one second, but she refrained from comment. She merely said, “Yes, please, dear. And then why don’t we all go out to the sitting room and wait on the remaining guests together?”

  At that comment, even Troy felt a little chagrined. They were officially being chaperoned.

  Chapter 35

  Alison looked around the table at the assorted guests who populated it. Besides Troy, and Mila, all three of Troy’s brothers were there, along with Alison’s new friends, who just happened to be their significant others.

  Dang
, she realized, I’ve really gone all in on the Valentine family when it comes to creating my new circle of friends here.

  And, of course, at the end of the table was the guest of honor. Caroline.

  Alison couldn’t help but see her new friends through Caroline’s eyes, since her agent was here in the room. Or rather, what she imagined Caroline must be thinking and feeling as she observed the raucous laughter, at any rate. It was difficult, as always, to get a read on what the woman’s true reactions were. Sitting at the end of the table quietly, she gave Alison nothing to go on but a slightly bemused expression.

  Trying to judge Caroline’s reactions to people or situations was nothing new to Alison. It was a game she’d been playing since she’d met the coolly elegant woman. What was different this time around was that Alison found she didn’t really care what Caroline thought about these people!

  Oh, sure. It would be nice if her agent approved of her new friends. Like a bonus. But it wasn’t necessary. Even if Caroline utterly hated them it wouldn’t change Alison’s plans, or how she felt about these new people in her life.

  It was a freeing mindset, trusting her own judgement. She liked it. In fact, she liked it a lot.

  Troy stood and tapped his fork against his glass. It took a couple of tries to get the attention of the animated, laughing group but he finally managed it.

  “I’d like to propose a toast,” he began, and Alison found herself hanging on every word. She couldn’t help it. When Troy was around, she was totally wrapped up in him. It was beyond her control. “To our guest of honor, Caroline. I realize we’ve all barely gotten to know you, but Alison speaks so highly of you that I know you must be an amazing person. Here’s hoping we see more of you in the future. To Caroline.”

  Troy put his glass up and the others echoed the gesture, repeating the words. “To Caroline!” they chorused, and she inclined her head in acknowledgement.

  Before the conversation moved on, though, Troy continued. “I’d also like to toast the woman who’s hosting this incredible dinner, and who invited us all here today.” He paused and looked down at her and they shared a smile. The moment felt intimate, like all of the other people in the room had faded away, leaving only the two of them. “Alison. You’ve only been in Valentine Bay a short while, but in that time, you’ve made all of our lives better. You’ve made my life better, in more ways than I can count, and I hope you’ll always be part of it.”

  He held his glass up, but never tore his eyes from hers. “To Alison,” he finished softly, and she was so carried away and wrapped up in the moment that she couldn’t even have said if the rest of the group echoed his words or not. She only had eyes for Troy.

  Chapter 36

  Yawning, Alison walked into the kitchen to make herself some coffee. Six o’clock in the morning came very early, but Caroline was an early riser so Alison wanted to respect that while she was staying there. It was all part of being a good hostess.

  Alison blearily pulled the bag of coffee grounds and package of filters from the cabinet over the coffee machine.

  “Oh, good, I was hoping I would get to see you before I left.”

  The voice from behind her, when she’d been so convinced that she was alone in the kitchen, caused her to screech and throw the coffee supplies in her hands up in the air.

  She turned to see Caroline standing in the doorway to the kitchen, perfectly put together and with her carry-on bag sitting next to her. With one hand, Alison reached out to grab the counter and steady herself, and with the other she covered her now–racing heart. The bag of grounds and package of filters landed on the floor with a thump, but thankfully the bag stayed closed. Alison was getting tired of cleaning up the floor as a result of being startled in this kitchen.

  Caroline barely seemed to notice her outsized startled response. She acknowledged it only with a mildly sardonic, “Well, I’m used to getting a reaction when I enter a room, but that seemed extreme.”

  “Caroline, I didn’t expect you to be up and ready already. It’s only six.”

  “Well, my flight leaves early, so I have to leave here early as a consequence.”

  Alison had been so surprised by the unexpectedness of another person’s presence in the kitchen that she hadn’t fully registered the words that Caroline had said. Now she heard them in her mind—that she was glad she got to see Alison before she left.

  “Wait, I’m confused. You’ve only been here a couple of days. Did something happen at the dinner party that offended you or upset you? Is that why you changed your plans?”

  “No, not at all. Your friends were perfectly charming. I just got the answer I came here for, and so there’s no reason for me to stay.”

  “And what answer was that?”

  Caroline smiled a little. “Whether this jaunt to the Oregon coast was going to be a temporary blip in your radar or something significantly more permanent.”

  Alison’s stomach flipped over. She knew which it was. It wasn’t something she was ready to fully accept yet. She still felt torn between two worlds—drawn by the one she was in, but still clinging, with some part of her, to the one she’d left behind. Still, if even Caroline could see it, then maybe she wasn’t quite as torn as she’d been telling herself she was.

  “I’m sorry, Caroline. It might not be forever. I don’t really know what my future holds right now.”

  Caroline walked over to her and, in a rare show of affection, placed her hand gently on Alison’s cheek. “Oh, my dear girl. Of course you do.”

  Then, back to her brisk self, she turned and firmly grasped the handle of her carry-on bag, wheeling it toward the door. Alison hurried to catch up with her. “Give me two seconds. I’ll put on my clothes and drive you to the airport.”

  Caroline barely glanced back over her shoulder. “No need. I’ve already called a car. It will be here momentarily.”

  She opened the door and stepped through it, but then stopped halfway over the threshold and looked back at Alison meaningfully. “You make that contractor take good care of you, do you hear me?”

  Alison was filled with both the warmth and energy that the strong cup of coffee she’d originally come downstairs searching for could never have matched. “I will. And I’ll do the same for him.”

  The door closed behind Caroline and it was like a light switch flipping on. Suddenly, Alison became clear on so many things she’d been foggy on until just that moment. It was like the sound of the door clicking had been implanted in her mind as the post-hypnotic suggestion that would cue her to wake up from a trance, and it worked just that fast.

  She needed to stop existing in limbo. She was hurting herself by subjecting her psyche to the constant back and forth of wanting two things at once. Cognitive dissonance and all the attendant stresses were keeping her from being able to fully enjoy the beautiful opportunity that life and fate were offering her here: a new life. A new love.

  Caroline’d been right. She already knew what she wanted to do. Of course she did. The only thing left to do was commit to it.

  Well…that, and get her cup of coffee. Nothing happened before coffee.

  Chapter 37

  Troy followed Alison and Mila through the door of the brick storefront at the far end of Main Street. When Alison had called this morning and said she wanted to show them something, she hadn’t been specific. Even though excitement made her voice tremble with tension like a high wire and he could tell she was just about to explode with the desire to spill everything, all she would say was that it was a surprise.

  Now, she stood in the middle of the room, stretched out her arms, and spun around in a slow circle. To Troy, she looked like a little kid spinning around in pure delight at the first snow of the season, face turned up to the sun in hopes of catching a snowflake or two on their tongue.

  When she’d completed the three-sixty degrees, she looked at him with thrilled expectancy shining from her eyes and clasped her hands together under her chin. “Well? What do you think?”
<
br />   Troy didn’t know what to say. She was so amped up she was actually bouncing up and down a little on the balls of her feet as she talked. He didn’t want to crush her spirit, but…

  “It looks great, Alison. I’m just…I’m not sure what exactly ‘it’ is.”

  She slapped her head to her forehead. “Oh, yeah! Of course! I’m getting way ahead of myself.”

  She took a deep breath and then looked between him and Mila. “This all started the night of Mila’s performance. I guess you could say Mila inspired me.”

  Mila stood a little taller, and Troy could only imagine what it probably meant to her to hear her idol say those words about her.

  “Working with a young person, presenting them with a challenge and watching them rise so beautifully to the occasion, caused me to come to a realization.

  “All of the people in my industry that were so angry with me for being ‘soft’ on the contestants at Broadway Baby. There’s an important difference between them and me.”

  “Yeah, they’re jerks and you’re incredible,” Troy interjected, getting angry at even the thought of some asshole giving her a hard time for being too nice, of all things.

  She smiled indulgently. “Thanks, Troy. You’ve always got my back. But, no, that’s not it. It’s that I have this innate need within myself to nurture young talent, to water the seed, give it light, and watch it grow. They don’t have that. It’s a whole different philosophy. They think that if someone’s talent is strong enough, and they themselves are tough enough, then they’ll make it in the business. If it’s not, or they’re not, then they don’t deserve to make it.”

  “Like the survival of the fittest! We learned about that in science,” Mila put in.

  “Exactly! Like a sort of performing arts Darwinism. And I realized the other day—I simply don’t believe that way. I think of talent more like a bell curve. There’s a certain percentage of people that have so little talent that no amount of training is going to help them. Then, at the top of the curve, there are people who have such powerful natural gifts that no matter what their training, they are destined to succeed.