A Secret Life (10 page)

The reporter opened his mouth.

Samuel raised his eyebrow.

“Thank you,” the reporter sputtered as he backed off.

“Wow,” said Heather.

“There should be a law against that.”

She’d been talking about Samuel’s ability to make grown men run for cover, but she didn’t correct him.

“My truck’s around the side,” he said. “You want a lift?”

Heather nodded. “Yes. Please.”

She needed to warn Joan about the reporters. And she needed to warn her about Samuel’s comments. And she’d better get on the phone to her parents, quick. Joan’s interview was one thing, but if they caught her and Samuel on the evening news, there was going to be a whole lot more explaining to do.

T
HE ONLY GOOD THING
about Heather’s story was that it acted as a buffer between Joan and Anthony over breakfast. Bad enough that she’d kissed him last night. Okay, so
kiss
was probably too mild a word. She’d practically made love to him with her mouth.

But then she’d called him back.

He was almost to the door, and she’d practically begged him to stay. Luckily, he was smart enough for both of them and kept going. Which made the morning after even worse.

“You have to call Mom,” said Heather, taking another drink of her coffee but ignoring the fresh croissant on the plate in front of her.

Joan shook her head. “I’m not calling Mom.”

“It’s your book.”

“You’re the spy. You report in to headquarters.”

Anthony interrupted with a harsh sigh. “You are both grown women. Will you start acting like it?”

Joan looked at him for the first time. “Excuse me?”

He set down his coffee cup. “Call your parents, already.”

“Like you would.”

“Of course I would.”

“With disastrous news.”

“In my family, this wouldn’t
be
disastrous news.”

“Oh, and they’d be
so
happy to have you publicly involved in a sordid murder inquest?”

Anthony took his napkin from his lap and tossed it on the table. “They’d be happy to see me succeeding at something as tough and competitive as fiction writing.”

Joan knew he was trying to manipulate her. “And their friends, their colleagues, their social contacts—”

“Would be happy for me, too.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Honestly, Joan. I don’t know what kind of world you two grew up in.”

Low blow.
She glared at him.

“But you people have some serious issues.”

Luc Carter strode in through the doorway. “You guys better take a look at this,” he said, turning on a small television on the countertop.

Anthony came to his feet as Samuel and Heather appeared on the screen. “Turn it up.”

Heather groaned. “Look at my hair!”

“It’s fine,” Joan lied, glancing sideways at her sister. Heather on television with bed head. What were the odds?

“Shhh,” said Anthony.

“I already told you what we said,” Heather put in.

The shot of Samuel’s angry scowl faded from the screen, and the announcer reappeared, smoothly segueing into the next story.

“You’ll probably want to call Mom now,” said Heather.

Joan closed her eyes and struggled to come up with a spin,
any
spin that would make the situation sound better.

Thing is, Mom, I’m a closet mystery writer. There’s a bondage scene in my latest novel. And the funniest part, it’s based on this murder-suicide…

Okay. That sure wasn’t it.

Anthony’s cell phone rang, but instead of answering it, he focused on Joan across the table. “You okay?”

“I’m perfect.”

His phone rang again, but he continued to hold her gaze.

He was obviously worried about her. She’d seen that look a hundred times. But something had changed. After last night, there was a wall of hesitation between them.

He didn’t seem to know how he should act.

Well, she sure didn’t know how she should act, either.

The phone rang a third time.

“Excuse me,” he finally said with obvious reluctance. He turned and walked through the doorway to the public lounge, flipping open his phone. “Verdun here.”

“Wow,” said Heather, as Luc shut off the television and followed Anthony out of the breakfast room. “Forget calling Mom.”

Joan felt a small ray of hope. “You’ll do it?”

Heather shook her head. “No. I want to talk about Anthony.”

“What about Anthony?”

“What’s going on between the two of you? I’ve got a nose for tension, and
wow.
”

“There’s no tension between us,” Joan lied, even as the tension buzzed its way through her limbs. Last night might have been a bigger mistake than she realized. Where did their relationship go now?

Heather shook her head, moved forward and lowered her voice. “What on earth did I miss?”

“Nothing,” said Joan, staring her sister straight in the eye.

“You lie.”

“I’m calling Mom.”

“Okay, now I
know
it’s something big. Did you sleep with him? Huh?”

“No, I didn’t sleep with him.” Joan headed for the phone in the corner of the breakfast room, but Heather followed on her heels.

“Because yesterday you two were all chummy and touchy.”

“We weren’t touchy.”

“Oh, yes, you were.”

“Well, a few things have changed since yesterday.” The interview, for one. The break-in, for another. The kiss…Joan silently groaned.

“And now you both act like you’re going to jump out of your skin.”

Joan lifted the receiver and pressed the Talk button. “You’re imagining things.” She punched in her long distance access number.

Heather shook her head and clicked her tongue. “I’m not imagining things. I’m observant and perceptive, remember?”

Joan keyed in her calling card. “You mean delusional.”

“What did he do?”

“Nothing.”

“Then what did you do?”

“Nothing, either.”

“You were still together when Luc and I left your room.”

“So what?” At the prompt, Joan dialed her parents’ number.

“Alone…in that romantic attic suite…”

“And Anthony left about five minutes later.”

“A lot can happen in five minutes.”

A ring tone sounded in Joan’s ear. “Or very little can happen in five minutes.”

“Joanie?”

“Yeah?”

“While we’ve been talking…”

Joan waited.

“You dialed Mom.”

Joan swore under her breath The receiver suddenly felt like a lead weight in her hands.

“Bateman residence,” came Dinora’s voice.

“G
ET HER BACK
out in front of the cameras right now,” boomed Stephen Baker.

“She’s not ready,” Anthony returned, glancing up to make sure Joan and Heather were still occupied in the breakfast room.

“I’m standing now,” said Stephen. “My blood pressure just went up thirty points.”

“The news story alone will sell thousands of copies,” Anthony pointed out. Stephen might think the sky was the limit on publicity, but Anthony had Joan’s feelings to worry about.

She’d been through a lot in the past two days. And he wasn’t forcing her into anything. Not that he could force her, in any case. Not that he had any right to even ask, since he’d shattered a pretty rigid professional boundary last night.

He shuddered to think what might have happened if he’d listened to the soft plea in her voice—if he’d gone back. He knew that if he’d so much as turned around and looked at her, he’d have plunged headlong into that big bed and lost himself in her luscious body. And then things would have been even more awkward this morning.

“I’m taking a nitro pill,” growled Stephen.

“I have a plan,” said Anthony. He had to think. There had to be a way to appease Stephen while respecting Joan’s desire for privacy.

Stephen’s voice rose. “
What
plan? I don’t see our star author on a morning talk show. Do you? You need to return Charlie Long’s phone call right away.”

“We need to let things calm down first.”

“What calm down? We want to heat them up.” If the tone of Stephen’s voice was anything to go by, the man might truly be on the verge of a heart attack.

“She’s been through a lot,” said Anthony.

“She’s not made of spun glass,” Stephen returned.

Anthony paused, gritting his teeth. “Give me some time.”

“I’ll come to Indigo—”

“No!”

A new voice came on the line. “Anthony?”

“Yes?”

“Bo Reese here.”

Anthony froze. Pellegrin Publishing’s vice-president was in Stephen’s office?

“Anthony?”

“Hello, Mr. Reese.”

The man laughed. “Bo, please.”

“Bo,” said Anthony, struggling to get his bearings.

“How are things going down there?” Bo asked heartily.

“It’s one of my more interesting trips,” Anthony admitted, glancing into the breakfast room again. Still no sign of Joan or Heather.

“Could have knocked us over with a feather when we found out Jules Burrell was a woman.”

“Quite a few people were surprised,” said Anthony, bracing for Bo to start the hard sell.

“We’re looking at bringing out her backlist.”

“Sounds great,” said Anthony, relaxing ever so slightly. Joan’s backlist was an untapped gold mine for all of them.

“Can somebody fax me copies of her original contracts?” he asked. He was making sure the publisher stuck to every single provision he’d negotiated for reprints.

Bo chuckled again. “Of course we can.”

“I’ll read them over before we talk further.”

“Always an eye on business,” said Bo.

“I like to think so.”

“Here’s the thing.”

Anthony braced himself.

“
Bayou Betrayal
is shaping up for a placement of at least twenty-five or thirty on the
New York Times
list.”

Anthony struggled to quell a surge of excitement. He had a best-selling author. Professionally, this was phenomenal.

“With the right circumstances,” Bo continued, “she might break the top ten.”

Now Anthony struggled not to hyperventilate.

“And then there’s the backlist. We’re prepared to launch a national media campaign, volume discounts, premium store placement, and any book tour she cares to name.”

This was it. This was the big time. For him, for Joan, for Prism.

“What do you say we start the ball rolling with Charlie Long?”

Anthony’s stomach congealed. They had him.

Of course they’d want the talk shows. They needed the talk shows. And Joan needed the talk shows, too.

Opportunities like this were lightning strikes, fleeting and never to be repeated. A couple of days from now, the news cycle would move on, and Joan would be out in the cold.

“I’ll do my best,” he heard himself say, struggling to come up with a strategy he could sell to her.

“Fantastic,”
said Bo. “You know, Anthony, if it would help…we could see if Charlie’s willing to make the call personally.”

Anthony hesitated. Ask Charlie Long to contact Joan? It was a risk. But it might be the only thing that would sway her.

He drew a deep breath.

“We’ve done it before,” said Bo.

“Fine,” said Anthony, gritting his teeth. “No harm in asking if he’s willing.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

J
OAN FELT
as if she were fourteen years old all over again. It happened every time she upset her mother. Normally, she tried very hard not to upset her mother.

“Because it’s the only way to nip this untenable situation in the bud,” her mother said tartly.

“If we give them some time,” Joan tried, “people might get used to the idea.”

She’d already apologized in half a dozen ways, but there was no backpedalling from this one. Going forward was her only hope.

Her mother’s voice rose. “We don’t want them to
get used
to the idea. We want them to forget all about the idea. You had to know this couldn’t end well.”

“I didn’t think much about the ending,” Joan confessed, tracing her finger along the outline of the wild-flower pattern on the breakfast room wallpaper.

If only
The New York Times
hadn’t picked up the story. If only Samuel hadn’t gone in front of the cameras. And if only she hadn’t included that bondage scene in
Bayou Betrayal.
She then might have had a chance to smooth things over.

But all those ships had sailed.

Paris was looking better and better. Maybe she could find a little garret off the Champs Élysées and come up with a different pen name. She sighed at the thought of starting everything from scratch. But what was her choice?

“This is all so typically you,” her mother sighed. “Plunging into some wild scheme without giving a single thought to the consequences. It’s like the time you played piano for that awful rock and roll band, and we had to—”

“I’ll go to Paris, Mom.” Joan glanced up just in time to see Anthony freeze in the breakfast room doorway, cell phone in his hand.

There was a pregnant pause all around.

Her mother was the first to break it. “Now you’re making some sense,” she enthused.

Anthony shook his head, and his voice went hoarse. “No.” He took a jerky step forward, but Heather moved in front of him.

“I’ll get your father to call the pilot right away,” said her mother.

Joan shrank against the sideboard as Anthony tried to jockey his way around Heather without manhandling her.

“I have to go, Mom,” said Joan.

“But we need to make plans,” her mother complained.

“Get out of my way,” Anthony growled.

“She’s going to Paris,” said Heather.

“Heather said the jet could land at St. Martinville.” Her mother’s words sped up. “I’d suggest you—”

“We can go commercial,” said Joan.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

Anthony grasped Heather by the shoulders and all but lifted her out of the way.

“Gotta go, Mom.”

“But—”

Joan disconnected.

Anthony stopped in front of her, his breathing deep, neck muscles pumped. “We have to talk.”