This Just In... (Harlequin Superromance) (3 page)

Sabrina stretched, letting the water sluice over her and feeling her muscles unkink. She still needed to figure out how to convince Noah Barnes that she only wanted to interview him, not make a federal case. But apparently the Barnes family was still holding on to old grudges.

Wasn’t there a statute of limitations on these things? It was nine years ago, for God’s sake. She shoved down the bubble of guilt that tried to rise. One more reason to get out of here. No one in Vancouver made her feel guilty or as though she’d done something wrong when all she’d done was report the truth.

The whole thing had started out so innocently. Sabrina had been taking journalism classes at the University of British Columbia and trying to find a way to finagle an internship at the
Vancouver Tribune,
the city’s broadsheet. But a university freshman with a few articles written for her local hometown paper the previous year was hardly the kind of student they were looking to groom.

Until Kyle, an early-round draft pick in the NHL’s draft, had injured his back at practice and herniated a disc. He’d been sent for surgery and then permitted to go home for recuperation and physiotherapy. Except Kyle had never come back.

Normally, an early-round player who crapped out before ever playing a game at the pro level wouldn’t do more than cause a brief mention on one of the morning talk shows. But Kyle had been drafted to Vancouver and he was a B.C. boy, so fans were interested. And Sabrina knew she could get the inside scoop.

Though she and Kyle hadn’t kept in touch after their breakup, she knew he’d agree to her interview and he had, willingly. No arm-twisting required. She’d flown home, expecting to find that Kyle, who’d been a naturally gifted athlete if a somewhat lackadaisical player, had simply decided he wasn’t interested in the work necessary to rehab his back to professional-sport caliber. Or he’d been one of the unlucky ones for whom the surgery didn’t mean full recovery.

She’d never expected that he was staying in Wheaton for Marissa. Or that her best friend was already pregnant with his baby. Her best friend and her ex-boyfriend. Together.

Sabrina hadn’t cared that Kyle had moved on. They’d never been anything serious. But Marissa? Her best friend since they’d met in ballet class as three-year-olds? The one who’d come to visit her for a few days over the holidays before they’d flown home together to spend Christmas with their families in Wheaton? That had stabbed.

So she’d let all her feelings seep onto the page. Snotty and snarky and cutting. How sad that Kyle had given up a promising career. What a shame the whole situation was. She’d never explicitly stated that Marissa was expecting, but anyone with half a brain could read between the lines.

She’d meant to hurt and she’d been successful. By the time her mad wore off and she wondered if she’d taken things too far, the choice had no longer been in her hands. The editor at the paper loved it, ran it as the cover article in the sports section and Sabrina was hired on part-time.

Sabrina shook the old memory off. That was the past and she couldn’t change things now. And right now, she just wanted to enjoy her soak.

She wet a washcloth and laid it across her eyes, sinking down until the water touched her chin. Her eyes shut and her mind quieted. It felt good.

Sabrina was sure she’d only just closed her eyes when a knock startled them open. She pulled the washcloth off, blinking away the wetness on her eyelashes. “Yes?”

“Dinner’s almost ready, sweetheart.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Sabrina climbed out of the tub, noting the water was far cooler than when she’d entered, and toweled off. Back in her room, she pulled on a pair of cute yoga pants and matching hoodie. Just because she was in the boonies was no reason to look like it.

She glanced at her cell phone as she pulled on a pair of warm socks, but she had no new messages. Tucking away the hurt that no one had called her—not her editor, not her friends, not even the mayor—she put the phone back on the nightstand. They were busy, that was all. Unlike her, they still had vibrant lives.

It was probably too much to hope for a call from the mayor’s office anyway. Even though he’d seemed to be considering her proposal, Sabrina didn’t think he was the type to make a snap decision. She resolved to call him first thing tomorrow morning. She couldn’t fix the mess back in Vancouver, but she could get her interview with Noah Barnes. Surely he could see that the interview would benefit him as much as her. And if not, she’d tell him.

Feeling marginally positive that things would soon be going her way, she headed downstairs to dinner with her parents.

CHAPTER THREE

T
HE
MAYOR
WAS
being difficult. Luckily, Sabrina had worked with difficult interviewees before. The hockey player who’d cancelled three times before she’d finally shown up outside the arena after practice like a groupie and done the interview while his hair was still wet. The singer who’d appeared an hour late, hung over from the night before and answering most of her questions with requests for a cigarette. The actor who’d insisted on staying in character, accent included. All had ended in successful columns for Sabrina.

She knew how to get what she wanted. And she wanted this interview.

Since their meeting in the parking lot on Monday, she’d had two other opportunities to talk to Noah in person, both instances as she was making his espresso. On each occasion, he’d nodded politely and told her he would get back to her. The four times she’d called his office, she hadn’t even managed to get him on the phone. His assistant had acted as a gatekeeper and brushed her off with the now familiar story that he was in a meeting or out of the office.

But Sabrina was pretty sure he couldn’t avoid her if she showed up on his doorstep. Not that she was turning into some creepy stalker who would wait outside his house and pounce the minute he showed his face. No, she had more couth than that. She was moving in across the hall. Far less creepy.

She’d known her parents owned an income property, half of a pretty little duplex in town, but she hadn’t known Mr. Mayor called the other half home and, upon learning this tidbit, she’d convinced them—okay, there might have been a teensy-weensy bit of begging involved—to let her move in. Their previous tenants had moved out a couple of months earlier and the apartment had been sitting vacant. Sabrina didn’t believe in astrology or fate, but her stars? Those were aligned.

She wondered if Mr. Mayor was a briefs or boxers man. Really, it was the kind of investigative journalism that readers would want to know. Her cheeks warmed.

“What are you thinking about, sweetheart?” Her dad interrupted her thoughts.

“Just excited to be getting my own space.” She rolled down the window. Mr. Mayor wasn’t even her type. She preferred the slightly dangerous bad boys. The ones who demanded rather than asked and kissed a woman so hard that she popped right out of her shoes.

“You haven’t even seen the inside yet.”

Although it was now Friday and she’d talked them into letting her use the apartment on Monday, she hadn’t had a chance to come out until now. The coffee shop had been busy all week as tourists began spilling into town for the start of the summer rush. Sabrina had worked two double shifts already and in the few hours she’d had off, she’d been at the newspaper office getting to know the staff and preparing for her interview with Pete.

But she didn’t need to see the inside to know the apartment was going to be perfect. Already, she could picture curling up in a cozy corner with a book, setting up her computer somewhere other than her bedroom and lingering over a cup of coffee on her mornings off without interruption.

At her parents’ house, she sat at the same dining chair that had been hers since she was old enough to scramble up on it, slept in the same twin bed that she’d graduated to after toddlerhood and had to share the remote for the TV.

It wasn’t that she didn’t love her parents. She did. A lot. But she’d lived on her own for the past nine years—except that one period when she’d had a roommate who spent the entire six months on the couch leaving crumbs on the cushions and smoking a bong. Never again. Sabrina was used to having privacy, playing the music she liked and watching various iterations of Real Housewives without having to justify herself to anyone.

Her father smiled as they cruised through town. Probably because he and her mother were now certain that Sabrina would be staying in Wheaton long-term. She’d heard them talk about it through the wall in her bedroom last night. Apparently, her fib about writing that book hadn’t fooled them. But there was another more important reason to get out and into her own place. The discussion about her future hadn’t been the only thing she’d heard from her parents’ room last night.

Logically, Sabrina knew they were still young and vibrant and sexually active, but she really didn’t need proof of that fact. Ever. Again.

“Here we are.” Her father pulled into a long driveway and parked in front of the house. “Ready?”

Ready? Sabrina was already out of the car and heading up the stairs that led to the long wraparound porch and front door. She hadn’t seen the place in over a decade but it was just as cute as she remembered. From the front it appeared to be a single dwelling with three steps that led to the blue front door.

Matching sets of French doors, one on either side of the main door, opened to the porch, as well. In its original state, the house had been built for one family and the doors led to a pair of sitting rooms and could be opened to catch the summer breeze. Now they provided porch access for each apartment occupant without needing to go through the entry and front door.

They were missing the artful iron vines she was used to seeing on large glass doors and windows in the city, but then security wasn’t such a concern here. Sabrina had been shocked to find her parents still didn’t lock their doors. And not just during the day when they happened to be at home. All the time, day, night, in or out.

Petty crime—or non-petty crime—wasn’t something she needed to worry about in Wheaton. No one was going to snatch her purse off her shoulder or kick in her window to steal her valuables.

Someone had planted shrubs along the sides of the house and in front of the porch. Probably her mother. They were well-tended, with small white flowers starting to bud.

There wasn’t any outdoor furniture, but Sabrina figured she could borrow some from her parents. She’d already requisitioned a coffee table and the floor lamp with a pink shade and ’20s fringe from her mom’s sewing room. What were a couple of outdoor lounge chairs, a small table, maybe some oversized pots of brightly colored flowers added to her tally?

Sabrina had loved her tubs of blooms on her balcony in Yaletown. Well, loved them until the tenant below her complained that they were making a mess on his balcony. One measly bud had fluttered onto his ugly wicker chair, but he’d acted like she’d purposely defaced his property. Her boot heels clacked a little louder. Please, her flower had done more to improve his decor than a mountain of furniture. Which she’d told her landlord, but he’d merely pointed to the clause in the contract that stated she needed permission to put anything on her balcony and she hadn’t bothered to get it.

But there weren’t any balconies here and Sabrina doubted Mr. Mayor would get crabby about flowers. People in Wheaton were friendlier, more agreeable. He would understand that her decor improved his space, as well. Assuming he even noticed.

She tried to peek through his curtain-free French doors while she waited for her dad to finish fiddling with the car and join her, but the glare from the sun prevented her from seeing much. She squinted, but couldn’t make out anything more than a couple of blobby shapes.

There was always the possibility that they’d become friends and he’d actually invite her inside. So far, her old friends had made themselves scarce. She hadn’t even seen Marissa or Kyle. Not that she’d expected to.

Her dad finally finished whatever he was doing and unlocked the front door. The entry was plain but neat. An overhead chandelier, original to the house, sparkled under the afternoon sun. Wood floors were polished to a golden gleam. A well-used Turkish-style rug lay in the center of the room beneath a round oak table that had a bowl of potpourri on it.

Sabrina wrinkled her nose. “Potpourri, Dad? This isn’t the ’80s.” Which was exactly what she’d told her mother when she’d spotted it in the guest bathroom.

He shrugged. “Your mother said it would smell nice.”

Yes, if people wanted their homes to smell like an old lady’s underwear drawer. Sabrina made a mental note to take the bowl and all the dried flowers with her when they left.

Her father walked past the offending decor without a glance and stuck his key into the interior door on the left. Men. Sabrina lingered, noting the cheerful welcome mat in front of the mayor’s door. There was a small nail beneath the peephole. Probably to hang a wreath at Christmas.

“Sabrina?” her father called.

She sent one last look at the door, not that it told her anything, and headed to what would become her new home. She imagined plain white walls, simple wood floors polished to the same gloss as the entry and maybe some architectural features found in older homes that gave them such character. Crystal doorknobs, paneled doors and thick crown molding.

What she found would have caused her mouth to fall open in a gasp of horror had she not trained herself out of the habit years ago when one of her university friends told her it made her look like a rube.

“What do you think?” Her dad was practically rubbing his hands together.

Sabrina wondered if they were seeing the same thing because what she saw was that the bowl of potpourri wasn’t the only thing left from the ’80s. The walls of the duplex were pastel stripes. Yes. Pastel. Stripes. In four colors. Lilac and mint and blush and sunshine shown off in all their glory because there wasn’t any furniture to distract from it.

She prayed it wasn’t wallpaper. Oh, God. She did not relish stripping thirty-year-old paper from the walls. She’d done that in an apartment once. The paper had practically fused to the drywall and it had taken her days of hard labor, one of those scoring tools, fabric softener and finally the rental of a steamer to get it off.

There was one lonely rug that the previous tenant had left behind. A fringed circle of lemon yellow—and not the cute and sexy fringe like her lamp. No, this was the thick yarn type. She didn’t bother to disguise her shudder.

But the wood floors appeared to be in good shape and the fireplace was nice. A simple, traditional wood frame that just needed a fresh coat of white paint to bring it back to life. The kitchen was all right, too, if she avoided looking at the walls, which had been sponge painted.

The appliances were standard white, but clean and carried no leftover odors. She’d once moved into a place where the previous tenant hadn’t bothered cleaning out anything ever. After scrubbing the fridge and scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing some more, Sabrina had insisted her landlord replace it. He’d been irritated and pissy. Apparently, he’d hoped she’d just grow used to the stench. The counters were a neutral beige. Nothing to get excited about but most definitely livable. The pink ruffled curtains, not so much. They would be coming down first thing.

“It needs some upgrades,” she said.

“Now, Sabrina. Don’t go getting any ideas about granite and marble and stainless-steel appliances. I’m already covering the costs of shipping your furniture from Vancouver. Why did you ever put it in storage? Waste of money when we can store it for you in our basement.”

“Because I’m going back.” She’d already explained this, but her father chose not to hear it.

He waved off her statement as he’d done the previous two times she’d told him. “Or you could stay.”

“Now you sound like Mom.” Sabrina sloughed off the idea without another thought because she wasn’t staying any longer than necessary. But until that day arrived, getting the apartment into the new millennium would be a good project for her. Something to fill the long evening hours when Wheaton shut down for the night. Her current obsession of checking email, text and social networking sites was not working for her. At all.

“Don’t you want to come back home?” her dad asked. For the hundredth time, she considered telling him the truth. That she wasn’t back to write a book about her experiences interviewing celebrities, filling the pages with all the tidbits that hadn’t fit into her articles. That she’d been fired and that it wasn’t looking like she’d ever get her job back.

Once again, she swallowed the words and smiled. “It doesn’t feel like home anymore, Dad. It’s been a long time since I lived here and I love the city.” With its late-night burger joints, extensive shoe stores and Opera Guy, a local gentleman who strolled around the neighborhood singing opera at the top of his lungs, Vancouver was the place she longed for. “But I promise to come and visit more, okay?”

When she saw the downturn of her father’s lips, guilt snuck into her cheerful attitude. It had just been easier for her parents to come to her. First because she worked at the paper through the holidays. Low person in the chain of command. Then it had just become habit.

“Oh, come on.” Sabrina elbowed him lightly. “Cheer up. I’m here now. You’ve got me doing slave labor at the coffee shop.” Even with what she hoped would be an increased workload at the local paper, she’d continue to work most mornings at the coffee shop. “And I’m going to fix up this place for free.”

“Does this mean it’s not going to cost me anything?” The edges of his eyes crinkled.

“My labor is free,” she clarified. “Which we all know is the majority of cost. I’m giving you a deal.”

She could see the finished project in her mind. A pale pink on the walls, like the inside of a rose, to play up the reds and pinks in the large throw rug she had. Maybe she could search out an old wrought iron chandelier to hang over the coffee table. Antiques shops would just be opening for the summer season and would not yet be picked over. Her parents had a grandfather clock in their entryway that was too large for the space, but it would be perfect against the wall in here. Pillows on her oatmeal-colored couch, throws on her ivory chairs, flowers in crystal vases on the end table. She had a small series of sculptures that would look fabulous on the fireplace mantel.

Sabrina was still thinking about it as they exited the suite. Until she saw the monstrosity of a potpourri bowl and hurried over to dispose of it. An act of compassion, really, putting the hideous thing out of its misery.

She was sweeping some of the dried blooms that had fallen onto the table back into the bowl when the front door opened. Her senses went on high alert. If she was at the table and she could still hear her father locking up the apartment, then the front door could only be opened by one person.