CHAPTER TEN
The next morning over coffee and a Danish Carrie called the stylist, a friendly girl named Lisa, and set up an appointment for the next day but made sure to warn her about her measurements. Lisa wasn’t getting a supermodel to style but she seemed fine with it. If she wasn’t, she was too polite to say so.
She’d just hung when her phone buzzed again. Greg. This was unusual. Their normal call pattern was once every few weeks or when something major happened. Her stomach clenched with fear as she thought about her niece and nephew. Had something happened or had he butt dialed her just to give her a heart attack?
“Hey big brother, didn’t I just talk to you? Is everything okay?”
“You’re in the news.”
No hello. No how are you. Just you’re in the news.
“Did I win that Nobel Prize I’ve been campaigning for? I assumed I was a shoo-in.”
She was playing with Greg but she had a feeling she knew what he was talking about. Those paparazzi last night had taken their picture and one or more of them had probably ended up in some tabloid rag.
“Funny, Carrie. I’m being serious here. You’re on the internet.”
Already tapping the keys of her laptop, the photos were incredibly easy to find once she typed in the search phrase Maxwell Hayes’s new girlfriend.
Bingo. Time to drop the bomb on poor brother Greg.
“I guess I didn’t mention that I’ve met someone.”
“You’ve met Maxwell Hayes? Funny you should say that because I’m having a secret affair with Angelina Jolie.”
Inwardly sighing, Carrie tried to remember the rehearsed explanation but it had fled her brain when she’d seen the tabloid photos.
“Funny, big brother. I’m serious. I’m…dating Maxwell Hayes. He’s a friend of Nate Mason, Paige’s husband.”
Lightning didn’t strike her down for telling that huge fib. Interesting. Her parents had lied about that.
“So…wow…okay. I saw the photos and figured something was up but I just assumed you were doing work for him or something.”
“Work?”
“You know, like assistant work. The stuff you do for Paige.”
Like most people in her life, Greg thought she was pulling down minimum wage fetching lattes for Paige. He didn’t seem to get her job responsibilities and frankly she’d been too busy to educate him.
“Well, we’re dating.”
Silence.
“Greg? I said we’re dating.”
“So I guess that’s good then? You must be over Mark.”
Actually, now that he’d brought her ex up, she realized she hadn’t thought about idiot Mark in quite awhile.
“I am,” she said firmly. “Max is a great guy.”
Sometimes.
“So you were out on a date with this movie star?”
“Max and I were chased by some photographers last night when we visited the Eye. It’s no big deal, Greg.”
It wasn’t a small deal either. Her likeness was splashed all over a couple of UK tabloids with some pretty lurid headlines.
Hayes rebounding with mystery redhead
Has Max given up on Alana?
Is that a baby bump? Why Max gave up on Alana
Mystery redhead soothes Max’s broken heart
Baby bump? As if. The way her life had been going lately it would have had to have been an immaculate conception. But she could see why the headline read that way. At the angle they’d caught her, and in that particular jacket, she did look slightly pregnant. Or chubby. Maybe she should be happy no one called her fat. Or plain. They just called her a mystery which for now was fine.
“They think you’re pregnant, Carrie. I’d call that a big deal. I mean…you’re not, are you? It’s okay if you are.”
Christ on a pogo stick.
“I know it would be okay but rest easy, Greg, I’m not. Not even a little bit. It’s just the press trying to sell papers. When I don’t give birth in a few months, they’ll realize they’re wrong. Of course by then they will have made up a dozen or so other stories. You need to not react every time they write something because I’m guessing it’s going to get worse.”
Carrie didn’t trust Max’s ex not to try and win in the court of public opinion if she couldn’t win in court. Smearing Max, and maybe Carrie as well, might be the way to go about that.
“Seems like a tough kind of relationship to be in, Sis. In the public eye all the time. I hope he’s worth it.”
Interesting question. The glimpses of the real Max? Yes, he was worth it. The snotty guy who often showed up here? Not in the least. She’d thought she was getting somewhere last night when they’d talked but he’d closed himself off completely, the mask coming down. She’d watched as he’d transformed himself in seconds from a friendly, open guy to a stiff, cold asshole.
“He is,” she said instead. Greg must never know the lengths she’d gone to keep her family and friends from feeling sorry for her. “He’s a good man. You’d like him if you met him.”
“Me and some British actor guy?” Greg laughed. “Sure, I bet we have a lot in common. Has he ever hunted gator?”
Really, Greg?
“No, and neither have you,” she shot back. “Stop acting like you’re some kind of redneck. You’re an attorney, for heaven’s sake. You live in a gated community. You play golf on the weekends.”
“I could hunt gator if I wanted to. In fact, I’ve been thinking about it.”
Snorting, Carrie almost dropped her phone laughing. “Jeannie would never let you go in a million-trillion years. Now I really do need to go and I’m sure you have to take someone’s deposition or bill hours to some poor shmuck. Thanks for letting me know about the pictures. There may be more so you need to get used to it.”
“I’ll never get used to seeing my sister in the gossip columns,” Greg grumbled. “Next time they try and take your picture, duck or something.”
“Now why didn’t I think of that? Say goodbye, Greg.”
“Goodbye, Greg.”
That was an old joke between them and she was chuckling as they hung up, but her attention was quickly back on the photos. She didn’t look too bad in them. None of them were all that great, a little blurry as she and Max rushed in the opposite direction. It had been dark so their faces were illuminated by the flash and she didn’t like how pasty white she looked but Max was the same so it didn’t have anything to do with her. The only thing that could have made it any better was if she was five inches taller and twenty pounds thinner.
Ahhh, wishful thinking.
A knock on the front door pulled her from the pictures and she slapped the lid down on the laptop. It was probably Max. He’d sent her a text earlier that he would be by today with the executed contract.
Pulling open the door, her mouth fell open when she saw who it was, standing at the door with an armload of pink roses in a delicate crystal vase. She’d never thought to see him again and just how did he find her?
Tyler Gaylord, perverted changing room guy and Hollywood heartthrob. What in the hell did he want?
Flowers. Smiling. Wait. Did he want…her?