“Her sister?” Gussie thought for a minute. Mimosa Key wasn’t a large island, but she hadn’t lived there long enough to know all the residents and their dirt.
“Her sister, Maggie Wallace,” Willow supplied.
Gussie gasped. “She can’t back out this late. Rhonda will be apoplectic.”
“I do not like the sound of that.” The woman’s voice in the doorway jerked them all around. A fearsome Mother of the Bride if there ever was one, Rhonda Lyons glared at the three of them. “What will make me apoplectic?”
Just about everything, Gussie thought, barely biting back the comment. Ari bristled, but Willow was up before Rhonda could ask another question.
“Mrs. Lyons, how lovely to see you.” Willow set her pretty face into an easy smile and reached out her hand. “We heard you’d arrived. How’s your villa?”
Rhonda swept into the room, zeroing in on Gussie. “I heard you say someone’s backing out of my daughter’s wedding. Who? Don’t tell me I have to break Hailey’s heart.”
Gussie swallowed, having already been on the receiving end of Rhonda’s wrath when the beaded lace for Hailey’s veil hadn’t been available with a scalloped edge. She’d acted like her darling daughter would walk down the aisle with a garbage bag draped over her head.
“It’s the photographer,” Willow said, breezing around her desk to put a friendly hand on Rhonda’s shoulder. “Nothing to worry about, Mrs. Ly—”
“The photographer canceled?” Rhonda’s voice rose at least three octaves into a bona fide shriek, something they’d probably be hearing a lot of in the next four days. “For a wedding this Saturday? What kind of planners are you?”
“Good ones,” Willow assured her, adding a gentle pat. “We have connections all over the county, state, and country. We’ll get another photographer in plenty of time.”
“Absolutely,” Ari agreed, gesturing toward a notebook in front of her. “We’re already working on it.” Except that notebook was awfully full of crossed-off names, Gussie noticed.
“Working on it?” Rhonda was aghast. “You’d better be doing more than ‘working on it.’ This is my only daughter, and Wayne and I have sunk a small fortune into this event, and I will not, I repeat, I will not accept a second-rate photographer.”
“And you won’t have to,” Willow said.
“I want a solution and I want it now,” Rhonda demanded. “In fact, I want to meet with the replacement photographer before the end of the day today. And I know that Maggie Wallace was excellent because I loved her work, so I expect someone equally talented, if not more so.”
Ari and Willow shared a secret look that confirmed all of Gussie’s suspicions: They had nuthin’.
“Who are we talking to?” Rhonda asked, pulling out another chair to join them at the table.
“Well, we…” Ari subtly pushed her list away.
“Names.” She tapped the table, her fingers hitting the magazine Gussie had set there. “And sample portfolios, right now.”
Willow and Ari stayed dead silent for a few long and awkward beats.
“TJ DeMille.” The name popped out of Gussie’s mouth, and all three of the women stared at her.
“I’ve heard of him,” Rhonda said.
Willow leaned out of Rhonda’s line of view to stare at Gussie in complete horror, then she quietly said, “But we don’t want to make promises we can’t keep.”
“He’s a really big name…as you know,” Ari added, trying to hide her shock at the suggestion.
“He’s huge,” Gussie agreed, snagging the issue of Vanity Fair. “He shot this cover.”
Rhonda’s eyes widened. “Get him.”
Willow and Ari blinked at Gussie when the order dropped silence over the room.
“I want him for this wedding,” Rhonda said, inching closer. “You claim to be so good, prove it. Get this TJ DeMille for my Hailey’s wedding. That ought to impress my tennis club. I doubt Sherry Wells is getting him for Brianna’s wedding.” She thought about that, nodding. “Yes, by all means, this is wonderful news. Get him.”
And all three of them looked at Gussie.
“No problem,” Gussie assured them all. And herself. Because it might be a problem. A big, fat problem. “I was just chatting with him.” She went for a casual air, despite Ari’s wide eyes. “And, as a matter of fact, he owes me a favor.”
“Excellent.” Rhonda stood, impervious and challenging. “I’m available for dinner and would like to meet with him at eight o’clock in the resort restaurant. I’ll bring Hailey, but the final decision is mine, since I’m footing the bill.” She picked up the magazine and narrowed her eyes at the movie star on the front. “And I don’t expect to be charged one penny more than I agreed to pay the original photographer.”
She sailed out of the room, leaving Gussie under the disbelieving gazes of her two closest friends.
“Please tell me you really know this guy,” Willow said.
“And that he owes you a big, gigantic favor,” Ari added.
“Kind of and maybe.” Gussie wrinkled her nose. “I ran into him at the Super Min and saved him from Charity’s wrath. Does that count?”
“Does that count?” Ari’s midnight-black eyes blinked in surprise. “You meet him on the very day we need a photographer? Now that’s what I call the universe doing her thing.”
“That’s what I call an opportunity,” Willow added. “But how can you possibly get someone of his caliber to agree to shoot a wedding?”
“I don’t have a clue,” Gussie admitted, pushing up and giving them a grin that covered her wave of self-doubt. “But I’m not going to let that stop me.”
Chapter Two
The noise never stopped. Whine, whirr, buzz, beep, and the occasional explosion. Something screeched and shrieked, and the constant sound of motors revving screamed for so long, Tom could swear he heard it in his sleep.
And he did, often. Because his twelve-year-old niece played her incessant, annoying video game of stupid little characters driving around in circles at all hours of the day and night.
Carrying the chips and candy as an offering for the broken raspberry tea he’d promised, he headed into the dimly lit den. Of course, Alex hadn’t opened the cheap vertical blinds on the window. Or cleaned up the kitchen or made plans with a friend or watered the plants or done anything but play that mindless, brain-numbing game that occupied almost all of her waking hours.
Obviously, it was her only escape from grief and shock. Lucky girl. Tom had no such outlet for the miserable situation they were both in.
He stood directly between the television and the controller in her hand, holding out the Milky Ways and Fritos. “Healthy lunch, anyone?”
She leaned around him, not looking up, her attention still on the game.
“Alex?”
Her dark eyes narrowed, concentration intense.
He shifted left to block her again. “Alex.”
Finally, she gave up, falling back on the recliner, her gaze as vacant and empty as the day he’d arrived. “You’re in my way,” she said, stating the obvious in her reed-thin voice.
He stayed there but put the snacks on the table next to her, smashing a frustration that was growing far too familiar in every exchange they had. “You haven’t done anything today but play this game.”
She blinked at him, her eyes dark against skin that would someday be pale and creamy but was currently dotted with preteen acne that only seemed to get worse since he’d arrived.
“Don’t you want to do something else?” he asked, already knowing the answer. “Call a friend? Ride your bike? Something?”
“No.” She set the controller next to the candy bars. “I’ll go to my room.”
“No,” he said sharply—too sharply. “Don’t leave, Alex. Just…don’t.”
But it was too late. She stood, barely reaching his shoulder as she slid by him, her waif-like body disappearing around the corner, leaving him wondering why his famed ability to get ice-princess
supermodels to open up to him when he was holding a camera couldn’t crack the shell around a twelve-year-old orphan.
Tom closed his eyes and walked as far away from the den as he could, which wasn’t very far in this tiny house that bore his sister’s lively fingerprints on every crocheted pillow and lacy curtain. It all reminded him that Ruthie had made a secure, loving, stable home for her daughter, and then left it all in the hands of the one person who didn’t do security, love, or stability—him.
“Shit.” Shoving his hair back and sighing hard, Tom went into the kitchen and stared out the window at the miniature backyard, noticing Ruthie’s drooping, brown-tipped plants that he supposed someone should water.
But he’d never had a plant. Or a tract home. Or full responsibility for a kid who erected walls made of blank stares and noisy video games.
What the hell had Ruthie been thinking? She’d been thinking what most people who live in a state of denial, never dreaming something like an aneurysm or a car accident or a…hemorrhage could end their life in an instant.
But Tom knew better. And Ruthie should have known better, considering their childhood history. But apparently she hadn’t, because she’d never bothered to change a twelve-year-old document that left Thomas Jefferson DeMille, least qualified person on earth, responsible for his niece.
What the hell was he supposed to do now?
Since he’d received the news that his sister had died and he’d dropped his camera on a shoot in Bora-Bora to get on a plane to a much less glamorous island off the Gulf Coast of Florida, he’d asked himself that question a thousand times. He was Alex’s closest living relative, if you didn’t count her father, who had been MIA for more than a decade and had already legally rejected his own daughter.
There was no answer to what he should do, only questions. How could he take care of a child when his career was one endless road trip? How would Alex fit into his lifestyle? Was it possible to incorporate a twelve-year-old girl into his crazy, chaotic world? Did he have a choice?
The questions were silenced by his buzzing cell phone with a reminder alarm.
Flight 615 to Majorca. Leaves in three hours.
Maybe it would, but he wouldn’t be on the plane. He’d canceled the flight, the shoot, and the whole European trip weeks ago, but he’d forgotten to take some of the dates off his calendar. Or maybe he’d secretly hoped that he’d find a solution to this insurmountable problem and be able to make the trip anyway. He squeezed the phone, staring at the notification, unable to resist tapping the month view to see all the things he’d canceled in those hazy days when he’d arrived, bearing his own grief for the loss of one more person he’d cared about.
The city names blurred, like his old travel days, one into another.
Barcelona after Majorca. And then Nice and Monaco. Son of a bitch, he wanted to do that campaign for LaVie on the French Riviera. But he’d had his agent cancel it along with everything else for July and August.
And then what?
He smacked the counter so hard it stung his palm. “What the hell am I going to do?”
“You could find my dad.”
He closed his eyes at the soft whisper, biting back the truth. Some lawyer had already found Steve Whitman, who lived in Oregon, had another family, and had done nothing but wave the legal papers that released him of any responsibility for the one he’d had twelve years ago with Ruthie.
Tom certainly didn’t have the heart to tell this broken girl that her father didn’t want her even though her mother was dead.
“That’s not what your mom would have wanted,” he said, choosing his words carefully.
“She wanted me to be happy.”
“Of course,” he said vaguely. And Ruthie had always been a little ditzy, and too trusting, and forgetful. Amusing as hell, but had she forgotten that Tom had already sacrificed a few years of his life to raise a young girl without parents? Otherwise, why would she let history repeat itself?
The front doorbell rang with a singsong interruption. More neighbors with casseroles? More of the colorful troupe of amateur actors from Ruthie’s community theater? The visitors had slowed to a trickle in the past two weeks. Nice enough characters with good intentions and tons of offers of sympathy and prayers, but no one had any idea what to do with Alex, and none seemed close enough to suggest they take care of her while Tom lived his life. Or at least while he went to the south of France for a few weeks.
“Can you get that?” he asked, not eager to make small talk with strangers right then. Or ever.
She barely nodded before walking out of the kitchen. Tom stayed exactly where he was, breathing slow and steady, his mind back to the original and only problem he had. Not that he wanted to think of Alex as a “problem” at all. She was a kid, broken and beaten by life’s cruel circumstances. He knew exactly how she felt. But what was he going to do?
He couldn’t leave her, even for a few weeks. And what about long term? Maybe he could put her in a boarding school, or find a live-in nanny willing to stay while he traveled, or take her with him when she wasn’t in school. Maybe that was a possibility.
“Um, she wants to see you.” Alex stood in the kitchen doorway again.
“Who?”
She lifted a bony shoulder. “I thought she was from the theater group with that pink hair, but I’ve never seen her before.”
Pink hair? A little shot of adrenaline rushed through him at the memory of the charming young woman from the convenience store. How had she found him? Without a word, he brushed by Alex into the living room, and sure enough, there she was, as pink and pretty as he remembered.
She smiled, showing small, straight teeth that fit pixie-like features. Still, she was more striking than classically “cute” and surprisingly intriguing. Not at all his usual taste in women, but purely attractive anyway.
“Hi.” She bit her lower lip, her eyes bright and as wildly green as he remembered from the parking lot. Instantly, he imagined those sparkly eyes aimed directly at his camera, slightly shuttered, with a yellow-tinged light to accent the green. “Charity told me how to find you,” she said.
He pulled himself out of the imaginary shot. “Charity?”
“That nice lady who owns the Super Min.”
Behind him, Alex snorted softly. “Nice as a python.”
The comment surprised him so much he turned to her, startled by one of the first emotive things he’d heard his niece say. “Um, Alex, this is Gussie, who swooped in and saved me from that python. Gussie, this is my niece, Alex Whitman.”
“Gussie?” Alex asked, eyeing their guest with more interest than she’d shown in anything except a video game in the month he’d been there.
“It’s short for Augusta,” Gussie explained, with the tone of a person who’d offered the information a thousand or more times in her life. “I was born one minute after midnight on August first, so my mom named me Augusta. I was supposed to be Julia, for July.”
“Do you have sisters named April, May, and June?” Alex asked.
She laughed easily. “Just a brother, Luke.” Gussie turned to Tom, leveling him with those grass-green eyes. “I bet you’re curious why I’m here.”
As hell. “And how that woman came up with this address, that wasn’t on my expired driver’s license.”
“Don’t underestimate the nosiness of Charity Grambling,” Gussie said.
Alex laughed, a sound so out of place that Tom had to look at her again, spying the faintest glint in eyes that had been nothing but dull for a month. “That’s what my mom used to say. She called her Chump Charity.”
Gussie snapped her fingers and pointed to Alex. “A Mario Kart fan?”
“Yeah. Are you?” Alex asked, her voice rising a bit.
“A fan and champion.” She gave up an endearing smile, flipping her colorful hair with playful smugness. “I’m kind of unbeatable at anything with Mario’s name on it.”
“Do you play Mario Kart?” Alex asked with a note of rising exci
tement.
Gussie held up her hands as if on a steering wheel. “Princess Peach rules the road.”
Alex let out a soft shriek. “I’m Rosalina.”
Tom looked from one to the other, the conversation volley throwing him on so many levels. Not only did he not know what the hell they were talking about, he couldn’t even wrap his head around the change in Alex. It was like someone had turned a light on inside her.
“Would you, um, want to play?” Alex asked. “Just one game, right now?”
“Well, I…I…”
“Maybe later, Alex,” he said, trying not to throw too much cold water on the ideas. As much as he knew the spark in Alex had been lit by their unexpected guest, he took pity on the woman who probably hadn’t hunted him down to play video games.
The light in Alex’s eyes dimmed, gone as fast as it had arrived. “My mom liked to play it with me,” she said on a sad whisper.
He bit back a grunt of frustration, furious at himself for killing the first sign of life.
But Gussie stepped forward and reached out a hand to Alex, sincere sympathy oozing from her. “Charity told me about your mother. I’m so sorry.”
Alex swallowed and nodded. “Yeah, thanks. And sorry I asked.”
“No, don’t be sorry. I’d love to play sometime.”
But Alex backed away, slinking into the hallway.
Damn it. Damn it.
“Oh,” Gussie breathed a sigh of sorrow that reflected exactly how he felt. “I shouldn’t have—”
“It’s not your fault,” he assured her. “I should thank you. I have no clue who Princess Whatever and Rosalina are, but you made her smile for the first time in weeks.”
“The poor kid. And…you. I’m sorry for your loss. Her mother was your sister?”
He nodded and murmured, “Thanks.”
She reached toward him, then pulled her hand back as if she realized she shouldn’t touch him. “That has to be horrible. Family is everything.”
Or it’s nothing, depending on the cards you’ve been dealt. “Is that why you’re here? A sympathy call?”
“Actually, no.” She gave a self-conscious smile and shuffled a little on bright red heels. “I came to ask you for that favor you said you owed me.”