Part 2 (2/2)
She let the curtain fall closed, cloaking the room in the darkness she preferred. She walked across to the round table beside the doorway, lifted the phone off its cradle, and pressed the numbers she'd long since memorized. She walked back toward the window, extending the cord its full length across the room.
Neil Winston answered on the third ring. ”Miss Montgomery, good morning.”
”I don't like the looks of the girl who is moving in across the street.”
He paused for a moment, then cleared his throat. ”But we already agreed-”
”I've changed my mind. I don't want her here.”
”I'm sorry, Miss Montgomery, we've already signed the agreement. You and I did discuss all this before, remember? You wanted the old place cleaned up a bit?” He was using his placating voice, as if his intentionally calm tone would somehow change the facts.
”Do not speak to me as if I'm an idiot. I know very well what I said about wanting that place cleaned up. I'm telling you I do not like the looks of that girl, and I do not want her here.”
”Unfortunately, it's too late for that. There's nothing we can do at this point. Unless she breaks her end of the agreement, you're just going to be stuck with her until next summer. That is the duration of the agreement.”
”Next summer? Ridiculous! That's far too long.”
”But that was the agreement that was made, and the contract that was signed, nonetheless.”
Charlotte watched the girl turn and go into the house as Ralph Edwards pulled out of the driveway. ”We'll just have to see about that.” She let the curtain fall closed.
four.
Lauren made her way through the sprawling Home Depot parking lot. Her cart was loaded with buckets, bleach, and upholstery cleaner, and the handles of a broom and a mop stuck out beside her head, making it difficult to maneuver. She almost ran into a man loading some sort of pipe into the back of his truck.
As she approached her car, she noticed a woman leaning against the trunk of the blue BMW convertible in the parking stall beside hers. She steered a wide path, finally reaching her car without cras.h.i.+ng into anyone.
”Excuse me.” The woman at the BMW took a step toward her. ”I'm wondering if you could help me.”
”I will if I'm able.” Lauren looked up at the woman, prepared to tell her that she, too, was new to town and didn't know the directions anywhere, nor did she have jumper cables, but she did have a cell phone and AAA on speed dial.
The woman wore black Lulu pants and an over-the-thumb black-and-white-striped yoga s.h.i.+rt. Something about her seemed vaguely familiar. ”You're Lauren Summers, aren't you?” she said.
Ice-cold p.r.i.c.kles ran from the back of Lauren's neck down to her fingertips. She began throwing the items from her cart into the cargo hold of her Ford Escape without giving any indication that she'd heard the question. She needed to get out of there fast. How could they possibly have found her? This soon?
”My name is Kendall Joiner. I work for the Hollywood Reporter.”
That was why she looked familiar. Of course. ”No comment.” Lauren pushed her cart toward the return area, not looking back at all. How had this woman found her? And in the Home Depot parking lot, of all places.
”I'm not asking for a comment.” Kendall Joiner was keeping pace, matching step for step. ”Actually, I might have something for you.”
”Oh really?” Lauren made certain her tone did nothing to hide her doubt about the truth in that statement. She shoved her cart into the queue and started back across the lot.
”Really.” Kendall followed her back to their cars. Then Lauren realized the BMW looked familiar.
She stopped walking and truly looked at Kendall for the first time. ”Are you following me? I saw you parked along the cliffs a little while ago, didn't I? Just outside that gated area?” At the time, she had chalked it up to a photo enthusiast looking for a peaceful shot just outside the restricted access. It had never entered her mind that it might be a reporter lying in wait. If this was reality, no wonder the people who lived on Hide Away Lane were so obsessive about unapproved visitors.
”Here's the thing.” Kendall leaned against Lauren's car. ”I know how it is when you're the scapegoat. Believe me, I've been in that position more than once.”
Somehow Lauren doubted that Kendall had ever been humiliated on national TV, but then again, the entertainment world was cutthroat. She probably had experienced some unpleasantness. Regardless of her past, in the present she was a reporter looking for an angle to her story-likely some dirt on Marisa, who had already suffered enough. Lauren had no intention of feeding that beast. ”I'm sorry for you, then. If you'll excuse me, I have things to-”
”Believe me, I understand why you don't want to talk to me. But I think if you'll listen for just a minute, I might have some information that you will find worth your while.” Her brown ponytail stuck out from a pink ball cap, and in truth she looked more like she was ready for the gym than for researching her next big story. Maybe that was the idea.
Lauren folded her arms across her chest. ”I am not giving you the inside scoop about Marisa Remington, her mother, her manager, or anything about the whole malfunction debacle. If that's what you're after, then you can just save us both a lot of time by getting out of my way.”
Kendall smiled, and as she shook her head, her ponytail swung back and forth. ”You've got it all wrong. It's not you giving a story to me, it's me giving a story to you.”
”What do you mean?”
”I have a fairly major lead that the 'malfunction'”-she made air quotes around the word-”was staged.”
”Staged? That's ridiculous.”
”According to my source, Marisa Remington hated the squeaky-clean image they were always trying to douse her with. She wanted to be seen as grown-up and s.e.xy-typical seventeen-year-old, right?”
So that was it. She needed Lauren to verify her sources about Marisa wanting to look s.e.xier and, by doing so, to seemingly corroborate her invented story line. Good luck with that. Lauren wasn't talking.
She pressed the unlock b.u.t.ton on her key fob and reached for the door handle. ”I need you to move, please. You're in my way.”
”Word is, her mother and agent were so overbearing, Marisa decided there was nothing to do but take matters into her own hands.” Kendall scooted out of the arc of the driver's-side door as Lauren swung it open. ”In spite of the general outrage, if you've been anywhere near the internet recently, you have to have seen that there has been more than a little attention given to the fact that she does, indeed, have an amazing body.”
”I've seen a little of the media coverage, and it's disgusting.” Lauren pulled at the door, but Kendall held it.
”In fact, did you know that Vivian's Unmentionables has reported a run on the bra and panty set she was wearing? They completely sold out in a matter of hours after the awards show and are now reporting a backorder of several hundred thousand garments.”
”That is just sick.”
Kendall tilted her head to one side and offered a hard little grin. ”That's the world we live in. I could tell you stories that would make this seem downright pure.”
”No thanks.”
”My point is, that kind of thing would be a dream ending for Marisa, if she did indeed plan the whole thing, wouldn't it?”
That statement knocked the breath right out of Lauren. In spite of how utterly absurd the story sounded, it also just slightly rang true. A successful ending . . . for Marisa. Never mind that it had ruined Lauren's career before it even had the chance to begin-a career she'd worked hard to even have the hope of achieving. And now, poof. She thought of all the laughs she and Marisa had shared together during fittings. The comments that Marisa had made about having ”at least one person around here who gets me.” She wouldn't have set this up knowing it would destroy Lauren. Would she?
Lauren had spent many sleepless nights worrying about Marisa since the mishap, and she'd been so proud of her being brave enough to immediately go back out into public. It couldn't all have been planned out. Surely not.
Lauren held the car door. ”If what you're saying is true, and I don't believe that it is, but if it were, then I really wish I could help you, because I could get my career back. But even if it is, I don't know anything about it, so I'm afraid I won't be able to help you.”
”I know. Let's go grab a quick cup of coffee, shall we?” She gestured toward the Starbucks on the far side of the parking lot.
Lauren wanted to go back to the cottage. But somehow, what Kendall was saying intrigued her enough that she just couldn't do that until she'd heard it all. A few minutes later, she was sipping a flat white, doubt mixed with hope mixed with anger rising inside her. ”So, I'm still not clear on what you want from me. Like I told you, this is all news to me.”
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