Page 7

chapter six

Emily

“Tuck Mattice? Tuck Mattice ?”

“Yes, Em, I did say Tuck Mattice,” my mom repeated into the phone. “And he needs a job.”

“I haven’t seen him in a hundred years, Mom, and you want me to hire him?” Along with the shock of hearing my mom say Tuck’s name, a strange and sudden bubbly sensation had erupted in my stomach, like an internal hurricane.

Tuck Mattice.

Or maybe I was just hungry. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast.

Only, that bubbly sensation? It was familiar. My body had always reacted that way to Tuck. And despite the years, it obviously still did. But flesh was dumb. And my body didn’t remember how Tuck had treated me, and how it had hurt.

It didn’t know who he’d become.

“He’s practically family, Emily.”

“Close,” my makeup artist, Sasha, said, and I closed my eyes so he could apply my eyeshadow.

“Family?” I asked. “He’s as good as a stranger to me. And, Mom, Nova. I need you to call me Nova when I’m getting ready for an event.” If I didn’t get into character, so to speak, I’d forget to respond to the stage name and look clueless. It’d happened before.

“Keep still, girl,” Sasha instructed.

“Sorry,” I murmured.

“I know he didn’t keep in touch,” my mom went on as though she hadn’t heard what I said about my name, “but you know what a rough time he had after his mom died.”

“Open,” Sasha said, tipping my chin. I opened my eyes, and he moved his gaze from one to the other, measuring. “Good. Louisa, she’s ready for you,” he called to my hairdresser in the living room, turning and beginning to gather his kit.

“Hold on, Mom.” I leaned toward the now-unobstructed mirror, turning my face in each direction. “Thanks, Sash. You’re an artiste ,” I said, making the gesture for a chef’s kiss. He’d done a heavy nighttime look on me, and though it was dramatic, he’d kept it tasteful. He was truly talented, and I was lucky to have him as part of my team.

“Kisses,” he called, sweeping out of the room. I lifted the phone toward my mouth again, moving my mind back to the conversation. My mom had been making excuses for Tuck Mattice.

“We all had a rough time after Mariana died, Mom. We all loved her.” I took a deep breath, mentally shaking off the feeling of that time. Of learning of Mariana’s—the woman who’d been like an aunt to me—diagnosis: brain cancer. We’d all been shocked and scared. Her immediate prognosis hadn’t been good, and the next nine months had gone by in a devastating blur of treatments, prayer vigils, and finally hospice care. Our orchard and the Mattices’, once brimming with gatherings and laughter and shared community, suddenly went quiet. When I remembered that time, my memories contained no sunshine, as if the hours between Mariana’s collapse and her coffin being lowered into the ground had gone by in perpetual night. Along with Mariana and her guitar strumming, music had died on Citrus Row as well. It was too painful, I guess. But music had always been my solace, and so I sought it out wherever I could, and it eventually took me away from home for good.

Tuck had turned inward as Tuck was wont to do. And then things had taken another sharp turn when his father announced he was selling Honey Hill Farm. That’s when the fighting started, the shouting matches we could hear all the way on our property. Two and a half years after Mariana’s death, Mr. Mattice moved to Florida and Tuck—almost eighteen—chose to stay in California with his uncle. He’d remained somewhat close to me, distance-wise, but it might have been a million miles away. Any friendship that had remained between us at the time was suddenly and completely over.

My hand dropped from where I’d been adjusting one of the false lash strips as Louisa came in the room, smiling at me. I pointed to the phone. My mom , I mouthed. She nodded, bringing a finger to her lips. Then, picking up the brush, she began running it through my hair.

My mother let out a shaky exhale as though for a moment, she too had traveled back and took in a stale breath of that sadness-tinged air. “Tuck didn’t only lose his mom, Em. He lost his home too, and his father as well.”

For a moment, I saw Tuck as he’d been. Quiet, angry, closed-off. I’d tried to be his friend, but he’d turned away from me completely. “He didn’t lose his home. His father made the choice to sell it and who could blame him? Everything in the area was changing and moving on. You know that, Mom.” I wasn’t trying to rub it in, but my mom and dad had been one of a handful of owners who had hung on for dear life to the orchards that were becoming a thing of the past in the San Fernando Valley, and instead of selling for top dollar and taking a profit, now they were barely making ends meet. In my estimation, it had been Mr. Mattice who’d made the wise choice at the right time. I’d offered to move my parents to LA more than once, but they’d consistently declined, preferring instead to hang on to a dying way of life. “And Tuck didn’t lose his father either,” I went on, a new energy to my words. “It was his bitterness that cost him that relationship. Tuck became a total asshole after Mariana died.” Louisa sprayed my hair and used the curling iron to form loose curls.

“Oh, Em. You’re being cold. It’s far more complicated than that, and you know it.”

I sighed, watching as Louisa moved quickly around my head, wielding the hot iron like the professional she was. My mom was right. Tuck had suffered a devastating life blow. But then he’d made choices that ruined his future, finally landing himself in prison. And that was on him.

I didn’t know all the details of the crime he committed, but I did know he’d been convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Each time I tried to picture him, I still saw a little kid grinning boyishly and squinting into the sun. I heard his laughter, remembered the delight I’d felt when all his attention was focused on me. That little boy was gone. He’d grown into a troubled man who’d committed a terrible crime that resulted in a human being’s life ending, even if Tuck didn’t intend for it to happen. He’d once been my best friend. Now he was a stranger, and frankly, that was fine.

I did hold some good memories, however, and because of that, I wished him well. “Okay, Mom,” I conceded, “you’re right, people do deserve second chances, but not as part of my security team, or any other for that matter. Is he even allowed to carry a weapon?”

Louisa picked up the can of hairspray and crop-dusted it over my head, shielding my face with her hand. I resisted the urge to sputter and cough.

“I thought you were against firearms,” my mom said. Louisa waved me off and I smiled, mouthing thank you , and headed for my closet.

“Well, I mean I don’t necessarily like guns, but I don’t make all the rules.” I unbelted my robe and let it drop to the floor, and then set the phone down on a shelf so I could slip on my dress as I spoke through the speaker. “My manager might insist that I have an armed bodyguard. There are a lot of loonies out there.”

“I thought you were the boss. Don’t you pay those people?”

I rolled my eyes. My mom didn’t get anything. “Yes, but I’m just the performer. I’m not the expert on every aspect of my career. I still need advisors , Mom.”

“But you don’t have to take every piece of advice they give. Tell them you’d prefer someone who’s strong, rather than armed. And you should see Tuck, honey. He’s so tall and broad. And he’s built like Thor, all muscle. He must have spent a considerable amount of time working out in the last six years.”

“Well what else was he gonna do?” I murmured.

“Again, cold, Em.”

My assistant, Destanie, pulled the door open, panic written all over her face. “Take that dress off,” she demanded. “Right now.”

“Who’s asking you to undress?” my mom asked.

“Hold on, Mom,” I said, taking her off speaker. “What is it?” I asked Destanie.

She held her phone to show me an Instagram post. “Layne Beckett is wearing that dress. Or close enough.” She rushed past me and started rifling through my dresses muttering, “I’m going to kill that bitch. I bet it got out that you were wearing an emerald green Ossie Francisco. Then she posts herself on Instagram wearing the exact same color dress? Trust me, it’s no coincidence. Oh no, she knew what she was doing. Look at that satisfied smirk on her face,” Destanie said, shoving the phone toward me before turning back to my collection of dresses. “She’s only dating Freddie Halston so she can show up everywhere you do.”

Layne Beckett was a singer, and Freddie Halston was an actor like my boyfriend, Charlie, so we did attend many of the same events, though I’d never formally met her. I wasn’t quite convinced she was so wrapped up in competing with me that she’d arranged her dating life around that effort, but the dress was a low blow. And from what I’d heard, it was exactly the type of thing she’d do. And so here I was, standing practically naked in my closet with only minutes to finish getting ready.

“Plan B,” Destanie was muttering as she ripped through my clothing rack. “Aha!” She pulled a red number out, holding it up. It was a gift from a newish designer that I’d forgotten about, still in the clear plastic garment bag it’d arrived in the month before. “Put it on,” she said. “The shoes will still work. I’m going to spike Layne’s drink with a laxative at the after-party,” she said over her shoulder, an evil tilt to her grin as she breezed away.

I let out a half-hearted laugh. She was kidding of course. The laugh died quickly in my throat. Wasn’t she?

I put my mom back on speaker and began unwrapping the red dress. “Sorry, Mom. Fashion disaster narrowly averted.”

“Oh my. Sounds serious,” she said. “By the way, where are you going? It’s late.” As if to prove it, she let out a loud yawn.

“To a premiere.” I began pulling the dress on. “This is when the nightlife starts in LA.”

Out in the living room, I heard a knock and then the loud buzz of multiple people entering my apartment. Charlie’s entourage.

“Nightlife,” my mom repeated as I slipped my foot into one spiked heel. “Nightlife here is when nature calls at three a.m.”

“Gross, Mom.”

My mom let out a tittering laugh, and Destanie popped her head around the corner, her gaze moving up and down my body before she gave the thumbs-up and gestured for me to hurry up.

I nodded to Destanie and then opened my mouth to ask my mom where exactly Tuck was sleeping but decided not to. He was probably in my old room, the one my mom and dad now used as a guest room. He was probably sleeping in my childhood bed. Which made me feel…weird. I pushed that hazy visual aside. “Hey, I’ve gotta go. Charlie’s here and a car’s waiting.”

“Tell Charlie I said hi. And please, please consider what I said. Tuck seems…lost. A second chance, Em. You have the power to give one, and I know you have the heart.”

“It’s not about heart, Mom.” It was about practicality. And safety, meaning not surrounding myself with dangerous criminals because my mom owed an old— dead —friend a favor. “But I’ll think about it,” I murmured as a knock sounded and Charlie leaned around the door.

“Thank you, Em. I love you.”

I gestured at Charlie, and he opened the door all the way, handsome in a classic black tux, his dark golden hair combed to the side. He grinned, showing me his megawatt smile.

“I love you too, Mom. Bye.”

I disconnected the call, smiling at Charlie. “Well, hello there. You look amazing.”

“So do you. Wow.”

I turned slightly, giving him a sultry look over my shoulder. “Will you zip me?”

“It’d be my pleasure.”

Charlie kissed my shoulder before pulling my zipper. I sucked in my breath as the dress came closed, groaning as the zipper moved slowly up my back and Charlie struggled to move it inch by inch. “Do you want to hold on to the bedpost like Scarlett O’Hara?”

“I don’t have a bedpost.” Or a corset. Unfortunately.

“Damn,” he said, working for a few more minutes before finally making a sound of victory in the back of his throat. “Got it!”

I turned slowly. It felt like my boobs were resting right under my chin, but by Charlie’s heated stare as his eyes hung on my—decidedly high—cleavage, I must look better than I felt.

“I guess I won’t be eating tonight.” I half laughed, half groaned.

He raised one brow as his eyes grazed my body. “Or sitting,” he said. “Or climbing stairs. Or… Can you breathe?”

“Barely.”

“Does it help to know you look drop-dead gorgeous?”

The only one who was at risk of dropping dead was me. A laugh bubbled up, but I swallowed it down. There wasn’t much room for that either. “It does,” I said. “Breathing is overrated anyway.”

Plus, Destanie would have a fit if I told her this dress wasn’t working. I linked arms with Charlie, pushed the door open, and then walked out into the main room to a loud chorus of oohs and ahhs. I grinned, batting my lashes, slipping far more effortlessly into my Nova persona than I had into the red dress.