Page 142 of No Holds Barred

“And if she agrees to do the show without you?” Logan asked.

“You’d have to ask her that. I haven’t talked to her about it. I honestly didn’t think about it being a possibility.” Hopescratched the back of her neck. This could be the biggest risk she took in her career.

“She has.”

“I know. But where Ange is a fatalist, I’m an optimist. And I don’t think you’re going to do her dirty over this, and I’m going to make sure of it.” Hope planted her feet on the floor. “It’s her and me, or you can find someone else. Because I’m not going to do this show without her.”

“Noted.”

Hope bit her lip, thoughts flying through her brain faster than a speeding bullet. “One more thing before I’d agree to any contract.”

If she was going to make demands, now was the time. She had no idea if any of her demands would be taken into consideration, but if there was one thing she’d learned in the last ten years in the show business, it was that opportunities typically came. All she had to do was figure out which ones she wanted to participate in and which ones she didn’t.

“What else can I do for you?”

“I know that I make more money than Ange. I know that my name was used to carry the show forward, and she does way more work forHotel Bombshellthan I do. Without her, the show wouldn’t exist or be what it is today. You can’t deny that.” Hope bounced her feet on her toes up and down as she let the nervous energy flow through her as freely as possible.

“I don’t deny it.” Logan sighed heavily. “There was a lot of discussion about that in the past few weeks, and just what she brings to the table.”

“Good. Then you’ve already got a list, and I don’t need to repeat one.” Hope smiled. This was going better than she planned, far easier than she anticipated. “She needs to earn as much as me, if not more.”

“Hope…” Logan trailed off on her name, and she knew exactly what kind of response she was about to get.

There’s no wiggle room in the budget.

It’s impossible.

Angelica can’t because of X, Y, and Z.

Hope could easily come up with those reasons, though Angelica would be better at it than she was. That fatalistic personality coming to haunt her again.

“I’m not going to argue about it, Logan. It either happens, or I don’t sign another contract. If you really want me back that badly, then you’ll find a way.” Hope settled. She’d said her piece, and that was enough. “Let me know when you hear anything about renewal. I’ll be interested to see what the network has to say about it.”

“You drive a hard bargain, Hope.”

“Well, I did learn from the best.” She laughed lightly, knowing that he’d understand what she was saying. It felt good to finally have that out in the open now, to be able to share freely with others what she felt, what she thought, and what she experienced.

“That you did. We’ll talk soon, Hope.”

“Yes, we will.”

Hope hung up, sauntered out into the living room, and sat on the couch with Eva, who snuggled up right next to her. She carded her fingers though Eva’s hair and stared at the television screen and whatever YouTube cartoon Eva had put on to entertain herself. It might not have been a day where she got answers, but it had been a good day. Hope had stood her ground.

And she’d made a decision.

She wanted Angelica in her life, and she was willing to go to the ends of the earth to make that happen.

They both deserved it.

Chapter

Forty-Five

“You’re a hard woman to catch.” Logan stepped into Angelica’s office and shut the door behind him.

She stared up at him curiously. They didn’t have a scheduled meeting. In fact, she had no scheduled meetings for the rest of the evening because she was supposed to head straight to Hope’s, despite the late hour. And it was already after nine in the evening.

“I have a lot of work to catch up on after being out filming.” She pointed to her desk which was still littered with papers. In the last week, she’d been struggling to find a rhythm that would still allow her some semblance of sanity. The desire to lock herself away in a room with Hope for hours and days was just too damn strong on a good day and on a bad day utterly distracting.