Page 11 of Sandbar Summer (Summer Cottage #3)

Chapter Eight

Goldie

Goldie showered, changed, discovered there was no laundry service, and started to question everything about this plan to hide in Irish Hills.

She needed to get her phone charged first off.

She had zero bars, and the battery thing was red. Normally, Tally did this, the tech stuff. Before Tally, there was her assistant Dylan, and before Dylan, it was Kara. She’d had a personal assistant going on twenty-five years. But a lot of good that did her while hiding out in Irish Hills.

The primary occupation of Goldie Hayes had been her occupation. She had someone for everything from laundry to technology to drive her where she needed to go.

She walked around the main floor of Two Lakes. She found an outlet in the main sitting room and plugged in her phone.

The view caught her attention. She marveled again at how pretty this spot was. With these rooms, a place this size, on water, could easily be ten million bucks somewhere chic.

But here, in the Midwest, who knew what real estate like this went for?

Goldie continued to explore the first floor. Off the kitchen, there was a huge pantry. The shelves contained a few food items. Did she need to buy food?

She decided against that. She’d order takeout or something. If she was going to stay much longer, maybe she’d look into getting a chef.

Scratch that. She wasn’t staying long. This hideout was temporary.

She could take care of her basic needs for a few days.

It wasn’t that she couldn’t do things for herself.

It was that she didn’t have to. She had a pile of mucky clothes to launder while her phone charged.

After that, start making some calls to find a new agent.

You couldn’t go it alone in L.A. without a shark on your side. She needed a shark.

To the left of the pantry, another door revealed a laundry room.

It was large, old-fashioned looking, and smelled funny.

Like bleach and Tide mixed in with mold.

The appliances were harvest gold, actual harvest gold.

In L.A., they’d call these vintage. Here, probably they were just old, but there were two washers and two dryers.

They were probably doing a ton of laundry here back when they were booked solid.

“Okay! Now we’re talking.”

Goldie rounded up her sopping wet clothes from this morning and put them in the washer.

At home, she did not operate her washer.

All she knew was that it was a computer, just like everything else.

There was a panel that controlled everything, and it looked like it could also launch the space shuttle.

“Ah, you’re old school. Thank goodness.”

Goldie put her clothes in, set the dial to small load, cold, and dropped in a cup of the nearby powdered detergent.

She hit start. And boom, one thing accomplished.

Back when she was a kid, it was her job to wash all the linens in the cottages. Sunday, they’d pick up all the linens, get the wash started, and she’d help her parents clean before the next set of guests would arrive. She remembered it was a quick turnaround.

She also remembered thinking, as a girl, that the moment she could hire a maid when she was famous and a movie star, that was the first thing she’d do. Movie stars didn’t do laundry or change bed sheets!

Sure, if pressed, she could still make a crisp-looking bed.

But she was rarely pressed these days.

Goldie had hired a housekeeper first, and then a driver, and then an assistant.

Because of them, Goldie’s home was meticulously cared for. She didn’t have time for it. She had deals to make, hair to get electrified off, red carpets to walk, and lines to learn. Her priority was always her career.

Goldie walked back out to the sitting room and checked her phone. It wasn’t fully charged, but there was enough to make the call.

“Auntie Goldie! Oh, my goodness, the news, it's nuts.”

“Well, hello, are you sure you want to talk to the evil witch who brought down the Victor Superhero Universe?”

“I do. Mom and I have been worried about you.”

“Tell your mom I’m fine. I’m in hiding. How is your mom?”

“You know, eyeballs deep in the color of the sky at dawn in July, in Montauk.”

“Ah, sure, I know it well.”

“She can get distracted by color palettes, and I’m like, hello! Can we get back to designing?”

“Ah, it’s her process. I’m glad you’re there to drive the bus when needed.”

“So, hiding out. Is it that serious?”

“I had a water bottle come at me at a high rate of speed, and Trevor Sunday’s minions are bent on making my life in L.A. miserable right now. But it will pass. They’ll get over this movie delay and start obsessing about some other stupid thing.”

“According to Twitter, you’re unhinged, but those that love you know the truth. Never fear.”

“Oh, except today, in my super-secret lair, I lost it completely when I ruined my best walking shoes.”

“I hope it wasn’t serious.”

“They were five-hundred-dollar shoes!”

“So, very serious. Got it.”

“Look, I just wanted to check-in. Tell your mom I’m good. I love you both.”

“Love you too, Aunt Goldie.”

“Good luck helping your mom capture the color of the sky at dawn.”

“In Montauk, don’t forget, the color is Montauk specific.”

“Got it. Talk to you soon.”

“Take care!”

Goldie hung up the phone. It was good to let them know she was okay; hiding out, yes, but okay.

Goldie sacrificed everything for her career, happily.

But one sacrifice had been the hardest, even though it had no doubt been the best.

Goldie

1999

By the last week of filming on Tenured, everyone on the crew had Oscar dreams in their heads.

From the very first day of shooting, the dailies were getting raves from the studio execs.

The movie was based on the book, and even the author had given thumbs up to the work they were doing.

Goldie played the free spirit, the troubled young woman in need of a ride to California.

Dustin Toms was the lead. He was playing the grizzled old professor who, after the death of his wife, embarks on a cross-country trip.

He gives Goldie’s character a ride, and they fall into a romance. Dustin was playing older against his normal action star type. They’d let his hair go gray at the temples for this.

America was used to seeing Dustin Toms in a totally different way, but for Tenured, he would be a revelation. That’s what the studio was saying. That was what Goldie could see each day they filmed.

Goldie and Dustin had chemistry, and it wasn’t an act.

The long shoot, in dozens of locations across the country, had pushed Dustin and Goldie together.

There weren’t any five-star hotels in South Dakota where they shot for ten days.

They were in hotels, dive restaurants, and in the middle of nowhere, just like their two characters.

Eventually, the on screen chemistry turned into a kiss, and the kiss turned into a passionate affair.

It was a dangerous path, Goldie knew, but she found herself in love with Dustin Toms. The real Dustin, not the one the public knew.

They had a secret between them, and it made the scenes they filmed that much more electric. Her agent told her the studio was talking Oscar buzz for them both.

But Dustin Toms was married. Famously married. It was easy to forget in South Dakota, away from the spotlight. Heck, away from decent phone service. It was also easy for Dustin to minimize when Goldie expressed her worries.

The problem of Dustin’s wife, an actress turned talk show host, wasn’t a problem, Dustin insisted.

“It’s been a sham for three years. She just doesn’t want me to announce a divorce during sweeps, but it is over. It’s just paperwork at this point.”

The things you’ll believe when you want them to be true. She believed Dustin. It was a piece of paper, a business arrangement between Dustin and his wife. Nothing more.

The location shoot had taken three months. The affair ignited almost immediately.

It had been an amazing experience. Creatively, Goldie knew she was turning into something more than the typical ingenue character.

She knew Dustin was, too, bringing something special to this story.

They were creating art. She felt it. This was the first time she believed that about one of her roles.

But the last week of shooting, the director commented on her figure. She was used to that in her business. This comment wasn’t out of the ordinary, but it did get her thinking.

“Wow, your rack looks great in this. Wardrobe should have had this top for you the entire shoot.”

Sexist comments were normal. She was a puppet, after all, in someone else’s puppet show. That was the price of the job. The more famous she got, the more it appeared the directors wanted to be sure to show her she was nothing but a pretty face and hot body. No matter how high her star rose.

She could ignore comments easily enough. Really easily, since her career was going like gangbusters, and she was in love with a movie star she used to dream about as a kid.

It was her fantasies come to life on the set of Tenured.

But that comment about her chest did make her look at herself more closely in the full-length mirror of the wardrobe trailer.

She was decidedly bustier all of a sudden.

And then she did the math and realized why.

Her life was about to get one more glorious step toward a fairy tale come true!

She was going to have Dustin Tom's baby!

Goldie

Present Day

Goldie’s walk down memory lane was interrupted by water all over the floor.

The area rug was soaked.

“What the heck?”

Then she heard the spraying. She made her way to the laundry room, and a hose was flinging around wildly as though it was a snake.

“Oh, man!”

Goldie put her hands up as the spray shot water directly into her face.

She screamed and tried to figure out what to do. What had she done wrong?

She opened her eyes, wiped the water from them, and took a step back from the laundry room. She had to fix this. The water was getting everywhere!