Page 4 of Under the Table

“You’d do best to remember that,” Angelica answered, taking another sip from her whiskey. She savored the flavor on the tip of her tongue as she swallowed. This was going to be a long season of filming. But she’d come out the other end. She was sure of it and of herself.

“So what now?”

“Did Rex get his call yet?” Angelica set the glass down a little more heavily than she expected and the sound ricocheted through the room like a gunshot.

“He’s on the phone with Josef now.” Hope suddenly sounded far more alert than before. Reminding her of Rex had been a good idea then. Angelica would have to keep that one in her pocket in the future.

“I’ll let him share the happy news with you then.” Angelica rolled her shoulders and walked toward the window. Los Angeles was lit up at night, hardly darker than it was during the day. She stared out across the city and frowned.

Hope wasn’t that far away from her, and yet it felt like they were worlds apart.

“Happy?” Hope sounded confused now.

But Angelica wasn’t going to put her out of her misery. They needed to keep whatever was between them as professional as possible, even if Angelica had to be the one to put those boundaries into place. She’d made a mistake when she’d let her guard down all those months ago, and now they were thrown back in a situation they never thought they’d be in.

Those kisses hadn’t been for a relationship, and Angelica had touched Hope with the full understanding that they would never see each other again and never work together again.

And yet…

“I’ll see you soon, Hope.”

Here they were.

Hotel Bombshellseason two loomed at their fingertips.

With that Angelica hung up.

Chapter

Two

“Lyric!” Hope gripped tightly onto her purse and wrapped her arms around the much shorter butch woman. She squeezed her tightly and closed her eyes, just breathing in her scent. She hadn’t expected this, the coming back together of cast and crew for the second season to begin with moments quite like this.

A homecoming she hadn’t anticipated.

But that’s exactly what this was. She should have expected it, really. She had it with her own little morning show that she filmed. But Lyric had been one of her constants during the last season, a rock and a comfort as they’d traveled all over the country filming, and now here she was! Standing on Hope’s front steps and wrapping her arms around Hope’s back.

“I told Ms. Shields that I wanted to pick you up today even though it was going to be a scheduling nightmare.”

“I’m so glad you did,” Hope whispered, squeezing her tightly one more time before she slid out of Lyric’s grasp. “I can’t believe we got renewed, and there was so little time to prepare for anything. At least it feels that way.”

Lyric’s cheeks pinked. “Ms. Shields has been putting in the extra hours to prove just how short the prep time has been this go around.”

Hope paused. She wanted to ask a question, but she wasn’t entirely sure how to say it without tipping Lyric off to the fact that she hadn’t actually spoken to Angelica. Not since that panicked phone call when the renewal information was being spread through the cast and crew.

“Is she going to be at the photo shoot today?”

“Eventually,” Lyric answered, turning toward the car she had driven. “But she had a few things she needed to finish up first, so you’ll probably be done before she gets to the studio.”

Right. Avoid each other. She shouldn’t have expected anything less from Angelica. Hope bit the inside of her cheek to keep those comments inside and not say them out loud. It wasn’t just that they had to maintain a distance between them, they also had to make it seem as though nothing had ever happened at the end of last season.

And that was going to be the hard thing.

“Where’s Eva?”

“Oh.” Hope glanced back inside the house. “She’s with the nanny at the zoo today.”

“Aww, I miss that rascal. I’ll have to catch up with her next time.” Lyric put her hand on the door and then paused. “Front or back?”