Love Me Sweet (A Bell Harbor Novel) (16 page)

Chapter 16

THE JUNGLE ROOM LOUNGE WAS
really just a hotel dining room with a ten-foot bar off to one side and a fifteen-foot-square dance floor in the center. There was a stage of sorts, a raised platform, maybe two feet off the ground, covered with royal-blue carpet. A piano sat to one side, and of course, there were the ubiquitous Elvis spottings. They were everywhere, bellied up to the salad bar, eating chicken wings, or posing for pictures with other hotel guests. Strains of “Blue Hawaii” could be heard over lulls in the conversations.

“So, I got a speck of bad news and I got two heaps of good news, fellas,” said the Paradise Brothers’ band manager when they were all seated around a table with drinks in their hands. Clark was a barrel-chested cowboy from the pointed toes of his black snakeskin boots to the top of the brown ten-gallon hat perched on the back of his head. Sissy, his wife, was a giggly little thing with long cleavage and a short attention span. Her enormous white-blonde hair was sprayed so stiff it looked like a plaster cast, but Delaney liked her instantly. It was impossible not to with all her
oh-sugar-this
and
God-bless-that
. Something about her Southern accent made everything she said sound entirely gracious. Even when she said, “My ex-sister-in-law is a gap-toothed, hump-backed, mercenary whore, God bless her little heart
.
”

“How about the bad news first,” Finch said to his manager, twin frown lines meeting up between his eyebrows.

Clark adjusted that enormous hat. There must be a lot of head room in whatever car he and his wife drove. “Well, it seems the Blues City Café where I had you boys booked just had a frozen water pipe burst. Place is shut down while they make repairs.”

Disappointment spread around the table.

“Oh, but don’t you boys worry, ya hear?” Sissy chimed in, waggling her red-lacquered fingernails at the group. “Sugar bear here has everything all worked out. You tell ’em, honey. Go on.”

“I do. I do indeed. That’s where the good news comes in. Seems that the band hired by this here hotel has been waylaid up north by the same storm that’s freezing pipes down here. I tell you, this weather is about as welcome as a two-dollar whore in church. Anyway, I figured, them being in need of a band, and y’all being in need of a venue, whah-lah! Goes together like country music and a pickup truck.”

“You want us to play here?” Humphrey asked.

“Right here in this very room.” Clark nodded and took a big chug of beer.

Finch looked around, squinting, and Delaney understood his concern. The acoustics would be lousy in a room like this, and they’d have to play unplugged or all that framed Elvis artwork would rattle right off the walls.

Clark tipped his hat back a little farther with the lip of his bottle. “It’s better than nothing at all. Just a couple of nights, anyway. Plus they pay almost as much as the other place, and they’re gonna comp us the rooms, and all our food’s included. So eat up, boys. You got a show to do tomorrow.”

Finch looked around at his brother and bandmates.

“We don’t have to dress like Elvis, do we?” Humphrey asked.

“Do they cover booze?” Reggie asked at the same time.

Clark shook his head. “No to dressing like the King, and no to the booze. If you want free drinks you’ll have to flirt with the waitresses. Knowing you horny devils, you’d have done that anyway. So, we all good here?”

The Paradise Brothers exchanged another round of glances before Finch finally nodded. “We’re in. Let’s eat.”

They ordered ribs, catfish, cornbread, and several more drinks, and passed the time swapping stories with Delaney managing to avoid giving anything but the vaguest of answers. Sissy here was exactly the type to watch a show like
Pop Rocks
. One word about making soap or even the names of her sisters and this woman could be on to her.

“So where did you say y’all are from?” Sissy asked, licking barbecue sauce off her thumb as she ate a french fry.

“Grant and I have a house up in Michigan,” Delaney answered. That was true. They did. Sort of.

“Really? ’Cause you look sort of familiar to me. You ever done any modeling?”

Delaney’s dismissive chuckle ended in a hiccup. “Me? Oh, gosh no. I was a bank teller.” Shit. Maybe she should have said travel agent? She glanced at Grant from the corner of her eye, but fortunately he seemed to be engrossed in something Humphrey was telling him. Just to be safe, she added, “Um, a bank teller in college, I mean.”

Sissy’s penciled-on eyebrows rose. “A bank teller? With a body like yours? What a waste.”

“Hey, speaking of bodies,” Finch interrupted, “Elaine here could use some clothes. Did you bring anything extra she might borrow? Not that Humphrey doesn’t enjoy having her in his pants.”

Clark chortled loudly and tapped his hand against the table. “Anything extra? What do you think, Fincher? My little missus here brought enough clothes to change her outfits six times a day.”

Sissy tilted her shellacked head from side to side and smiled like Miss America. “Y’all didn’t marry me because I was so smart, Clark Doolittle. You married me because of how I fill out a sweater, so don’t you go giving me grief now about wanting to look pretty for you.”

He leaned over and kissed her cheek with a big, juicy smack. “Damn straight, doll. First time I set my eyes on this lady I knew she was the one for me. Pretty as the day is long. And I knew she was smart too, on account of when I asked for a dance, she said yes.”

All the band members smiled blandly and nodded at the insipid cuteness of a story they’d obviously heard before. Meanwhile, Delaney felt Grant’s hand slide down her thigh. The touch was light on her leg, but deliberate enough to set off firecrackers in the sensitive spot right between them. She bit her lip and moved a little in her chair to ease that unexpected tremor. A sharp inhale of breath came from his direction, then that naughty dog dared to move his fingertips closer to the source, moving his hand back up. Delaney let out a gasp of shocked laughter.

Everyone looked at her and she felt the heat blossom on her cheeks. “That’s . . . why, that’s just such a romantic story.”

Sissy squinted her eyes and took a sip of her champagne cocktail. “How did you two meet?”

How did we meet?
Delaney looked at Grant. Her mouth wouldn’t quite work just then, which was probably a good thing, because her brain had shut off the minute his hand hit her lap. A slow, lazy smile tilted up the corners of his lips as he stared at her instead of Sissy.

“Oh, I’d say our first meeting was similar to that,” Grant said. “Elaine walked in the room and took me completely by surprise. In fact, she took one good look at me, I looked back at her, and damn, she nearly blew me away.”

Blew him away? Oh, that’s right. With a blow-dryer. Clever bastard. His smile heated up, and she felt it from her toes to her scalp and every delicious detour in between. Damn it. How was she supposed to
not
have sex with him when he looked at her like that?

“Is that how you remember it, Lane?” he asked.

“Pretty much,” she said softly.

No one said a word for the space of a heartbeat, and Delaney didn’t even realize she and Grant were gazing at each other like moony-eyed teens until Reggie raised his arm and called out, “Check please!”

“Well, ain’t that cute,” Sissy said, wiping her hands on a napkin. “Let’s you and I head on up to my room now, Elaine, and I’ll see if I have any outfits that fit you. We could stop in the gift shop too, for a few things. You boys stay here and finish your drinks and let us have some girl time.”

A ringtone sounded as Sissy stood up, and everyone shifted around, going for their phones.

“I think that’s mine,” Grant said, pulling his hand from Delaney’s lap and taking the phone from his pocket. He glanced at the screen, then handed it to her, his gaze intense.

“It’s your sister.”

“Where the hell are you?” Melody said as soon as Delaney answered. “Are you in Memphis yet?”

Delaney had jumped up from the table as fast as she could and practically sprinted into the hallway outside the lounge. “We just got here about an hour ago. Sorry, I didn’t have a chance to call you yet.”

“Well, don’t scare me like that! God! I had no idea where you were, and then the police called. Lane, it’s all over the entertainment news.”

“What? What is?” Dizzy time struck, and she tipped against the wall for support, then realized she was pressed against Elvis ’69 and had to move. She sat down on an oversized planter instead.

“The police found some old abandoned car on the side of the road that was supposedly registered to you, but of course we told them it couldn’t possibly be yours because you wouldn’t be caught dead in a piece of shit Volkswagen. Then a while later, I started to freak out a little bit, thinking maybe this Grant guy
had
killed you and maybe you
were
caught dead in a piece of shit Volkswagen! I couldn’t help it, Lane. I had to tell Mom and Dad. I know you didn’t want me to, but honest to God, if you don’t tell me what the fuck is going on I’m going to find you just so I can kill you myself.”

Grant came around the corner and touched her shoulder. “Everything all right?”

Delaney nodded and tried to smile as if everything was hunky-dory, although what she really needed to do was put her head between her knees and hyperventilate. She held up a hand. “Just a little . . . family drama. I’ll be back in a sec.” Hiccup.

She stood up and wobbled farther down the hall, past a super-fat Elvis, a super-hairy Elvis, and an Asian Elvis in six-inch platform shoes.

“OK, explain this to me again,” Delaney said to her sister. “What exactly is being reported on the news?” Hiccup.

“They’re saying that you’re missing, and that your family has no idea where you are. You need to come home now, Lane. The longer this goes on, the bigger the story gets. Mom and Dad want to know if you’re OK. They’ve already called our lawyer, and they hired a publicist.”

Delaney nearly laughed at that. Or she would have if she could breathe. They’d tried to hire a spin doctor as soon as Boyd’s video surfaced but Delaney had thought she could work this out on her own. She’d thought a little break from the spotlight would be all it took for this story to go away. Obviously that wasn’t the case. And now that the police and lawyers were involved? Fuck.

“Which lawyer did they call?” she asked, pressing a thumb to her lip.

“Tony, I think.”

“All right. First, tell Mom and Dad I’m fine, because I am. Then tell Tony to call the police and tell
them
I’m fine. He can play the lawyer confidentiality card or whatever, but I want to make sure the police understand I’m not missing. I’m hiding, but that’s not a crime. And as far as the publicist goes? God, I don’t know. Maybe she should make a statement that the car belonged to a different Delaney Masterson or something. There must be more than one of us around.”

“You are freaking me out right now.”

“I’m not trying to, but you guys are all overreacting. The truth is I can’t do anything about this right now. If I call the police, they’re going to want to ask me a bunch of questions, and I’m not in a position to talk to them at the moment. If I do, Grant and his family will get dragged into this too, and there will be no way to keep the whole mess from the paparazzi. They’ll end up in the news right alongside me, and I will look like an even bigger fool than I did with just the
sex tape
.”

She’d meant to lower her voice when she said
sex tape
but apparently she’d only made it slightly more strident.

Asian Elvis lowered his gold sunglasses and stared at her above the rim. Note to self: never say
sex tape
in a crowded hotel lobby.

“Why can’t you just get on a frickin’ airplane and come home?”

“Because I don’t have any money! Or my wallet, or my ID, Melody. All that stuff got stolen with my phone, so I couldn’t book a flight and get on a plane even if I wanted to.”

“Everything got stolen?” Alarm bells were sounding but Delaney was determined to curtail the drama.