Not So Snow White (16 page)

So she bit her tongue and let the conversation continue, although admittedly she wasn't quite as amused by it all any longer.

"You'll only have to tolerate my existence for a few weeks or until she's out of the tournament. I don't see the big deal."

"The big deal is that she told an interviewer about you today."

Now Tess crossed the room, her expression instantly all business. "She did what?"

"That's what I came here to tell you."

"What exactly did she say, dear?" Aurora asked, quite concerned.
Her
plans had barely started to come together, and now this.

Max raked his hand through his hair, let out a breath. "Before the interview, she was telling me about her plan to have Tess coach her during Wimbledon."

"Mentor," Tess put in immediately. "I'm just a mentor."

Both Aurora and Max ignored her.

"And your response was?" Aurora asked him.

"I wasn't happy about it, which you all obviously knew or you wouldn't have been sneaking around behind my back all week."

"We didn't 'sneak,'
" Tess shot back. "We merely avoided confrontation. Besides, you gave Aurora carte blanche to help Gaby and you knew I was talking with her. So don't get your tighty whiteys in a knot."

"Now, now," Aurora said, stepping in. Maybe she'd been wrong to think the agitation between these two was really just an overload of chemistry trying to sort its way out. For once, she really wished Vivian were here. She'd toss out a few clever double entendres and the tension in the room would either dissipate, or implode. Either way they'd have their answer. Holding out a slender thread of hope that all her carefully initiated plans hadn't been dashed, she said, "Did she tell the interviewer Tess was coaching her? What exactly did she say?"

"Yes," Tess chimed, "what exactly did she say? And what did you say to goad her into such a rash decision?"

"Me?" Max said, eyebrows leaping in defense. "I stated my concerns with her plan—calmly and rationally—then told her I'd think about it."

Tess rolled her eyes. "Which meant you were against it."

"Which meant I'd think about it," he reiterated.

Aurora saw the tic surface once again in his clenched jaw. He really had quite an attractive profile. Privately, with all those sparks shooting from his dark
eyes?
She thought he was quite something. If she'd been a few decades younger
…
well, no point in going there.

"Not to a teenager, trust me. She did what she thought she had to do in order to get what she knew she needed to have going into this tournament. She was only doing what had to be done because you're too stubborn and overprotective to see it yourself."

Aurora snapped back to the matter at hand. "There is no point in bickering over this. What's done is done," she said calmly. "Now we have to determine what the result of this interview will likely be. When is it being printed?"

"Originally it was slated to run Monday, the first day of the tournament. But no way is she holding back. S
he thinks we're talking to other
journalists right now, so I know—"

"Why would you tell her that?" Tess asked, incredulous. "Of course she'll rush to press with it, if they don't sell it to some other media outlet first. All they need is some film of her and—" She stopped, and both she and Aurora looked at Max's expression. "No, you didn't. You let her take pictures? Film? My God, Max, why not just hand her the story on a silver platter?"

"It was too late then," he told them. "The story was out. I had to get her out of there before she said anything else, which is why I told her we had another interview. It doesn't matter. I'm betting it'll be all over the place by tomorrow."

"Hell, tonight's news, most likely
,"
Tess exclaimed. "At this point every broadcast is pretty much all Wimbledon, all the time. It's the freaking Super Bowl over here. Something I don't have to tell you about." Suddenly she laughed, but there was a caustic edge to it.

"What could be funny about this?"

"Nothing, really. It's just that here you are all worried about my supposed impact on all this and who goes and screws it all up and leaks it to the press? You."

"I didn't say anything, Gaby sabotaged—" He broke off, pinched his fingers on the bridge of his nose. "This isn't getting us anywhere." He looked up, his expression set in stone. "Regardless of who said what to who—"

"Whom," Tess supplied, with an ever-so-helpful smile.

Max's jaw was clenched so tight, Aurora was surprised his molars weren't ground into dust. "Whatever. What matters is that your presence in her life, no matter your intentio
n, is about to get her dragged r
ight into the sticky hands of the media hounds. Right before the toughest first-round match of her life."

"Listen,
"
Tess broke in. "There will be other grand slams, there will be other Wimbledons in her future. If you're so freaked out by all this, then yank her from the tournament."

He said nothing.

"We both know Gaby can handle this. We also both know, at least if one of us would be willing to be honest with himself, that she is going to be a superstar, with or without my help. She will be facing this type of intense media scrutiny for a very long time. And of course it never starts at a 'good time,' if there is such a thing, because if she was playing the Dubai Open in the middle of freaking nowhere, and I was hanging around, no one would give a flat damn. It's only because it is Wimbledon, because it's a grand-slam event, that anyone cares. Whenever she hit the spotlight, for whatever reason she hit it, it wasn't going to be when no one was watching. It's only newsworthy when a lot of people care. So why don't you just accept the fact that now is her time and try and figure out how to use this to your best advantage." She stalked back over to the bar and made herself another drink. "And if there is anyone around here who knows a little something about how to do just that, it's yours truly."

Aurora waited a beat, let the tension in the room shift from a boil to a slow simmer, then said, "I'm sure we can do just that. And because I'm fully part of this endeavor, I want you to know you have the full power of Glass Slipper behind you. Whatever we can do." She paused then and brightened considerably as part of the solution came to her. "One thing we can do is move you and Gaby out of that hotel and move you in here. Sir Robin would love to have more company, I can assure you, and you'll have complete privacy and a private court."

Tess didn't say anything right away, but she didn't look immediately thrilled with the solution. She was probably tom between giving Gaby the privacy she needed and having Max underfoot for the next few weeks. Well, it was a big house, a very big house. All of them could retreat to their own wings, if necessary. For Aurora's part, she was quite pleased with that unexpected little bonus. If they had to be in each other's way every day, maybe they could get past this silly antagonism and see what was becoming quite plainly apparent. Well, it was to her, anyway.

"That's a very generous offer, Aurora," Max said, sounding mostly sincere. "But I doubt Sir Robin would be thrilled with the idea of media stomping around his gates and fences, or worse, camping out."

"Are you kidding?" Aurora laughed. "You don't know him like I do. I'll be surprised if he doesn't change his plans and jet home just to be part of the excitement. He'll be tickled to play a role in subverting the press in any way. Trust me on this." She laid a hand on Max's arm. "But, of course, I will run this by him, just to be certain. You can speak with him yourself if it would make you feel any better." She turned and walked to an intercom unit that was tucked next to the service dolly and pressed a button. "Phillip, could you be a dear and call over to Glass Slipper for me? I'll need a car sent to the Fontaines' hotel." She
looked at Max. "Would an hour give you enough time to pack? I think it's best we move quickly, on the off chance Tess is right and they do run this sto
r
y on the evening news.''

Max just sighed. Tess downed the rest of her drink.

Au
ror
a
took that as a yes. "In an hour, Phillip. Thank you, darling." She looked at her two houseguests and beamed. "Don't be such worrywarts. It'll all turn out splendidly." She slid her arm through Max's and ushered him to the door. "You best head out and get to Gaby. You can pack all your suitcases into the
li
mo and bring your car, or better yet, why don't I have the limo sent here and you can just leave your car here. Stay completely under the radar. We can spirit you in the back way and—"

Max waved a hand. "Aurora, please, I don't think we need to go to quite those lengths; It's not like she's Elvis or something. I'll be fine. And while I appreciate your offer, I really think—"

Finally Tess spoke up. "
J
ust do what she says so we can all have some peace, okay? And to be honest, she's probably right, Let's err on the side of caution here. For all our sakes. Especially Gaby's." She walked to the parlor doors and opened them.

"I'll have chef prepare us a lovely dinner," Aurora added. "We can discuss how we should handle this, come up with a game plan, as it were. Then get a good night's rest and be ready to tackle the day tomorrow."

Max looked at them both, then finally blew out a long breath. "Fine. At least for now." He leaned down and kissed Aurora's cheek. "Thank you. I'm sorry for all this."

"No need to apologize, dear. We do what we need to for friends."

As he passed through the parlor door, Tess called out from behind him. "And to think, now Gaby will have access to me twenty-four-seven."

"Tess," Aurora hissed, reprovingly. She loved the girl dearly, but she did have a little problem with impulse control.

Max just kept on walking to the front doors.

"Just one big happy family," Tess went on, trailing out behind him.

Aurora stepped to the open doorway, unsure whether to s
hake her head in exasperation…
or pat herself on the back. Tess just couldn't leave the poor man alone. And it made her wonder why. It wasn't that she didn't know how to go after a man. Lord knows she'd plucked them like grapes off a vine over the years. When she saw something she wanted, she just went after it. She was a lot like Vivian in that way.

Aurora folded her arms and leaned on the doorframe, observing the little ritual mating dance unfolding in front of her. Wondering why Tess didn't just take what she wanted this time. What was it about Max that was so different it had her behaving like something of a fifth-grade boy who tossed out taunts to the girl he had a crush on because he didn't know how to handle what he was feeling?

And that's when it hit her. Tess knew all about stalking her prey, but it occurred to her that, this time, Tess had no real idea what to do with a man like Max, who was so different from her usual conquests. And connected, as well, to a teenager that Tess was coming to care about, no matter what she said. In fact, it was her immediate insistence on diminishing that role—mentor instead of coach—that gave her away
.
Much like her constant baiting of Max was giving something else away entirely. Even though she'd bet money Tess wasn't quite aware of it.

Yet.

C
ha
pter
1
3

"
Y
ou know something else?" Tess followed Max into the foyer.

Max ignored her and kept on his straight-arrow path to the front door. "Straight arrow" being the key phrase there, she thought. He was so damn exasperating.

For whatever reason, probably because she just couldn't resist the challenge of trying to direct that straight arrow off course a little, she didn't say what she'd been about to, which was that Gaby needed a female influence in her life, and that time spent with someone as maternal as Aurora would be a good thing for her right now.

No, instead her mouth opened and what came out was,
"A.
s I
noted earlier, for being such a tight ass, yours really is quite fine."

Max paused at the door,
his shoulders were so tense she half-expected him to just rap his forehead straight on the mahogany panels. "You might want to take all this a bit more seriously." Without looking at her, he gripped the doorknob and slowly turned it.

"You worry too much. We'll handle the press. Hey, who knows, I'm yesterday's news now that I'm retired. We might have blown this way out of proportion."

"You didn't see Fionula's face light up like a shark at feeding time."

" 'Fionula'?" Tess swallowed the string of curse words, "As in Fionula Hust?"

"The very one."

"J
esus," she muttered under her breath, but quickly recouped. "Well, look at it this way, if Gaby's goal was to put this out there in a big way, she picked the right mouthpiece. Key word there being 'mouth.'
"

He turned a little then, looked at her over his shoulder. "My point all along."

Tess shrugged off the pointed insult. She was too busy mentally scrambling, considering all the possible ways tomorrow was likely to play out. Fionula had been a major t
horn in her side during her lat
er years on tour. When she'd been busting her ass to come back after her first couple shoulder surgeries, Ms. Hust liked nothing more than to write opinion pieces on how she should just accept that her career was over, take her titles and big paychecks and go home. Maybe Tess should have thanked her. It was largely op-ed pieces like hers that had kept Tess focused through physical therapy and driven her to return to tour in better shape than when she'd left it.

She doubted Fionula was going to be kind to her now, which meant this wasn't going to be fun for Gaby. She'd just have to do what she could to minimize the fallout. But she'd be lying if she said she hadn't already started thinking how she could play this to her advantage. She'd been trying to get press since landing at Heathrow. Here was her perfect opportunity. She wouldn't throw Gaby to the wolves, but then, Gaby had pretty much made that decision. She was old enough to start learning the
hard lessons of reaping the seeds she sowed. Tess was the first to admit she'd done some stupid things in her life, but she'd always owned up to them.

"We'll get through the next couple of weeks," she told him, then raised her hand as if taking a pledge. "I'll help her through this. I know you don't want to hear it, but I'm good at this."

"Fo
r
all the wrong reasons."

"Hey, I wasn't the one shooting my mouth off in the interview today."

Max's jaw flexed. You know, he really had a decent profile. She caught herself wondering what she could say to make him smile. He'd looked pretty damn hot that one time she'd caught him at it.

Shaking that thought off, she said, "She's going to shoot her mouth off, Max. She would whether she ever met me. It's who she is. You know it, I know it. Hell, if anyone was going to influence that out of her, it would have been you. And you've had years to give it a shot."

"A running battle, to be sure. Which is why I don't need you coming in here and giving her any ideas. You're right, I have my hands quite full as it is, thanks."

Tess laughed. "I don't think she needs my help with ideas. She seems to be doing just fine on her own."

Max scowled. "You don't have to look so damn—"

"Proud of her? I wouldn't go that far. But if she operates on the idea that she wants to have a hand in what's said about her, then now is her opportunity to learn how to handle the results of her little bait-throwing expedition."

So much for getting a smile out of him. She wondered if he ever eased up. And she thought she was stressed out. Sheesh.

He'd shifted and was looking at her directly now. "Something tells me having the two of you under the same roof is going to make that damn near impossible."

"Such a pessimist." She couldn't have said what made her do it. The tension screaming between them every time they got within spitting distance of each other was hardly sexual in nature. But all of a sudden, or maybe not so sudden, she wasn't looking at him as Gaby's older brother, stick in the mu
d, thorn in her side. She was…
well, she wasn't quite sure what she was doing. But whatever it was, it made her take a step closer. Mostly, she told herself, just to see what he'd do about it.

Surprisingly, Max held his ground. She knew he had an edge, but perhaps she hadn't given him quite enough credit for it. Because in that little instant of time where she had t
o decide whether to back down…
or go into her tried-and-true mantrap mode, she seriously considered the former. Which wasn't like her at all. The hard truth was, she wasn't a hundred percent certain she could pull it off. It was a rare thing for her, that uncertainty.

But when had she ever backed down from a challenge?

"I'm beginning to wonder about something," she said, purposely dropping her voice to something closer to a husky whisper.

"Which would be?" he asked evenly. He held her gaze rather easily.

Hmm. The surprises kept coming. But he might as well have waved a red flag in front of her. No longer thinking about Gaby, or her own greater good, her focus had zeroed in on one thing and one thing only. She shifted an incremental step closer. "Are you more worried about my negative influence on sweet, young Gaby?" Another incremental shift and she was almost breathing the same air he was. He was taller than her own five-eleven, which was nice, she found herself thinking. Really nice. She reac
hed up and toyed with the collar
of his polo shirt. "Or are you more worried about my possible negative influence on terse, not-so-naive you?
"

Without breaking their gaze, he took her hand and moved it away from his collar. "Do
n't be mistaken. Only one member
of the Fontaine family is starstruck."

"That's not exactly what I asked."

Shockingly, his mouth twitched the tiniest bit. "I know." Then he let himself out the front door and shut it abruptly between them.

Tess stood there, mouth hanging open, before turning and leaning back against the door. She let out a short laugh. "Dammit." Who knew he had such an exit in him? "Point to the tight ass."

She glanced up to find Aurora standing in the parlor doorway, arms folded over her flowing caftan, a knowing smile beaming from her expertly made-up face.

"What?"

"Don't give me that innocent look," Aurora said.

Tess merely smiled. "Yeah, I guess it's been a few years since I could pull that off." She could see Aurora was ready to pounce on her little interaction with Max—wasn't it just her luck she'd had a witness?—and she wasn't about to let her. Hell, Tess didn't even know what had just gone on there. She clapped her hands together. "I guess we'd better prepare for our guests."

"Don't worry, dear. I'll take care of that. Is there anything we should do to try and counter Fionula's interview? What do you think she's going to do with it?"

"Well, no one knows I'm staying here, so moving Gaby here tonight is. a good move. The story will break tomorrow morning when the papers come out. She writes for
Good Day
and they have no direct media outlet."

"You seemed concerned earlier that it might go that way."

"With her, you never know. If I was still an active player, I'd be more worried. But, frankly, this is gossip, not news. The Brits worship their gossip rags, but this will make a little splash, then
they'll move on to something else, something more sensational than a retired player helping out a rookie."

Aurora tucked her chin, "Come now. At any other time of the
year
,
that would be true. But we're on the eve of the British Championships. It might be a blip in the gossip rags for a day or two, but it will most definitely be chewed on quite thoroughly by those in the tennis
world. Every announcer will ana
lyze it to death, and every sports journalist is going to want a quote or something. From you, from Gaby."

"I know, you're right.''

"It's going to be a flurry of attention for her, the likes of which she hasn't seen yet."

"She's going to have to learn to deal with it sometime. Consequences, there's always consequences. Nobody knows that better than me."

"Whatever the case, I'm glad we can give her some respite from what will surely be, at the very least, a major distraction for her, right when she needs it least."

Tess smiled. "Maybe next time she'll think twice before playing an angle like that, with a journalist, of all people."

Aurora laughed lightly. "Darling, I know you don't believe that any more than I do."

"True," she said, looping her arm through Aurora's as they walked back into the parlor. "But look at it this way, at least she'll get her 'Handling the Hounds of Hell' tips from the best."