When You Were Mine (Adams Sisters) (2 page)

              Laurence leaned forward, and the seductive scent of spice and musk had her longing to curl up against him.  “I’m sorry all of this comes as a shock to you but...we can still be
friends
.”

              Joey groaned.  That was usually her line.

#

              Sunlight shot through the blinds and sliced across Ryan’s head.  He sighed and contemplated whether he should bother getting out of bed.  Lying there and listening to the stillness was probably going to be the highlight of his day. 

              However, the silence ended at the sound of footsteps rushing down the hallway.  Guadalupe’s soldier’s march.

              After a quick rap at the door, his bossy, nosey housekeeper poked her silver head into the bedroom.

              “Are you decent?”

              Ryan tucked his nude body beneath sheets.  “I’m not hungry.”

              “Always the grouch.”  Guadalupe’s laughter was larger than her husky, five-foot-two frame as she sashayed toward the bed with his breakfast tray.  “It’s not so bad.  You survived.”

              “Yeah, don’t remind me.”  Ryan groaned as he forced himself to sit up.  “What time is it?”

              “Time to get up.”  She placed the tray over his lap.  “I have your favorite.”

              Ryan’s gaze dropped to the stack of fluffy buttermilk pancakes topped with strawberries, surrounded by link sausages and scrambled cheese eggs.  His stomach growled and he smiled at his housekeeper.

              “Sounds like hunger to me.”  She winked.

              “More like a marriage proposal.”  He reached for the small pitcher of maple syrup.  “You spoil me,” he admitted.

              “That’s my intention.”  Guadalupe planted her hands into the folds of her thick waist.  “Every woman knows the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

              “Most women I’ve gone out with couldn’t tell the difference between a skillet and a George Foreman grill.”  He took his first bite of breakfast and moaned in ecstasy.

              “Another satisfied customer.”

              “Marry me.”  He shoveled in another mouthful.

              She tossed her head back with a hearty laugh.  “What would I do with a young pup like you?”

              “Are you kidding?”  Ryan teased as he gestured to the room around him.  “All this could be yours.”

              “It’s already mine...to clean.”  She glided back toward the door.  “Don’t forget you have a two-thirty appointment with Zachary Griffin at Miramax,” she reminded him, and then disappeared out of the room.

              At the reminder, Ryan set his fork down as his head filled with endless possibilities of how the meeting would go.  Would he get the opportunity to direct his dream script,
A Nation’s Defense,
or would they push that sappy romantic comedy,
La Bella Vida
on him?  Knowing the studio, they would ship him off to Italy before he could say
arrivederci.

              There was nothing about him that screamed romance or comedy. 
La Bella
would just be another iceberg sitting in still, black water.

Ryan lost his appetite and removed the tray from his lap.  After he climbed out of bed, he reached over and opened the top drawer of his nightstand to pull out an old and rumpled screenplay.

It was a damn good script; nearly everyone agreed on that.  But was it commercial?  Who was the target audience?  Lastly and largely, how much was it going to cost?

              Getting a project green-lighted was not unlike doing the tango with a starved cougar.  Movies were built on favors as well as money.  I scratch your back, you scratch mine was the city’s fight song.  What the hell did talent or telling a damn good story have to do with anything?

              So, for the last few years, Ryan did one favor after another.  A few paid off, most of them didn’t.

              But today, hook or crook, he had to get his financing.

              His gaze dropped once again to the title page and the screenwriter’s name.  “Joseph Henry Adams, I’ll get this film made…somehow.”

#

After a night of crying her eyes out, Joey woke up with a throbbing headache.  Even so, she didn’t want to climb out of bed long enough to find some aspirins.  In fact, she was perfectly willing to spend the rest of her life hidden beneath the folds of her soft comforter.

              Closing her eyes again, she sighed when Laurence’s congenial smile flashed back at her.  Laurence.  Sweet Laurence.

              “Oh, God.  Please say it’s not over,” she whined.

              “Joey?” A voice called out from somewhere in the house.

             
Dear God.  Not now.

              “Joey?  Are you here?” A second voice inquired.

              Groaning, she buried deeper into the bed.  In the back of her mind, reason said her efforts were futile, and from the sound of rushing feet, she surmised the whole cavalry had assembled for this attack.

              All the saints in heaven couldn’t save her from what was coming next.

              “Joseph, are you alright?”  Sheldon, the eldest and the family’s fertile matriarch, placed a comforting hand against Joey’s shoulder.

              Torn between kicking them out and bawling like a baby, Joey finally chose to close her eyes and pretend she was invisible.

              Of course, her sisters knew all her tricks.

              “We’re not leaving here until you talk to us,” Sheldon persisted.

              “I’m fine” was what she wanted to say, but instead a sob blocked her windpipes.

              Suddenly the covers were snatched off and Joey was forced to stare at her four concerned sisters through a waterfall of tears.

              “Oh, Joey.”  Frankie, the bejeweled diva, who had the good sense and good fortune to marry a multimillionaire, fluttered her Harry Winston adorned hand across her heart. 

              “Are you hurt?” Michael asked.

              Considering the ache throbbing in her chest, Joey nodded and sat up.

              “Oh, sweetheart.  What happened?” Peyton asked as the bed dipped from their collective weight.

              Stuttering, choking, sobbing, Joey struggled to find her voice.  When she couldn’t, she reached for Michael and cradled her face against the crook of her neck and wept.

              Michael, the nosiest of them all, tsked under her breath and patted Joey lovingly on the back.

              The embrace tightened as more arms encircled her.

              It was impossible not to feel the love radiating from her sisters and it was natural for her to want to stay cocooned in their embraces forever.  They might be meddlesome, but when it came right down to it, they were Joey’s lifelines.

              “He didn’t propose, did he?” Peyton asked softly.

              This time instead of trying to talk, Joey shook her head. 

              Moans of disappointment surrounded her.

              “It’s all right,” Michael cooed, stroking the back of her head.  “There’s always Christmas.”

Between them, the one sister who undoubtedly understood Joey’s plight was Michael.  She’d finally made it down the aisle after dating her husband, Phillip, for ten years and being engaged for an additional five.  She was an inspiration to any woman who was determined to hang onto her man.

             
Hang on.

              Joey sniffed and eased out of their arms.  “I’m okay,” she lied.  “But...I would love something for my headache.”

              “I’ll get you some aspirin,” Sheldon said, and took off for the bathroom’s medicine cabinet.

              “Do you want to talk about it?” Peyton asked, reaching for her hand.

              Joey did...and she didn’t.  She was new to this kind of emotional breakdown.  It was embarrassing how she’d hung her hopes and dreams on a proposal.

              Sheldon returned with the requested aspirins and a small Dixie cup of water.  “Here you go, sweetie.”

              Joey quickly popped the pills and quenched her disappointment when it didn’t immediately soothe her headache.  “I can’t believe you guys drove up here to L.A. to check up on me.”

              Frankie waved her off.  “Are you kidding?  With Sheldon’s heavy foot, it only took three hours.”

              Up until a year ago, all of the sisters resided in their hometown of San Jose.  Joey moved to L.A. first, chasing her dream of becoming a screenwriter and shortly after, Michael and her husband, Phillip, moved there when his job transferred.

“I just don’t know what happened.”  Joey shook her head.  “Where did I go wrong?” she finally settled on asking.  Her eyes swam.  “We were perfect together.”

              Everyone’s concern deepened with their frowns, but they all seem cautious about pressing her too much.

              “He dumped me,” Joey confessed, wanting to get over this whole ugly business.  “On one of the most romantic nights of my life, he dumps me.”

              “That bastard.”  Michael’s frown hardened into stone.  “I say we go down and put sugar in the tank of his brand-new Mercedes.”

              “Or key up the paint job,” Frankie added.

              “Heck, how about we pull that job we did to Peyton’s first husband, Ricky?  We can break into his place and superglue everything together.”

              Peyton crossed her arms.  “Only, more than half that stuff you guys glued was mine.”

              “Hey, it was the thought that counts,” Michael reasoned defensively.

              “No,” Joey said, jumping in before they got carried away.  “No silly acts of revenge.  We’re too old for that, don’t you think?”

              Sheldon crossed her arms over the small bulge of her stomach.  “Age is a state of mind.”

              “Joey’s right.” Peyton said.  “I’m not crawling through any more windows.”

              The girls’ shoulders deflated.

              “I just don’t get it,” Sheldon griped.  “He boasted he was crazy about you just this past New Year’s.”

              “I cooked for that man,” Frankie added. 

              Everyone looked at her.

              “Well, I supervised,” she amended.

              “I’m sorry, Joey,” Peyton said with commiseration.  “But maybe this was for the best.”

              “The best?  How can you say that?  He was perfect. 
We
were perfect.”

              The room went silent with her declaration, and Joey looked around confused.  “What?  You guys liked him.  You all said so.”

              Everyone’s eyes couldn’t or wouldn’t meet her gaze.

              “It doesn’t matter.  I love him and he loves me¾he told me so.”

              “He sure has a strange way of showing it,” Peyton quipped.

              “Don’t start, P.J,” Joey retorted, and smote her with a look of warning.  “No male bashing today.”

              Peyton’s wounded look was quickly covered with a broad smile.  “Hey, I love men.”

              The other sisters turned their incredulous gazes toward her.

              “Okay.  I love
my
man.” Peyton amended.

              Against her will, Joey’s lips curled into a smile.  “Exactly, and when you love someone, you should fight for them.”

              “I thought you were supposed to set them free,” Sheldon said.  “Isn’t that how the song goes?”

              Joey untangled herself from her sisters and climbed out of bed.  She didn’t know where her surge of courage and determination was coming from but from nowhere a balloon of hope inflated within her.

              “I’m not letting Laurence go.”  She lifted her chin.  “He just doesn’t know what he wants and probably got scared.”  She turned and headed toward the closet. 

              Peyton frowned.  “What are you planning to do?”

              “I’m going to do whatever it takes to win my man back.”

Chapter 3

              A nervous Joey twitched at the front door of the Blue Diamond, praying her name would magically appear on the club’s guest list.  The three times she’d been allowed into the exclusive club was when she was draped on Laurence’s arm¾mainly because Laurence’s brother was the club’s owner.

              “I’m sorry, Joey, but your name is not on the list.”  Marcus, the bouncer, a brick building of a man, glanced down at her and shrugged.  “I can’t let you in."

              “C’mon, Marcus.”  Joey flashed her best smile.  She didn’t tweeze, waxed, polished and buffed herself to perfection just so she could be turned away.  She didn’t even want to think about the damage her first pair of stilettos was doing to her calves right now or how her new bra had her breasts sitting beneath her chin.  Tonight, she was a woman on a mission. 

“You know me, Marcus.  I’m sure it would be okay if you let me in.”

              “Is this going to take all night?” A woman snapped.

              Joey checked her temper and stepped aside.

Marcus scanned then list and then with a wide smile allowed the woman to enter.  However, when he returned his attention to Joey, his lips curved downward.  “Can’t do it.  You know the rules.”

Joey’s heart dropped and tangled with the knots in her stomach.  “What’s it going to take to get you to look the other way?” she asked with desperation seeping into her voice.

As quick as a whip, a lustful leer sparkled in Marcus’s eyes and caught her off guard.  Joey fluttered a hand to cover the top of her plunging neckline.  She wasn’t
that
desperate.  “I meant how much money?”

Disappointment blanketed the bouncer’s chiseled granite features, but Joey still detected interest. 

“What you got?”

Joey snapped open her purse, which was only large enough to hold her ID, a tube of lipstick and a lousy ten-dollar bill. 

“You’re kidding me, right?” Marcus asked when she slipped the folded bill into his hand.