Manhattan Cinderella

by Kate O'Keeffe

  There’s warmth in his eyes and a smile on his lips when he greets me with, “Hey there yourself, Gabriella.” He stands up and leans his guitar against the wall. “Thrown anything on yourself lately? A milkshake, a bottle of beer?” He eyes the bucket in my hand. “That doesn’t have that green crap in it again, does it?”

  I wave the offending tub in the air, the edges of my lips teasing into a smile. “Empty. I’m looking for ice.”

  “Good, because I’m clean outta shirts.”

  I eye his plain white T-shirt and bite my lip. If I spill something else on him, would he take that off, too?

  Focus, Gabby.

  A change of subject is required before I embarrass myself any further. “That song you were playing. It was beautiful.”

  He shrugs. “Oh, thanks. It’s just something I’ve been working on lately.” He slots his guitar back in its case and closes it up. “I’m supposed to be learning a new song, but I needed, I dunno, I needed to play something I knew, I guess.” He shrugs, as though embarrassed.

  “I get that. It’s comforting.”

  He studies my face for a moment. “Yeah, that’s it exactly. You’re a performer, too?”

  “I sing, but I can’t play the guitar. What are you doing out here in the hallway again? Shouldn’t you be with Rex Randall’s people? I mean, you are with the band, right?” I keep my tone as casual as possible, considering the depth of my desperation.

  “Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

  I need to delve deeper, find out if he can really help me—or if he’s just a ridiculously hot distraction. I collect my ponytail in my hand and toy with it. “What exactly do you do for him?”

  His brow creases. “For who?”

  Is this guy stupid? Someone this pretty, who can sing like that? It wouldn’t be fair if he’d been handed out brains, too.

  Keeping it light, I say, “For Rex Randall. What’s your job?”

  “I don’t work for Rex.”

  My heart sinks. “Oh. I thought you said you did.”

  He studies my face for a beat. “Well, I have just agreed to perform on stage with him at the concert next week.”

  My eyes widen. “You have? The one at The Garden?” He nods. “That’s awesome! How’d that come about?”

  Pointedly, he ignores my question and instead gestures at the empty tub in my hand. “I saw an ice machine around the corner. I’ll show you.”

  I almost get whiplash from the change in topic, but I go with it. Cole Grant has just gone to the top of the list of people who can help me achieve my goal. He can talk at length about the eating habits of the rare New Zealand White Kiwi for all I care.

  “Don’t you need to practice?” I look at his guitar, leaning up against the wall.

  “I’m killing time right now.”

  “What are you waiting for?”

  “Rex Randall,” he replies simply.

  A surge of hope rises inside me at the mention of his name. We walk down the hallway together in silence. I’m doing flips and high kicks inside. Of all the people I could have crashed into today, I managed to do it with a guy performing with Rex Randall!

  A short stroll and we reach the ice machine—which is literally right around the corner, just as Cole said it was. It makes a clunking clinking sound as I fill the tub with ice. I glance at Cole. He’s studying something on the wall. I turn to see what it is that’s caught his attention and notice it’s a blank wall.

  I knit my brows together. “You okay? You seem distracted.”

  “What? Oh, yeah. I’m fine.”

  “Okay.” I don’t believe him, but then again, maybe he’s the brooding type and staring at blank walls is his thang? I hold the now full tub aloft. “I’m going to deliver this ice. Want to come with?”

  “Sure.”

  We retrace our steps back around the corner and down the hallway. I glance at him, trying to work him out. Sure, I only met him earlier this morning, so I can’t exactly say I’ve got a whole lot to go on, but he seems different. More solemn, I guess.

  “Are you new in town?” I ask him and he nods. “Where are you from?” I put my hand up to stop him from telling me. “Actually, let me guess. By your accent, it’s got to be somewhere in the South.”

  “So far, so obvious.”

  “Alabama? Like the song.” I sing the famous chorus. “Sweet Home Alabama,” I throw in a little air guitar at the end for good measure.

  He shakes his head, a ghost of a smile forming on his handsome face. I take it as a personal triumph after that brooding wall-staring he did only moments ago. “I’m not from Alabama, but you’ve got a beautiful voice.”

  That heat in my cheeks begins to bloom, just as it did when we met. “Thanks. I love to sing. It’s my passion.”

  “You’ve got talent. Do you sing professionally? I mean, I know you’re an assistant to a band and all.”

  I bite my bottom lip. “I hope to one day.”

  “You should. I sing at a friend’s bar some weekends. I love it.”

  “Well, at the risk of this sounding like I’m just blowing smoke up your butt, you have a beautiful voice, too.”

  His smile broadens, his eyes alight. “This is a mutual love-fest, huh? And all because of some green goop you decided would look good all over your T-shirt.”

  A zing of excitement pulses through me. “Something like that.” We hold one another’s gaze until he blinks and turns to look down the corridor.

  “You’re just trying to distract me with your smooth talk. I’m going to work out where you’re from.”

  “Give me your best shot.”

  “Missouri?” He shakes his head, and I rack my Manhattan-centric brain. Why didn’t I pay more attention to geography in high school? Maybe if I’d realized there were such cute guys in our great Southern states, I would have done just that. “How about Oklahoma?”

  “Oklahoma? Try about seven hundred miles east.”

  “East?” I tap my chin as I think.

  His smile spreads. “You’re really bad at this, you know? Want me to put you out of your misery?”

  I’ve run out of ideas, but I’ve gotten him to smile. It feels nice. More than nice. “Sure, put me out of my geographic misery.”

  “I’m from Tennessee, a little town called Hamilton.” His features soften as he speaks, and it’s as clear as day he loves his home.

  “Is that Tennessee, where teeth are optional?”

  He throws his head back and lets out a hearty laugh—and I notice his full set of pearly whites. “Something like that.”

  “Do you live anywhere near Nashville?”

  “About hundred miles north.”

  “Wow, I would love to go there.”

  “It’s pretty cool. That’s where I play on weekends sometimes. I’ve got a regular gig at a friend’s bar. It’s just me and my guitar, playing the songs I love.”

  “Which is what, the kind of song you were just playing?” I hold my breath. If he tells me yes and he’s a country musician, I may just fall in love with this guy right here in the hallway.

  “Yeah, mostly country, maybe a little folk music, too.”

  Swoon.

  An image of him in a pair of cowboy boots with his hat tipped low over his eyes comes to mind. The thought of him singing tender words to me makes me yearn for him.

  Oh, my. Be still my beating heart.

  I blow out a breath. “Well.” My voice is a little higher than usual. I try again. “Well, Cole from Hamilton, Tennessee, who sometimes plays country music in Nashville and has all his own teeth.” I nudge his arm with my elbow. “They are all your own teeth, right?”

  “They are. Oh, except for this one.” He taps one of his front top teeth. “Got knocked out with a baseball by Elijah Johnson in my back yard when I was thirteen.” He squints, looking off into the distance. “Man, I hated that kid.”

  “Why did you play baseball with him if you hated him?”

  He shrugs. “I was an only child and he was my neighbor.�
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  “Figures.”

  Until Cece came along, the “pleasant surprise” Mom and Dad were told they couldn’t have, I too was an only child. I can relate to the Elijah Johnson thing. Without any siblings, you took kid time whenever you could get it. Although, I was lucky enough to have my two best friends from an early age, Raffaella and Isabella. With all our names ending with “ella,” together, we’re The Ellas (I never said it was rocket science how we came up with the name), and they’re still my closest friends to this day.

  I come to a stop outside the door to the Pop Princesses’ room. I haven’t had the chance to ask Cole if he can introduce me to Rex Randall or his “people” yet, and I can’t let this opportunity slip through my fingers.

  The fact that being with Cole makes my legs turn to jelly has absolutely nothing to do with it. Honestly.

  “I need to deliver this. I won’t be long. Do you feel like running an errand with me once I’m done in here?”

  “Oh, I’m waiting for a text from someone.”

  “A text?” I extend my hand, palm up. “Give me your phone.”

  “Why?”

  “I want to show you something.”

  He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out his phone. I take it from him and immediately begin to walk away, down the hall.

  He catches up with me in a few short strides of his long legs. “What are you playing at?”

  “Oh, I’m demonstrating something for you, in case phones don’t work the same way in Tennessee as they do in Manhattan.” I keep walking, his phone held aloft. I’m totally hamming this up, of course, but it’s fun, and it extends my time with him, too. And I’ll admit it, I could get used to having hot guys chase me down a hallway.

  Don’t judge me.

  “What exactly are you demonstrating, Gabriella?”

  I stop, turn, and look at him. “First up, my name is Gabby.”

  “Not Kermit?”

  “Not Kermit.”

  “Can I call you that anyways? It kinda suits you.”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Roger that,” his lips twitch, “Kermit.”

  I try not to let the fact he’s given me a nickname set a bunch of excited butterflies batting their wings in my belly. “Focus, Tennessee.” I shoot him as stern a look as I can muster, and he pulls a serious face. “Secondly, I have to tell you something that may rock your world.”

  He crosses his arms while his eyes dance. “Is that so?”

  “Oh, yes. This phone here is what we call ‘mobile.’” I tuck the phone and the tub of ice under my arms and do air quotes. “Let me explain what that means. You can take this phone wherever you go, and it’ll still work. It’s a new innovation they came up with at the phone making place.”

  “The phone making place?” He shakes his head, smiling. “Anyone ever told you you’re a total smart aleck?”

  I hand him back his phone. I look up into his eyes and swear my heart misses a beat, maybe two. “All the time. Only they use another word that starts with an ‘a.’”

  “Well, thank you for this informative session. I feel I know a lot more about cell phones now.”

  Dammit! Why has this guy got to be all kinds of wonderful, the kind of guy I could fall head over heels for?

  “That’s good.”

  “I bet you could teach me a lot of other things, too.”

  The note of suggestion in his voice has my belly doing a flip-flop. “Maybe,” I breathe.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” The not so dulcet tones of my stepmom reverberate down the hall.

  First the sexually-charged cucumber moment earlier today, and now this? Sylvia’s like a heat-seeking missile where I’m concerned today, interrupting my time with Cole.

  Not in the least bit interested in provoking the beast any further than I already have, I turn and tell her, “I’ve got the ice for Britney.”

  I hold the tub out to her, and she takes it from me, barely looking my way. Instead, she raises her brows at Cole. “You again?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I thought you worked for Rex.” She looks like she’s been sucking on a lemon, her features are so pinched.

  “Yes, ma’am. I do.”

  As I look from Cole to Sylvia, I have the sudden urge to show her he’s worth so much more than her scowl suggests. “Cole’s performing on stage with Rex at the concert.” I smile up at him. He doesn’t return it. In fact, he shifts his weight as though he’s uncomfortable.

  Sylvia sizes him up. I can tell he’s gone up in her estimation—at least by a peg or two. “You play the guitar?”

  The guy is standing in front of her with a guitar slung over his shoulder. Rocket science this ain’t.

  “I do.”

  She narrows her eyes at him. “Why are you performing with Rex? I’ve not heard of you.”

  It’s a good question.

  He shrugs. “I, ah, I guess he saw my YouTube clip and wanted me in the band.”

  I am officially intrigued.

  “Well, that’s quite the coup for you,” Sylvia says.

  “You have no idea,” Cole replies. Something in his voice has me narrowing my eyes at him.

  “What was your name again?”

  “Cole Grant, ma’am.”

  “Well, Cole, I imagine we’ll be seeing you again.” She turns her attention to me. “Go get the shoe fixed. With all your messing around with drinks today, you’re running behind.”

  Despite the fact the drinks were for her and the spawn, I smile sweetly. “I’m on it.” I breeze by her into the room and collect the yellow bag with the shoe.

  Sylvia follows me into the room. “Right, girls. Make yourselves presentable. We’ve got the press conference with Rex in two minutes.”

  I close the door behind me to my stepsisters’ excited squeals. He glances down at the bag in my hand. “The shoe again, huh?”

  “I’ve got to get it to the cobbler.”

  “That makes me think of peach cobbler, the way my granny used to make it.”

  “Sounds delicious.”

  “Believe me, it was.” We reach the top of the elevators and step on. “And you know what? As long as my phone is ‘mobile,’ as you claim, I think I could manage a trip to the cobbler. Shoe, peach, or otherwise.”

  Excitement stirs in my belly. “It’s definitely the shoe variety.”

  As we reach the bottom of the escalator, I remind myself to keep my eye on the prize: Cole is an introduction to Rex, a way in. The fact he does all kinds of nice things to my insides and makes me want to grin from ear to ear has got to be irrelevant.

  At least that’s what I tell myself as we walk together through the front door of the recording studio and out into the bright New York sun.

  Chapter 6

  Cole

  Taking a shoe to get fixed with a girl I’ve just met isn’t exactly what I had in mind for today. Although I’m not sure what I thought would happen when I met my father for the first time, I know this isn’t it. But, I’ll take it. Despite being as clumsy as a drunk bear when it comes to holding drinks—and yeah, I know I was the one who opened the door that started the chain of events—Gabby sure is a great antidote to the crapstorm of my life right now.

  Fun, cute, and snarky, she may not be packing much in the curves department—as far as I can tell with the androgynous jeans and T she’s wearing—but she’s hot as all get-out, as well as beautiful.

  Not that I’m looking for a beautiful girl right now, or any girl, for that matter. My life is way too complicated for that kind of trouble.

  I guess as long as she remains an antidote, I’m good.

  Outside on the sidewalk, New York City is proving to be just as hot and muggy as it is back home. Shielding my eyes from the blinding sun, I ask, “Where are we heading with this shoe?”

  “The Cobbler King on 42nd Street.”

  “We’re going to 42nd Street, huh? Is that in the Theater District? Near Times Square?”

 
She pulls a face. “Don’t tell me you’re going to go tourist on me, Tennessee.”

  I shrug, embarrassed. “Hey, this is my first trip to The Big Apple. Can you blame me?”

  “I can blame you for calling my city ‘The Big Apple.’” She gives me a cheeky grin as she raises her hand in the air. Like magic, a yellow cab pulls up beside us. I’ve got to work out how to do that. Native New Yorkers seem to manage it with no effort at all.

  Gabriella tells the driver where we’re heading as we climb in. We both lean back in our seats as the taxi joins the stream of traffic heading north. A fish trying to swim upstream against a strong current comes to mind.

  I shift my guitar, which is placed between us on the seat. It changes the direction of my thoughts. “The girls with Sylvia, they’re the Pop Princesses, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Are they any good?” From the brief look I got at them earlier, they’re a couple of divas, but that doesn’t mean they’re not talented.

  “You don’t know their music?”

  I shake my head. “It’s like this, Kermit: I’m neither a tween nor a horny teenage boy.”

  She narrows her gaze. “Yeah, I guess they’re pretty beautiful.”

  Surprised at her assessment, I let out a laugh. “If you go for that type of girl.”

  “What’s their type, in the world according to Cole?”

  “High maintenance.”

  “Oh, they’re definitely that. But they can sing, and they’re doing really well right now.”

  “How long have you worked for them?”

  “A while now.”

  Is she avoiding the question? “How long is ‘a while?’”

  She fiddles with the edge of the window trim. “I dunno. Too long. Sylvia’s, well, Sylvia’s not exactly the easiest person to work for.”

  She’s all flirty confidence and bravado with me, and a meek little mouse around that band manager of hers. Sure, I can see how the likes of Sylvia could scare someone, but Gabriella doesn’t seem the type. “Yeah, I can see that.” I go out on a limb. “Tell me if I’m being too personal here, but why are you like that around her?”