“Try it on,” Natalie urged. “That’s what she would have wanted.”
“I’m not convinced it’s my size,” Chloe said. The hours she did on the treadmill to improve her lung capacity kept her trim, but the skirt looked brazenly insubstantial. And the draped neckline—which wouldn’t come anywhere near as high as her neck—didn’t seem big enough to hold in generous C cups.
Natalie rolled her eyes. “It’s not like I asked you to show up for dinner at the Dixieland Diner wearing it. It’s just us.”
“All right, all right.” Chloe took the dress back to her room without further protest. She shrugged out of her clothes and eyed the red fabric. Here goes nothing.
Not only did the dress fit, it looked as though it had been magically tailored to her body. Surprised, she turned in front of the mirror, enjoying the way the fabric moved. When Vonda had said she could see some of Aunt Jane in her, Chloe had dismissed it as a well-meaning fib. Now though…
“This is not a Chloe dress,” she told her reflection. It was beguiling, just for this moment, to see herself as someone else, someone—
“I’m going out of my mind with curiosity,” Natalie complained from the other room.
“Come take a look,” Chloe called, doing mental inventory of her closet. What kind of shoes did one wear with an outfit like this? She doubted canvas sneakers would cut it.
From the doorway, Natalie reiterated her earlier assessment. “Whoa.” Then she grinned. “We have so found your outfit for the reunion.”
“Natalie—”
“Explain to me why you won’t go,” the blonde demanded, her hands on her hips.
Because high school had represented some of the most abysmal times in Chloe’s sheltered life. In elementary school, she’d been mostly invisible, the girl who sat quietly in class and read storybooks through recess; she’d never minded. The only child of a couple who hadn’t expected to be blessed with a baby, as well as being born premature and battling respiratory developmental delays as a kid, Chloe had received tons of attention at home. Not being the center of everyone’s focus at school had been a relief.
Her teachers liked her well enough and she made good grades. Maybe she hadn’t been invited to a lot of roller-skating and swimming parties, but she wasn’t that coordinated anyway. She’d buried herself in descriptions of faraway places and made lots of fictional friends.
Then came her teenage years. As a freshman, she’d had a significant growth spurt, and was suddenly several inches taller and filling out her blouses much differently. Also, there were far more extracurricular activities offered in high school. Teachers were no longer content to inconspicuously give her A’s—they asked her to peer tutor and courted her publicly for events like the Academic Decathlon. Although her parents’ official policy was that Chloe couldn’t date until she was sixteen, they’d allowed her to go to the fall homecoming dance sophomore year and meet a boy from her geometry class there.
That dance had been a fiasco. Chloe had been nervous, awkward within her changing body and with the sudden attention of classmates who’d previously ignored her. Her date had grazed her breast at the punch table—which she realized in hindsight had been an accident—but she’d jerked away violently enough to send Candy Beemis, a popular brunette, sideways into three dozen filled and waiting cups. Candy went on to cocaptain the varsity cheerleading squad, so one would think she could forgive a less socially adept person an awkward moment.
One would be wrong.
Instead, Candy and her A-list entourage targeted Chloe for snide comments. What Chloe had hated most wasn’t that they cracked jokes at her expense, but her own inability to quip back or at least to shrug it off. She froze every time, her throat tightening as her cheeks heated. Natalie, annoyed with Candy’s pettiness and exasperated by Chloe’s tendency to react like a deer in the headlights, had claimed that Candy was jealous. Chloe couldn’t imagine what kind of insane person would have been jealous of her in high school.
And now Nat wants me to willingly relive all those superfun glory days?
Chloe sighed. “Our former classmates fall into two groups. Those who had no clue who I was and those who ragged me about who I was.”
“A-hem.”
“Not counting you,” Chloe amended. “You are a true friend.”
Although it had been Natalie’s idea senior year to give Chloe highlights, neither girl knowing that Chloe’s dark brown hair had natural red undertones. The proposed blond touches intended to make Chloe glamorous had become clownish orange streaks that sent Candy and others into fits of giggles. Fairy godmothers were supposed to transform pumpkins for you, not give you pumpkin-colored hair.
“You’re a successful self-employed woman who can seriously work that slinky red number you’re wearing,” Natalie said. “Don’t you want to stick it to everyone who heckled you by showing up and looking hot?”
She hated to think she was insecure enough to need that kind of validation. “Stick it to them? It’s been ten years. I don’t care that much about anyone’s opinion. Especially at seventy-five dollars a ticket.”
“Well, that includes a sit-down dinner and dessert buffet. Don’t forget the great band. And it goes without saying that the floral arrangements will be phenomenal.” Natalie smiled beseechingly. “Come on! There have to be some people from our graduating class you want to see.”
“Most of the people I care about still live here in Mistletoe.”
Natalie’s blue eyes took on a wicked gleam, but she ducked her gaze, making a point of studying her French manicure.
“What?” Chloe demanded. “What ace do you think you have up your sleeve?”
“I got an unexpected RSVP today. From Dylan Echols.”
Dylan? An all-too-clear picture of his sexy grin and deep green eyes flashed through Chloe’s mind. “He’s really coming home?”
After college, the former Mistletoe High baseball star had become a local celebrity when he worked his way through the “farm system,” pitching two and a half seasons in the minors before being called up to play for the Atlanta Braves. As far as Chloe knew, he’d been back in Mistletoe only once, for his father’s funeral this past January. That had to have been a dark period for him, coming on the heels of a highly publicized early retirement. He’d torn a rotator cuff last season. After surgery, time off and physical therapy, he’d attempted to return but it was clear his pitching arm would never be the same. Just when Dylan had, according to sports journalists, “hit his stride,” his dreams of becoming the next Nolan Ryan or Greg Maddux were snatched away.
“I’ll bet Dylan would love that dress,” Natalie added. “You could really wow him. A little red lipstick, we could do something special with your hair…”
“I prefer my usual gloss,” Chloe said. Natalie had given her a gift certificate two birthdays ago for a fancy cosmetics Web site, and she’d developed a fondness for their line of high-end flavored glosses. “Remember what happened the last time you got big ideas about my hair?”
Natalie had the grace to blush. “Well, maybe someone at the salon could help you with it this time.”
“Yes, but why? What’s the point of spending three hours trying to convince a guy who doesn’t remember me that I’m someone I’m not?”
While Chloe had adored Dylan from the back of civics class, he’d given no sign of reciprocating the sentiment, which would have first required him to notice her existence. He’d been preoccupied with either baseball or whichever girl he’d been dating that week. Dylan Echols was the kind of guy who’d held court in high school, a student-body Prince Charming who made peers and teachers alike laugh during discussion and led his baseball team to state championship.
“Are you sure you know who you are?” Natalie asked skeptically. “Jane saw that there was a lot more to you than just a quiet straight-A student. I do, too.”
Chloe remembered the way she’d felt at the memorial service, the vague sense of having let down Jane. I could be more, couldn’t
I? Suddenly she found it difficult to recall why she was so set against going to the reunion. After all, it was just one night. Seventy-five dollars wouldn’t break the bank.
Still, she worried about Natalie’s plans for the evening getting too grandiose. “I’ll go. But stop imagining some movie where the formerly mousy heroine shows up, impresses everyone with her poise and scintillating conversation and wins her man. Get real. Dylan’s only going to be here for the weekend, and he doesn’t even know me.”
Natalie smiled, undeterred. “Then we’ll have to find the perfect opportunity for you to introduce yourself.”
Chapter Two
Dylan Echols muttered a word under his breath that network censors would definitely frown on. Since the broadcast had just gone to commercial, however, he felt free to express his irritation.
And Grady Medlock, seated behind the anchor desk, was free to snicker. “The scores may not be as important as world politics,” Grady said, “but viewers still expect you to get them right.”
Dylan didn’t bother responding. The newscaster had been insufferable ever since Dylan was hired, and had become even more so since Liza Finnell—the object of Grady’s unrequited affections—had hinted at the station’s spring picnic last month that she was attracted to the newest addition to the Channel Six team. Dylan had ducked her interest by politely reminding her that he was seeing someone.
At the time, anyway.
As of Friday’s e-mail, his brief relationship with Heidi was over. Dylan wasn’t sure what bothered him the most: that she’d jilted him for a Braves first baseman he himself had introduced her to, that she’d jilted him via an impersonal e-mail or that he’d only recognized in hindsight that she’d used him as a stepping stone to better-paid guys who were still in The Show.
Dumb. Much like the mistake he’d just made in his broadcast.
For the majority of Dylan’s reports, he had plenty of time to prepare beforehand, but he’d flubbed some incoming college scores on the teleprompter. Falling back on adolescent habits, he’d made a joke to cover his unease reading aloud. Why had he thought this local sportscaster position was a good idea? Because you didn’t have a Plan B.
He’d known what he wanted to do with his life ever since he pitched his first elementary school baseball game, striking out older kids with more practice. He’d known the major leagues were his destiny, but he’d had no idea what to do when the glorious ride screeched to an abrupt halt.
Liza, the divorced hair and makeup artist with a bright smile and a kid, darted forward to give Dylan a powder touch-up. He wondered if he would ever adjust to having to use on-air cosmetics. Pretty boy, his father would have sneered. More looks than brains. Thank God you have a decent throwing arm.
“Great job tonight,” Liza offered.
“Really?” He was careful to keep his tone teasing, not want to take his annoyance out on her. “What broadcast have you been watching?”
“Your recovery was fantastic. Don’t let Grady bother you. He’s a jerk.”
Dylan flashed a quick smile. “That’s nicer than what I usually call him.”
Grady Medlock was an insecure windbag who clung to the hope that covering important events made him important by extension. He’d been none too thrilled when Channel Six hired an ex-Braves player whose minor celebrity status threatened his own. Dylan sympathized with having insecurities, but he had no patience for men who puffed up their own egos by belittling their teammates.
The commercial break ended, and the cameras cut to the weather segment. Dylan could seethe in peace until it was time for the entire Channel Six crew to bid viewers good-night. As he stood, unfastening his lavalier mike, he noticed Liza hovering to his left at the edge of the lights.
He chuckled at her anxious expression. “I’m not that upset. Don’t worry about me.”
“Is that how I look?” She smiled self-consciously. “You’re probably sensing nervousness.”
“About?”
“Asking you to dinner this weekend,” she said in a rush. “My ex has our son for a couple of days, and you’re not on the schedule, so…I heard about you and Heidi.”
Who hadn’t? His spotlight-seeking former girlfriend had thrown her arms around her new beau right in the middle of a postgame interview. Dylan winced. They hadn’t been together long enough for him to be broken-hearted, but he hated to be humiliated. Though Liza’s interest in him might be a soothing balm to the ego, this job was already awkward without adding the complication of dating a co-worker.
“Thanks for the invite,” he said, “but I’m out of town this weekend. Going home.” The word felt clunky and foreign on his tongue. Despite the years that had passed, his mother still called Mistletoe his home, as in when will you be…?
“Town in north Georgia, right?” Liza snapped her fingers. “Christmas? Evergreen?”
“Mistletoe.” For such a small place, it held a vast store of conflicting memories. He’d struggled through his early school years—far worse than the actual dyslexia had been his father’s disdain that Dylan couldn’t read properly—but he’d later developed his fastball and his confidence. Most important, he’d been blessed with Coach Todd Burton’s mentorship. The gruff affection of the high school coach, who was officially retiring this spring and would be honored at a dinner this weekend, had almost made up for Dylan’s uncomfortable home life.
Almost.
Liza nodded. “Well, have a good time.”
“Thanks.” High school had been a good time. He’d set the division record for strikeouts but never struck out with his female classmates. He’d graduated with an indulgent fondness for Mistletoe High, grateful for what had taken place during the four years but knowing he was headed for bigger things.
Now he was returning, a twenty-seven-year-old has-been. Would he enjoy the reunion? He didn’t want to be one of those clichés who stood around all night with a beer in hand, reminiscing over former glory. For a second, he regretted his RSVP.
However, on the heels of his breakup, it seemed like a good time to get out of Atlanta for a few days, and his mom deserved better than to be neglected by her only child. In earlier years, he might have resented that she hadn’t done more to intervene, buffering him from his emotional bully of a father, but it was hard to be angry when she seemed so lost without her late husband. Dylan planned to stay at the reunion hotel, visiting the house to see his mom and find out if there was anything she needed done around the old place. The moment of the weekend he most looked forward to and simultaneously dreaded was presenting the appreciation award at Coach Burton’s dinner. Perhaps more than anyone else in the entire town, Coach had believed in him. Dylan was sorry that two shoulder surgeries hadn’t been able to keep their combined dream a reality.
He grimaced at the weekend that stretched ahead. If he were really lucky, his mother would be in a cheerful, noncloying mood, the reunion band would be loud and the hotel would be filled with pretty alumnae feeling nostalgic.
“I CAN’T BELIEVE you talked me into wearing these!” Chloe stepped out of the car, hyperaware of the towering heels she’d borrowed. She’d accepted Natalie’s red shoes and patient help with a curling iron, drawing the line at crimson lipstick and salon highlights.
Natalie grinned as she handed her keys to the valet. “I can’t believe it, either, but you look great.”
Chloe tottered into the lobby, trying to adjust to Natalie’s expensive pride-and-joy shoes. Natalie had said she was glad someone could wear them tonight since they wouldn’t have matched her sapphire-blue spaghetti-strapped dress. Ironically, the appreciative way the hotel clerk behind the counter followed Chloe with his eyes did nothing to bolster her. Women like her aunt knew how to gracefully handle attention; Chloe always felt breathless and panicky. Why couldn’t she have been more of a “people person” like Jane or Natalie? Even Chloe’s professional contact with clients was done largely through e-mails, rather than face-to-face.
“I tell you what,” Natalie said sym
pathetically, “let’s check to make sure there aren’t any last-minute glitches with the reunion committee or hotel staff, then I’ll buy you a drink in the lobby bar, okay?”
“Deal.” Chloe followed her friend downstairs, fighting the urge to tug at the top of her dress. She’d never left the house with this much cleavage exposed.
One floor below the main lobby, an elegant corridor led to the ballroom. Waitstaff in white tuxedo jackets were setting tables in the back half of the room. Toward the front, a stage set with sound equipment overlooked a portable dance floor. An archway had been created with tightly fastened helium balloons of green and gold, their alma mater’s colors. Against the entrance wall was a long table covered in a gold cloth and rows of name tags. A man and woman, both in formal attire, stood near it.
Natalie headed in their direction. The man was Jack Allen, who had been their student-body president and was now a married father employed by the planning office of city hall. The striking dark-haired woman next to him was—ugh—Candy Beemis.
Though Chloe had seen her former nemesis around from time to time, they hadn’t spoken since high school. Candy was the personal assistant to one of the town’s wealthiest women and spent most of her time in elite circles. Well, as elite as Mistletoe got, anyway. The brunette’s shimmering white one-shouldered dress looked like a toga as reimagined for the Academy Awards. Annoyingly, she hadn’t gained a visible pound in the past ten years.
“Hi.” Chloe smiled in their combined direction but focused on Jack’s congenial face.
He returned the smile, his gaze apologetic. “You’ll have to forgive me, I’m blanking on who you are.”
“Chloe. Chloe Malcolm?”
“Right. Sorry. I’m terrible with names. My wife harasses me about it constantly. I have entire building forms memorized, but can forget our neighbor’s name in the middle of a barbecue.” He turned to Natalie, reporting on the event’s status. “Everything’s well in hand. We had to make a quick appetizer substitution, but they’re not charging us extra. Candy was just on the phone with the band’s lead singer. ETA is about ten minutes for sound check.”
Mistletoe Cinderella Page 2
