by Bird, Peggy
Hunter threw her a kiss and headed for the bedroom. “I’d kiss you if I wasn’t afraid my brother would knock me into the middle of next week. Don’t feel you have to go rushing off because of me.”
Georgeanne looked after him. “What was that all about? He doesn’t look at all sleepy to me.”
“He knows I want to talk to you in private, and he also doesn’t want to miss the next episode, so he’s temporarily adjourning to the bedroom.”
“The next episode?” Georgeanne looked at the blank television screen in puzzlement. “Did I miss something?” She met Zane’s gaze briefly, then looked away, reddening. “You know, don’t you?”
“That you wrote Faking It? Yes, and I probably should have realized it a lot sooner, like when I saw those two boxes from your publisher.” He drew her closer. “Giving intimate advice on a national scale must have scared you half to death.”
“It did.” Georgeanne closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. “All of a sudden, people were literally taking the book to heart. And it was all — “ She broke off on a gasp, then repeated, “It was all just theory. That’s why I let it go to press. I thought that maybe some other woman out there would read it in time to save her marriage.” She added, “If she wanted to, that is.”
Zane touched her chin to make her look at him. “Did you want to save your marriage, Georgie?”
She changed color, in true Georgeanne fashion. “At first, I thought I did. It wasn’t until I had finished the book and sent it to an agent that I realized … that I realized … ” She trailed off, looking horrified.
“Go on, please,” Zane said.
She glanced at him, then looked away, flushing again. “I suddenly realized that I was glad he was gone, and that I was no actress. All that acting all of the time would have been wearing, and for what? We would still have fought over the time I spent at the Humane Society, or at the Saturday Clinic.” She covered her face with her hands. “I’m a terrible person, telling everybody to do something I couldn’t have done myself.”
Zane gently pried her hands away from her face and held them in his, noting automatically how cold they felt. “That’s because you’re basically too honest to pretend for long. The truth is, I don’t think you loved him. Not the way you’d have needed to love him in order to pull off a long-term act of the sort Faking It advocates.”
“I didn’t realize that when I wrote the book.” She kept her head bent, staring at his hands holding hers. “My pride had been crushed. I felt like a failure, and that everything wrong between us was my fault, so I began writing the book as an analysis of what I thought went wrong and what I could have done about it.” She swallowed. “Somehow, after I finished the writing and sold the book, I realized I was actually glad the marriage was over.” She added in doleful tones, “Then the book took off.”
“What happens now, Georgie?” Zane asked gently. “You appear to have a huge audience waiting to hear from you. What do you intend to do about it?”
“Do about it?” Her huge, brown eyes met his in a startled flash. “Keep dodging my agent’s calls, I suppose, and praying that no one figures out who Fritzi Field really is.”
“Do you really think that’s going to be possible?” Zane still had trouble getting his mind around the idea that Georgeanne Hartfield had a nationwide audience breathlessly awaiting her least pronouncement. “You heard Hunt. The talk shows can’t seem to discuss anything else.”
“They’ll just have to find something.” On that, Georgeanne sounded determined. “I have nothing more to add on the subject.”
Zane touched his fingertip to her lips and wished Hunter was back in Los Angeles, even though he knew that now was not the time to make love to Georgeanne again, no matter how much he might want to. “In that case, kiss me again and let’s talk about this.”
Georgeanne stiffened in his embrace. “If you kiss me, I won’t be able to talk about anything, much less Fritzi Field.”
“I think you’ll manage.” He smiled into her eyes and kissed her gently. “Georgie, you do realize, don’t you, that you’re going to have to do something about this?”
“This?” Georgeanne looked dazed, much to his delight. “What do you mean?”
“You’re going to have to deal with the Fritzi Field thing, or it’s going to blow up in your face. You need to go public at a time you choose. Otherwise, you won’t have that choice.”
She turned her face away. “Can we please not talk about Fritzi Field? She’s trying to take over my life, and that was not what I bargained for when I wrote that book.”
“But you have an audience waiting, Georgie. Don’t you think they deserve to hear from the author?”
Georgeanne winced. “Are you talking about all that mail waiting at home? I can’t possibly read all those letters, Zane. I’d have to quit my job.”
She looked so upset, Zane longed to comfort her in the time-honored male way. But sex wasn’t what she needed just now. As he saw it, Georgeanne had a real problem, one that was not going to go away unless she dealt with it.
For a moment he considered ignoring the problem right along with Georgeanne, but he fought off the temptation. Whether Georgeanne knew it or not, Fritzi Field could not succeed in remaining anonymous forever.
“The way I see it is this,” he said. “Like it or not, you have a responsibility to your readers, and they aren’t going to let you remain anonymous for long. One of your fans will succeed in tracking you down, if a reporter doesn’t manage it first.” He paused and stared into her eyes in all seriousness. “Georgie, you need to come up with a plan.”
*
Georgeanne drove home in a dither, scarcely able to think. Zane knew she was Fritzi Field. Soon, everyone else in the entire world would, also.
A plan. Zane thought she needed to come up with a plan.
“How about hiding under my front porch?” she had asked. “Isn’t that a plan?”
“The sooner you go public, the sooner the fuss will die down,” Zane said.
Then Hunter appeared in the bedroom doorway with her purse in his hands. “Your phone is ringing. It might be important.”
It was Alice Anson, Georgeanne’s agent. What Alice had to say almost jerked the floor from beneath her feet, with the result that Zane and Hunter both wound up soothing her with bowls of flavored popcorn and glasses of wine.
“You’ve been outed, kid,” Alice said. “I don’t know who dug it out, but I’ve been getting calls for the past half hour, and your name and location are popping up all over the Internet. So be warned. Now, about these talk show invitations … ”
Georgeanne had managed to end the call without committing herself, only to find Zane and his brother ready to offer good advice. According to them, by tomorrow morning she would probably be headline news in all the local newspapers, and her home phone was probably ringing off the hook with calls from reporters.
She finally left Zane’s apartment at two in the morning, sent on her way with several cups of stout coffee — as if she needed coffee to keep her awake after this news.
Then she remembered she had to be at work by eight, and she needed at least a little rest, even though she didn’t feel sleepy in the least.
Who was she kidding? She’d disrupt the clinic if she went to work as usual.
She turned in at her own driveway and saw two canine forms arise and stand waiting, along with one human form that reposed on her front porch swing. When she stopped her car before the front steps, she noticed Nurse Denise Devereaux’s snappy little red car parked well to the side.
Denise rose in her dignified way and waited while Georgeanne greeted Roscoe and Jack. “Is Fritzi going to get after me for starting a website about her book?” she asked, when Georgeanne straightened.
“She’s more likely to offer you a fat fee and ask you to call it the Fritzi Field official website,” Georgeanne said in dry tones. “Come on in, Denise.”
“At first, my feelings were hurt because you didn’t te
ll me, even after you saw how much the book meant to me.” Denise entered and followed Georgeanne into the kitchen. “Then I realized you must have been caught totally by surprise when the book took off like a rocket.”
“That’s an understatement.” Georgeanne, moving on autopilot, put more coffee on to perk and located a fresh box of lemon snap cookies in her cabinets. “I’m still in shock.”
“So what are you going to do now, Georgie?” Denise sat down and looked across the table at her friend. “I can understand why you’re sort of between a rock and a hard place, what with meeting that stunning Dr. Bryant. I’ll bet you’re not even interested in your ex-husband anymore.”
“You’re right about that,” Georgeanne dryly. “But Zane thinks I need to do a publicity tour, because the book has such a wide audience now.”
“You told him you wrote Faking It?” Denise asked, surprised. “Well, he’s right. The readers need to hear from Fritzi herself.”
“I literally have nothing else to say on the subject.” Georgeanne looked into Denise’s face in a searching way. “However, it looks to me as though you have a lot to add to what Fritzi had to say.”
Denise smiled and took out her smart phone, tapped on the screen a few times, then handed the phone across the table to Georgeanne. “I got my website online last night, and I’ve already gotten several thousand hits. This thing is big, Georgie. An author almost has to have a website nowadays.”
Georgeanne stared at Denise’s intense face, then down at the little screen. “Everyone except Fritzi, apparently.”
“Fritzi’s online now, whether she knows it or not.” Denise looked intensely satisfied. “I’ve posted several essays about some ideas in the book and started a question-and-answer section.” Her dark face glowed with excitement. “The questions are pouring in. I can’t wait to start answering them.”
Georgeanne regarded her friend in disbelief. “You’re going to answer questions online from readers of Faking It?”
Denise grinned. “Why not? I feel almost like I wrote this book, and since Fritzi isn’t talking, I’m going to talk for her. I’m telling you, Georgie, there’s a huge need out there, and somebody has to fill it. I’m going to do my best.” She added craftily, “And if Fritzi doesn’t like what I say, then she’ll just have to go public and refute me.”
Georgeanne sat for a moment in awed silence, while her brain sifted through the new set of facts. She stared at the tiny screen and absorbed the fact that Denise’s Q & A Forum had almost a hundred questions awaiting answers. Then she looked toward her bedroom, where two boxes filled with letters to Fritzi Field took up entirely too much space in her closet.
“Denise,” she said slowly, “I think it’s time our friendship progressed to a higher level of trust and mutual support. Let’s call my agent and discuss this over coffee and cookies.”
*
A month later, Zane sprawled on his sofa and glared at the television screen, where a talk show host hugged a tall, shapely woman far too enthusiastically. Zane was tempted to fly to Los Angeles and flatten at least five male talk show hosts he could name. They had no business hugging Georgeanne Hartfield. She belonged to him.
In his dreams. Zane leaned back, muttering curses, as Georgeanne seated herself across from the host and smiled graciously. This time, Georgeanne had brought a companion. Denise Devereaux, stunning in a slinky red outfit, also took a hug from the host and sat down beside Georgeanne.
Zane sat up, certain something earthshaking was forthcoming. It had been weeks since Georgeanne took his advice and left her job and her home to do a book publicity tour. He had recorded every single show he could when he was unable to watch her, but Georgeanne onscreen just wasn’t the same as Georgeanne in person, preferably in his arms.
He refused to think about the fact that she hadn’t called him but one time in the past month. Book publicity tours were whirlwind affairs, or so he understood. She probably didn’t have time for conversations with him.
A loud pounding sounded at his apartment door. Zane ignored it on the grounds that it was Friday night.
“I know you’re in there,” Hunter Howell called. “Open up.”
Zane sprang to his feet and flung open the door. Hunt probably knew all these wolfish talk show hosts.
“I know ’em all,” Hunter said, when asked. “Just tell me the name, and I’ll tell you whether or not to worry. Now move aside and let me in.”
Zane scowled. “I thought you lived in Los Angeles.”
“Glad to see you, too.” Hunter stepped inside and shut the door behind him.
Zane sat down and glared toward the television, where a close-up shot of Georgeanne’s face gave him a wrenching pang of loss. “Glendale Guzman is hugging up to her. I’d like to … ”
“You should.” Hunter came and sat beside him in the semi-darkness. “Old Glen is known for trying to bed his guests.”
“What?”
“Just kidding. Relax, Zane. The guy is a happily married man with three little kids. Hugging is his only interviewing skill.”
The brothers listened in silence as Georgeanne talked about what it was like to be Fritzi Field and answered questions about Faking It. Her replies sounded natural and polished, and Zane sighed. He was so far gone, even her voice over the television set moved him.
“How much longer are you going to put up with this?” Hunter asked, during the first commercial break.
Zane scowled. “With a career like Fritzi Field’s, what woman wants to be a pediatrician’s wife?” He laughed with some bitterness. “Did I ever tell you that Roxanne was after me to switch to cardiology?”
“Gawd,” Hunter said.
“Lots of social prestige in cardiology these days,” Zane said. “Don’t see anything in it, myself. If people would quit smoking and drinking and get some exercise … ”
“Georgie seems to like pediatricians. Who’s that with her?”
Zane scowled again when the talk show resumed. “It’s one of the nurses from the clinic where Georgie works. She’s big fan of Georgie’s book.”
Georgeanne said in her rich voice, “Glen, I’d like to introduce you and the viewers to Fritzi Field’s official spokeswoman, Ms. Denise Devereaux. She’s the administrator of ‘Fritzi’s Front Porch,’ a website devoted to Faking It, and she will be answering all reader mail. Every letter will be answered, and readers with questions can be assured … ”
“Well, I’ll be,” Zane said, astonished. “She’s turning it all over to Denise.”
“She isn’t going to write a follow-up to Faking It?” Hunter chuckled. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen a bestselling author dump her fame into someone else’s lap and take a hike.”
Onscreen, Georgeanne listed Denise’s qualifications and said, “No, Glen, I’m afraid I have nothing further to say about Faking It. But Denise has been hard at work for weeks, planning a sequel and answering reader mail. Believe me, no one is more qualified or better able to fill Fritzi Field’s shoes.”
“She’s quitting.” Zane still couldn’t believe it.
“You didn’t know about this?” Hunter asked.
“I’ve only talked to Georgie twice since she left.” Zane frowned at the memory. “I was tempted to tell her to come back home, but she owes her readers something.”
“Looks like she’s taken care of that end on her own.” Hunter got to his feet. “I’ll go make coffee. So why haven’t you called her more often?”
“Georgie deserves a chance to reap the benefits of her hard work,” Zane said, wondering why the words left him feeling so hollow. “I don’t want to influence her unfairly.”
Hunter halted at the door to the kitchen. “So while you’re busy being noble, the woman you want is getting the idea that you don’t care about her?”
Zane gazed at Georgeanne, who looked a little thinner than he liked. “She can’t possibly think that. I told her we needed to put our relationship on hold, and that we’d talk about us later.” He watched G
eorgeanne’s face, noting her practiced words and expression even as he remembered how hard he’d had to argue in order to get Georgeanne to see her duty. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but she deserves a chance to enjoy her success.”
Hunter lounged against the doorframe. “For what it’s worth, brother, poor old Georgie doesn’t look particularly happy to me.”
Chapter 12
Georgeanne lay on the bed in a Las Vegas hotel suite, which was exactly like the hotel suites she’d recently left in New York, Atlanta, Chicago, and Los Angeles, among other cities and stared at the television screen. It was one o’clock in the morning, and Georgeanne couldn’t sleep.
“Our guests today are Miss Georgeanne Hartfield, also known as Fritzi Field, author of the bestselling book, Faking It, and the official Fritzi Field spokeswoman, Denise Devereaux,” the hostess said. “Ms. Hartfield, Ms. Devereaux, welcome to ‘Late Las Vegas Lights’.”
The camera focused on Georgeanne’s face while she politely thanked the hostess. Georgeanne realized that no amount of exposure would ever make her like seeing herself on television.
Worse, she had lost nearly fifteen pounds during the past four weeks. Even Georgeanne had to admit that she was probably the only woman in the United States whom weight loss didn’t benefit.
Small wonder she had lost weight. She had toured the country and appeared on a grand total of sixty-four radio and television talk shows, sometimes doing four or five shows a day. She had autographed what seemed like sixty-four-thousand books, and she had spoken to what seemed like sixty-four-million fans.
Zane had been right, she realized. She did owe her readers this chance to see and hear her. He was also right in saying she was a writer, something she had never fully realized. She thought she had just gotten lucky. Thanks to Zane, she now knew that although a bestselling book might indeed be a lucky break, it was also the result of doing a lot of things right, and that Faking It was a book that Georgeanne Hartfield had been uniquely qualified to write.
