Cabin Fever

by Jillian Burns

  “Whoa.” His brother-in-law Gino stilled from filling his mouth with meatballs. “You hit that hottie?”

  “None of your business.” Joe made a grab for his phone, but his sister twisted away and swiped his phone several more times. Gino eyed him smugly.

  Rosie giggled. “Geez, Joey, you got enough pictures of her in here. Come on, is she your new girlfriend?”

  Joe clenched his teeth and glanced heavenward. “She’s not my girlfriend. She was just the director of the photo shoot.”

  “You have a girlfriend, Joey?” His mother stopped stirring her sauce and turned from the stove.

  Great. Now they’d done it. “No, Ma.”

  “Then how come you have so many pictures of her?” Rosie asked.

  His ma’s eyes widened and gleamed with hope. “Is she a nice girl, Joey?”

  He was going to kill his sister. Slowly. For almost a decade now Ma had been obsessed with him finding a nice girl, settling down and giving her grandkids. She already had twelve but that apparently was not enough progeny. “Ma. She’s not my girlfriend. Carly is just the blogger who ran the contest.”

  “This is the Carly, from Carly’s Couture?” Rosie asked.

  “Ooh, we love her blog!” Donna-Marie added.

  “You bring her to dinner Sunday, Joey,” Ma ordered. “I want to meet this girl you took so many pictures of.” She punctuated her command by poking her wooden spoon in his direction.

  “Yeah, Joe, bring her to dinner Sunday.” His older sister smirked.

  Joe closed his eyes. Counted to ten. Then he lunged at his sister, seized his phone and shoved it into his duffel bag. “I’m heading home.”

  “Oh, we restocked your fridge and watered your plants, baby brother,” Donna-Marie called as he strode toward the front door. “And you had a lot of mail at the firehouse and your chief asked us to come get it, so we left it on your table.”

  “Mail? At the firehouse?” Joe stopped halfway to the door.

  Rosie giggled.

  “Fan mail.” Donna-Marie smiled knowingly. “From women who saw that you won Carly’s contest.”

  Joe groaned. Shook his head. He was going to kill his sisters.

  BEAUTY BEHIND BARS!

  Supermodel Piper Arrested for Drug Smuggling

  Shocking Link to Swindleton Scandal

  Carly pitched the worst of the tabloids across her kitchen table and knocked back the last of her coffee in one swallow. A glance at her coffeemaker showed the carafe was empty. It didn’t matter. There wasn’t enough caffeine in the world to make the emptiness in her gut go away.

  Facing the editor yesterday had taken every ounce of her nerve. Just getting to the meeting at Modiste had been agony. The minute she’d stepped outside to catch a cab dozens of microphones had been stuck in her face. Cameras rolled while reporters yelled at her for a comment. Or worse; shouted questions about her father.

  When she arrived at the Modiste offices in Times Square, she’d been shown into a conference room by an intern and had waited almost thirty minutes before Ms. Cauzan, the managing editor, and her team showed up. Piper’s manager walked in beside the senior editor all buddy-buddy. Carly had taken that as a sign that things weren’t going to go well for her.

  After making sure Carly had been offered a beverage, Ms. Cauzan had recommended they get right to the business at hand. She’d taken her seat at the head of the long table and folded her hands on its gleaming surface. “Piper’s attorney has accepted a plea bargain on her behalf. She’ll get probation and ninety days community service.”

  Piper’s manager had nodded and smiled at the editor, studiously avoiding eye contact with Carly.

  Ms. Cauzan had cleared her throat. She gave the man seated on her left—probably an attorney—a meaningful look, and then brought her cold gaze back to Carly. “The photos of Piper and your contest winner will be published in the May publication as agreed. But, unfortunately, we’ve decided not to bring your blog in-house. Modiste will be taking their online presence in a different direction.” With that, she’d stood, indicating the meeting was over. Her team got to their feet, as well.

  So, Piper’s manager had been right. The powers at Modiste believed Piper’s titillating—and temporary—fall from grace would ultimately sell more magazines. But Carly’s connection to a billion-dollar Ponzi scheme was not the right kind of publicity.

  Carly had suspected they would do this, yet the news still hit her with a hard thud. Somehow she’d managed to nod and smile, keep her expression pleasant and shake everyone’s hands.

  Of course Modiste had known of her connection to Swindleton Pendleton when they offered to sponsor the contest on her blog. However, at that time her father’s scandal was old news. It had happened ten years ago. The world had moved on. Now, though, public outrage over her father’s criminal activities had been brought to the forefront once again. And Modiste wouldn’t want any association with him.

  Carly didn’t remember much of the cab ride back to her apartment. She’d been pleasantly numb until the taxi pulled in front of her building and she’d had to run the gauntlet of greedy paparazzi.

  Twenty-four hours later and the memory still stung.

  Her cell rang, and the tone startled her. She fumbled as she grabbed it to check the ID. And suppressed a groan. Not now. The ringtone taunted her while she debated answering. If she didn’t talk to her mother now, Vicky would keep phoning until she did. Resigned, she touched Accept. “Hello, Mother.”

  “Carly, how could you do this to me?” Her mother’s wail held just the perfect amount of wobbly voiced sobbing punctuated by sniffles.

  Carly gritted her teeth. “It will blow over soo—”

  “How can you be so calm? Do you know what I’ve had to go through today? I had to cancel my spa appointment and my trainer won’t brave the vultures gathered outside my house. And now I’ve got a migraine coming on, I can just feel it.”

  Spas and trainers? Carly knew her mother’s new husband had a lucrative cosmetic-surgery practice in Taos, but still.... There was always that niggling traitorous question in the deep recesses of Carly’s mind. Had her mother known about her father’s illegal scheme? “Mother, you need to calm down.”

  “That’s easy for you to say, but I can’t leave my house. I can’t go to lunch. I can’t meet my friends. They certainly can’t come over here, Carly. It’s happening all over again. This is just like after your father...”

  Carly tuned out the rest of her mother’s rant. She knew exactly what it had been like. Her mother had fallen apart and Carly had been left to pick up the pieces.

  For the first few months after her father’s arrest, Carly had been haunted by his crimes. Every major newspaper, magazine and television newscast had skewered Charles Pendleton. And deservedly so. But the media had decided she and her mother were guilty by association. Even though she’d been completely clueless about her father’s actions.

  At school, she’d heard whispered slurs. Crooked Carly or Carly Swindleton. Every friend had deserted her. She’d been ostracized, and, if she was lucky, ignored. She’d been forced to change to a public school her senior year, where at least most of her classmates weren’t from families her father had defrauded.

  Then, while she was in college, he went to trial and it had started all over again.

  It’d taken her years to pull together some semblance of a normal life. By the time she’d earned her degree she’d vowed that someday she’d redefine the name Pendleton.

  “Carly? Are you even listening?”

  Carly blinked. “Yes, Mother.”

  “If you had just changed your last name this wouldn’t be happening.”

  “Which stepfather’s name should I have taken, Mother?” Somehow, changing her name had seemed like denying who she really was. And, maybe a part of her had just wanted to defy her mother.

  “Well at least I have a man. You can’t even manage to keep a boyfriend, much less a husband.”

  “I support my
self, Mother.”

  “Support? You’ve struggled with that blog for years and where has it gotten you?”

  “Uh, thirty thousand followers and recognition from Modiste magazine!”

  “Really? That many? And Modiste magazine?” There was a speculative tone in her voice. “Are they going to buy you out? Carly, you could make millions. Oh, that’s Simon on the other line. Talk later.” The line went dead.

  Wow. Good thing she had no illusions about her mother. The relationship was what it was.

  At the time of the scandal Carly had made the excuse that Vicky was too distraught to see how miserable her daughter was. Her mother had hated losing the house and her status. They’d moved into a budget motel, and, for a while, the district attorney had even investigated Vicky as a possible accessory to her husband’s pyramid scheme. But within six months Vicky had remarried and moved to Florida, leaving Carly alone. Carly had scrambled to find a place to live and taken a second job.

  Other than a few phone calls, she hadn’t heard from her mother again until Vicky showed up on her doorstep with the news that her marriage was over. She’d stayed with Carly a couple of weeks—Carly slept on the sofa—until Vicky met and ran off with her current husband. And that was the beginning of seeing her mother only when she got bored with Taos and needed a New York fix.

  At least she’d checked into a hotel the past couple of times. And Carly’s second job had been serendipitous. Sewing at night for an apparel manufacturer in the garment district had given her a look at the world of fashion from the inside out.

  Carly returned to the kitchen table, sat and opened her laptop. The photos from the cruise still needed to be sorted and the ones to be used for the magazine spread chosen. She opened the folder, determined to— Oh, that one of Joe was... She bit her lip.

  Sexy. Joe was sitting on the outcropping of rocks on the beach, his elbow on his raised knee, and that smile. He seemed to be looking directly through the camera at Carly. And the smolder in his eyes. How could any woman resist a man who was so steamingly sensual? Steamingly? Was that even a word?

  Who cared?

  She didn’t want to stop reliving their nights together, the way he’d made love to her. She imagined his tanned skin radiating heat, defining muscle. His hands touching her, pleasuring her. His large body moving over her, entering her...

  She closed her eyes, remembering the feel of his lips devouring hers, his tongue—oh, the things he’d done with his tongue. Something wet dropped onto her forearm and she blinked. Crying? She never cried. She was just stressed. She blotted a tissue under her eyes, careful not to smudge her mascara. There’d been all the work on the contest, then the travel and directing the photo shoot, and then yesterday she’d had to worry about putting out fires at Modiste.

  Putting out fires? Oh, no. What had made her come up with that metaphor? Did everything have to remind her of Joe?

  Joe... She studied the photo of him again. What was he doing right now? Was he at work? Sitting around the firehouse? Or was he off work? Home? Maybe on a date or...had he brought his date back to his place for the night? A deluge of images flooded her brain. Of him naked, sprawled on a bed with some beautiful woman.

  Stop!

  She’d never pined over some guy. And she wasn’t going to start now. It’d been a fun fling. Great sex. But it was over. And she had work to do.

  Straightening her spine, she grabbed her cell phone. Screw the paparazzi camped in front of her apartment building. She ordered her usual dim sum for one and then went to run a bath.

  She would look at the photos later tonight. After a meal, and her scented bath oils, and some Pilates restored her equilibrium. After she’d steeled her mind to see Joe Tedesco as just a model in a photo shoot.

  She would do this.

  * * *

  “ANJU RAJARAMAN, how do you plead?”

  Piper startled at the sound of her real name coming from the judge’s lips.

  “She pleads no contest, Your Honor.” Her attorney spoke for her. He’d advised her to not admit guilt but to take the plea bargain of no contest in exchange for a lowered charge of assault—only a misdemeanor—as opposed to aggravated assault, which carried a mandatory term in a penitentiary.

  “Very well, the fine is set at five thousand dollars and time served.” The judge banged his gavel and that was it. She was free to go.

  “Thank you.” Piper shook the lawyer’s hand, then turned to Ragi, her dear friend standing behind her, the only one who really knew her and understood. “Let’s go home.” Piper slipped her arm through hers.

  They’d stayed at The Palms awaiting her court date. The Miami resort hotel was accustomed to catering to celebrities’ needs and it was as good a place as any to try to hide from the press and the paparazzi.

  “No.” Ragi pulled her arm from Piper’s.

  “What do you mean no?” Piper saw the deep sadness in Ragi’s eyes and frowned. “We can’t hang out here any longer. I’ve got work in New York.”

  “Then you must return there without me. New York is destroying you. You must find peace, Anju.”

  Piper glanced around the courtroom, and then leaned in to whisper. “We’ll talk somewhere else, okay?”

  “What difference does it make now? How could anyone think any worse of you than they already do?”

  Piper looked closer at Ragi. Her face was sallow. There were dark circles under her eyes. “You aren’t well?” She spoke to her in their native language of Hindi but Ragi replied in English.

  “I’m fine. It is you who is sick.” She placed her palm over her upper chest. “In here.”

  Piper had no answer for that. She shrugged. “There’s nothing I can do about that.”

  “There is. Be honest with the therapists at the rehab center you go to. Tell them how lonely you are, even when you’re in a crowd or with a group of friends. Tell them about how you miss your brother. How you can’t sleep at night.”

  Piper stiffened even before Ragi finished speaking. “Please.” She scoffed. “What can that help? They probably wouldn’t understand anyway. People who don’t really know what loss is, can’t talk about it or advise—”

  “Joe recommended this lady. She’s helped a friend of his whose wife died when their towers were struck.”

  “Joe? How would he know someone in Florida?”

  “His friend was a college roommate who grew up here and he moved back after his wife died so his children could be near his parents and his wife’s parents.”

  “Ragi, please. I just want to get back to work.”

  Her friend frowned. She looked skeptical. “I’ll always be grateful to you for the opportunity you gave me. But I can’t watch you destroy yourself.” Her friend bent to reach for her handbag and slung it over her shoulder, then straightened to face her, her chin raised stubbornly. “You must find a new assistant..”

  Piper couldn’t believe this was happening. “But what will I do without you?”

  The sadness in Ragi’s eyes darkened and they welled with tears. “I don’t know.” She wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “Goodbye, Anju.”

  Piper returned her hug with both arms and didn’t let go even when Ragi tried to pull away.

  9

  “WELL, LOOK WHO showed up. Mr. Sexy!” Wakowski struck a pose with one hand behind his head and the other on his hip as Joe entered the fire-station rec room. With his barrel chest and bald head, Wakowski looked more like a trucker having a seizure.

  “Hey, Joe! You gonna be America’s next hot model?”

  “Well, if it ain’t little Joey back from paradise!”

  The other guys greeted Joe as they stood from where they’d been sitting in front of the TV.

  Joe lifted his hands and crooked his fingers. “Come on. Get it over with.”

  Everman smirked. “We gonna see you modeling underwear on the jumbotron in Times Square now?”

  Stockton snickered. “He’s probably gonna pose for the fireman’s calendar.”


  Joe smiled and nodded while the guys hooted and catcalled. “You guys are just jealous.” He tossed his duffel onto a cot, then strode to the foosball table and grabbed the 5-bar and the 3-bar rods.

  “Course we are, Tedesco.” Wakowski answered as the guys followed him, gathering around the game table.

  “So, Joe. You and Piper, eh?” Miller waggled his brows and elbowed him in the ribs.

  “You losers gonna play or what?” Joe spun the 3-bar rod, hitting the ball toward the goal.

  “Seriously.” Wakowski grabbed the goalie rod and blocked the ball, hitting it back into play. “Did you know the contest lady was Swindleton’s daughter? What was she like?”

  Joe shoved his 3-bar forward and spun, trying for the goal again and missed. “How’d you guys know about that?”

  “It’s everywhere, dude.” Miller grabbed the 2-bar rod, playing defense.

  “Yeah, who doesn’t know about it?” Wakowski said, jostling a rod back and forth, blocking another potential goal.

  Stockton nodded. “Try the Daily Scoop.” He tossed a tabloid at Joe’s chest, and then joined the game, gripping a steel rod.

  The game forgotten, Joe caught the newspaper, glanced at the front page, and there was Carly’s picture in a full-color eight by ten. Why did the gossip rags have to choose the most unflattering images? The photographer had caught her glowering at someone off camera. The headline insinuated that she was spending her daddy’s ill-gotten millions on luxurious beach vacations. Ouch.

  That had to hurt. He knew how hard she’d worked during the cruise. How she’d bristled when he’d asked her about her connection to Pendleton at their initial meeting. She’d tried to hide her reaction, as if she didn’t care who knew or remembered, but he’d noticed her shoulders had stiffened and her chin had raised just a notch. And that defensive glitter in her eyes. Oh, he’d gotten to know that look pretty well.

  And he missed it.

  He flung the tabloid at the garbage and took up the game again. “Pizza’s on me tonight, boys.”