by Meg Cabot
Cook, Lou thought. He said it so casually, as if everyone had had a Cook in their childhood.
But hey, so far he was more comfortable in the kitchen than either Lou or Barry had ever been, and neither of them had grown up with servants in the house. In fact, if it hadn’t been for takeout, she and Barry might well have starved to death before either of them ever picked up a pot to boil some pasta.
Then she realized that, beyond the fact that Jack had grown up rich, the heir to the Townsend Securities fortune, she knew virtually nothing else about him.
“Did you, um, have any brothers and sisters?” she asked, again in that weird voice that sounded so unlike her own.
“Nope,” Jack said. He splashed some wine from the bottle into the remaining empty glass. “Just me and Mom and Dad.”
“Oh,” Lou said. Then, because she could think of nothing else—except how nice his butt continued to look in those jeans—she said, “That must have been lonely.”
“That’s what all you people who come from big families think,” Jack said, with a grin. “But how could I miss what I’d never had? And I got along with my parents.” The grin disappeared. “At least until I decided I wanted to be an actor.”
Lou, relieved the grin was gone, because it had done something to her pulse she had not liked at all, figured this would be a topic on which they could dwell until bedtime, if it was going to keep him from smiling and messing up her resolve to have nothing to do with him…at least physically, anyway.
“Oh? Your parents didn’t approve of you pursuing an acting career?”
“Well, my mom didn’t mind,” Jack said. “My father wanted me to take over the family business. Or, at the very least, go to law school.” He took a sip from his wine. “When I disagreed, he pretty much cut me off. I don’t think playing a janitor on an extremely short-lived sitcom was exactly what he had in mind for his only son.”
Lou said, “Oh, but you’ve done lots of stuff since then. I mean, that was just when you were starting out, right? You’ve had incredible success since then. I mean, he must have been proud of the work you did on ‘STAT.’ ”
“Maybe,” Jack said with a shrug. “But he never exactly had a chance to tell me. He died during the second season. He never even made it to the first Copkiller.”
“Oh,” Lou said. Amazingly, she really did feel badly for him. For Jack Townsend! “That must have been hard.”
“No harder, I expect, than growing up the only girl in a houseful of boys.” The grin was back. “They the ones who taught you that move you executed on me back there?”
She felt her cheeks growing hot at the reference, however oblique, to the kiss they’d shared. Fortunately, the timer dinged on the microwave, and Jack had to go see to the creamed spinach.
“No,” she said, carefully. “That was my dad. He was worried about me, you know, when I went off to college. He wanted to make sure I could take care of myself.”
“Yeah,” Jack said, stirring the spinach. “Well, you can tell him from me that he succeeded. That must have been pretty intimidating for your boyfriends back in high school, huh? I mean, dating a girl with four big brothers and a dad who owned firearms.”
Lou didn’t know if it was the wine, the ease with which they were conversing—without rancor, for practically the first time all day, or the fact that she was finally, after a nightmare forty-eight hours, starting to relax. In any case, she found herself laughing at Jack’s question, and saying, “Well, I don’t know. There was only the one.”
“Only the one what? Gun?”
“No,” she said, with a giggle. A giggle! Lou, who never giggled, but practiced laughing throatily, like Linda Fiorentino, whenever she was stuck in traffic on the freeway! “Boyfriend.”
Jack apparently burnt his hand on the creamed spinach. He waved it in the air as he asked, with some bewilderment, “What? Barry? Barry Kimmel was your only boyfriend? Ever?”
Belatedly, Lou realized what she’d just confessed. To a man who’d been linked romantically with as many women as Jack had—and that was just since he’d become famous—the grand total of Lou’s past partners had to be an astonishing, even off-putting thing.
But what did she care if he was put off by it? She didn’t want to have a relationship with him, anyway. Vicky had cured her of any tendency in that direction. And besides, Lou had sworn off actors, remember? Wasn’t that what the towel on the head and the no makeup thing had been all about in the first place?
So she lifted her glass of wine, took a fortifying sip, and said, “Yep. Just Barry.”
Jack stared at her in utter disbelief. The last time she’d seen him look this astonished was during the read-through of Copkiller IV, when he’d gotten to the part where Detective Pete Logan’s hand was forcibly broken by an Inuit crimelord.
“My God,” he said. “Just one guy, your entire life? You’re practically—” He broke off.
She narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. “Practically what?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said and turned back to the stove. “Oh, hey, these look about done. Let me just grab a couple of plates and—”
“Practically what, Townsend?” she asked, her voice hardening.
“Well, you know,” he said, with an embarrassed shrug. “A virgin.”
18
“Oh!” Tim Lord’s wife cried, clapping her hands together. “He didn’t! That is just too funny. It sounds like just the kind of thing he would do. Doesn’t it sound like the kind of thing Jack would do, Mel?”
Melanie Dupre—that, Eleanor thought, was another one of those stage names Jack’s friends all seemed to be so fond of taking; the girl couldn’t actually be French. No Frenchwoman of Eleanor’s acquaintance would name her daughter Melanie—smiled, but only just. Unlike Vicky, Melanie did not seem particularly interested in hearing stories from Jack’s childhood. Not that Eleanor blamed her, particularly. Jack had been a sweet child, of course. But it could not be entertaining for a young woman like Miss Dupre, who was so ravishingly beautiful, to sit around on a Saturday night in a hotel suite, listening to a mother’s affectionate stories about her son, a man the girl hardly knew.
Or perhaps Melanie knew Jack better than she let on, since she said, politely hiding a yawn behind a pretty hand—though the girl’s fingernails, Eleanor could not help thinking, were really a bit too long for her taste—“Oh, Jack told me that story a million times.”
Mrs. Lord shot the younger girl a look that Eleanor could only describe as venomous.
“Did he?” Vicky said acidly. “Well, he never told me.”
Then, the angelic-looking Vicky—who, after she’d learned that there was a chance Jack was still alive, had become positively animated, and had changed out of her pyjamas and actually run a comb through her hair— turned back towards Eleanor and said, her blue eyes wide as a child’s, “Tell me what Jack did next, Mrs. Townsend.”
“Oh,” Eleanor said. She glanced at Mr. Calabrese—or Frank, as he’d urged her to call him. Eleanor did not, as a rule, approve of nicknames, but Franklin seemed too formal a name for this kindly man. Poor thing. He looked as sleepy as she felt, almost nodding on the white couch. Poor, sweet man. What a darling he had been since the moment they had met, letting Alessandro sit on him like that.
And how invaluable he’d proved in speaking with the police! As a retired officer himself, he quite understood the “lingo” and had explained all manner of things to her, such as how the police go about conducting a search and rescue mission like the one they’d currently embarked upon to find Jack and Frank’s little Lou. Eleanor had already developed quite a soft spot for the unfortunate Miss Calabrese, who’d had the great misfortune to be called Louise. If anyone should have demanded a stage name, it ought to have been Frank Calabrese’s poor daughter. Louise Calabrese indeed!
Still, she was quite a pretty girl—Frank had shown her a photo—and very successful, too, in her career, so Eleanor supposed the poor thing’s name hadn’t hurt her t
hat badly. Still, that awful business with that di Blase man, the one Frank called Barry, the one that horrid Greta Woolston had left Jack for. Eleanor did not like to cast aspersions upon people she had never met, but she quite agreed with Frank’s assessment that this Barry fellow was “smarmy.”
Such delightful new words Frank had taught her! Really, but he was a delicious discovery. Eleanor slid a look at him from the corners of her eyes. Good looking, too, and quite a gentleman. Why, Eleanor could not remember the last time a door had been held open for her by anyone—excluding Richards, of course.
Much more gentlemanly than that horrible Tim Lord. Imagine, that man having directed the highest-grossing motion picture of all time—that one about the blimp that Frank’s daughter had written. It was no wonder, really, that the little man was so full of himself. Still, it was unconscionable of him and his wife, keeping them like this. He must have known that she and Frank had spent the entire day in and out of interviews with the police, the Federal Aviation Association, the press….Why, it had been enough to exhaust a much younger person, and here was Eleanor, getting on towards sixty-five…though wild horses would not have dragged the truth of this from her.
Still, it might have occurred to their host and hostess that the two of them were still on eastern time. It was past midnight back home! Even Alessandro was quite unconscious in his little wicker basket.
“Mrs. Townsend?” Vicky Lord was looking at her expectantly. Oh, dear. She must have asked a question. Eleanor was simply so tired. How could she remember…?
Oh, yes. The story she’d been telling, the one about Jack.
“Well, Jack, being just a little boy, hadn’t any real interest in art,” she said, “and so he was running this little automobile he had—a toy one, you know—along the wall…of the Louvre! I had no idea until a guard came up to him and said, ‘Petit monsieur—’ So polite, the guards at the Louvre, have you ever noticed? ‘S’il te plait, ne conduis pas sur le mur.’ Please don’t drive on the wall. Isn’t that amusing?”
Tim Lord’s wife laughed, but Miss Dupre did not. A beautiful but rather dense creature, Eleanor thought to herself. She was rather like Greta Woolston in that way.
This realization caused Eleanor to take another look at her son’s costar. Good heavens, she thought to herself. Could this girl, and Jack—
No. It was preposterous. Surely Jack had learned his lesson by now. He could not possibly be involved with this girl. Not another actress. No….
But then the girl said, glancing at Mrs. Lord through her eyelashes, “Yes, Jack told me about that, last time I was at the ranch. You’ve been to the ranch, haven’t you, Vicky?”
Mrs. Lord had been taking a sip from her champagne glass. At the other girl’s question, she choked a little. Tim Lord, who was sitting on a chair across from his wife, looked concerned. “Are you all right, sweetheart?” he asked, so courteously that Eleanor, had she not been convinced of the man’s disingenuousness, might have thought better of him.
“Fine,” Vicky said, coughing into her closed fist. “I’m fine. Sorry. Just went down the wrong tube, I guess. I’m so sorry.”
Beside her, Frank Calabrese stirred, apparently wakened by the coughing. He looked around, his blue eyes wide, as if he were not sure where he was. Eleanor understood the feeling.
“What time is it?” he asked.
Tim Lord looked at his watch. “Only half past nine,” he said. “Let me get you scotch, Mr. Calabrese. I have a twelve-year-old that’ll knock your socks off—”
“No, thank you,” Frank said, climbing to his feet. “It’s late for me. Past midnight. And we’ve got another long day ahead of us tomorrow. Eleanor, are you all right? Or would you like me to escort you back to your room?”
Eleanor felt a rush of gratitude for the man.
“Oh, I am tired,” she said. “You’ve all been so kind, but if you don’t mind—”
“Not at all,” Vicky Lord said, jumping to her feet as if suddenly anxious to see them go. Which was odd, since she’d been the one so insistent upon their coming up to the suite for drinks after their dinner—which had been lamentable; it was always a mistake for a restauranteur not to stick to simple American fare if his chef was not highly skilled in the culinary arts—in the hotel restaurant. “I’m sure you both must be exhausted. Let me walk you to the door.”
She did, too, hovering about quite unnecessarily, Eleanor thought, while Frank retrieved Alessandro and his basket. Still, at least there was something likable about the young Mrs. Lord. Pity the same could not be said of Melanie Dupre. A sulkier girl Eleanor had not encountered in quite a while. If Jack was seeing her, it could only be because of her looks, which were of course extraordinary. But as Eleanor had been reminding him for some time, looks were not everything. Why couldn’t he seem to find a nice girl, someone to settle down with on that ranch of his, and raise something more than just horses? Her grandchildren, for instance?
Well, that certainly wasn’t going to happen any time soon. Not if Jack continued to consort with sulky starlets like that horrible Melanie Dupre.
“Let’s hope there’s good news in the morning,” Vicky Lord said at the doorway, squeezing Eleanor’s hand.
“Yes,” Eleanor said. “Let’s.”
“Good night,” Vicky said.
“Good night,” Frank said.
Then Vicky closed the door to the suite, and Frank, who had Alessandro’s basket in one arm and the dog in the other, said, “What’s the matter with those people?”
It was all Eleanor could do not to burst out laughing. But really, they might overhear. Still, she had never heard her own thoughts voiced so exactly by another human being.
“I don’t know,” she said, pushing the down button beside the elevator. Tim Lord had taken the only penthouse suite. “It was a bit strange, wasn’t it?”
“Strange?” Frank Calabrese shook his head. “Downright stupid, was what it was. I mean, our kids are missing, and they wanted to drink champagne. That may be how they do things in Hollywood, but I’ll tell you, back on Long Island, somebody’s kid goes missing, nobody’s pouring champagne.”
“I think,” Eleanor said, as the elevator arrived, and Frank politely stepped aside so that she could board it first, “that’s what they drink as a matter of course. The way we drink coffee.”
“Well, I could’ve used a cup of java or two,” Frank said, pushing the button for their floor. They’d been assigned rooms across the hall from one another. “Might’ve kept me awake while that Tim Lord was going on about that Hamlet business. Guess Jack hit big with that one, huh?”
“It was quite critically acclaimed, I suppose,” Eleanor said. “But, oh, dear. It doesn’t give me much confidence, Frank, that Jack and Lou are ever going to be found, if that’s an example of the type of people out looking for them.”
“Well, it’s not,” Frank said. The elevator door slid open to their floor. Frank held it for her as she stepped into the long, carpeted hallway. “The folks that are out looking for our kids aren’t Hollywood types. They’re the real thing. Especially that sheriff. He looked as if finding a polar bear in a snowstorm wouldn’t be too much for him. So don’t you worry, Eleanor. They’re going to be all right.”
Eleanor wished she could believe him. But how could two people simply walk away from a helicopter crash, and vanish without so much as a trace into the woods? It didn’t make sense. Yes, of course, the weather was hampering the search, all of this dreadful snow—she was so glad she’d sold the ski cabin in Aspen; really, she never wanted to see snow again.
But how long could they last, the pair of them, in this cold?
Not long. No one had told her so, but Eleanor had seen the look Frank and that sheriff who’d come down from Myra, the one who’d been to the crash site and driven all that way just to tell them Jack and Lou had not been found there, had exchanged when the subject had come up. They were protecting her from the truth, she was certain of it.
And the truth was
that no one—no matter how many survival movies they might have seen—could last out of doors in the arctic for going on forty-eight hours.
Eleanor was not, of course, unaccustomed to loss. She’d lost both her parents long ago, and more recently, her husband. She had weathered all three losses, weathered them with the best humor she could, as well as a little grace…or so she hoped.
But how could anyone weather the loss of an only child? It couldn’t be done. If Jack was gone…if Jack was gone….
She might as well be dead, too.
Then Frank was putting Alessandro and his basket down. Only instead of asking her for her key, so that he could open her door for her and then politely bid her goodnight, he took her arm, and said, “Now what’s this?” while peering down into her face.
Eleanor, who was quite certain she must look very sulky indeed—sulkier even than that nasty Melanie Dupre—tried to smile bravely.
“Nothing,” she said. “It’s nothing. Only I…I’ve got something in my eye.”
“Now, Eleanor,” Frank said, in his deep, kind voice. “We talked about this. You and I have a couple of real hotheads for kids. You really think a couple of hotheads like those two are going to let a little cold and snow get to them?”
Eleanor sniffled. She couldn’t help it. Her handkerchief was in her purse, but she didn’t feel like fishing it out just then. She was so tired. So terribly tired.
“You listen to me,” Frank said. “My daughter’s the stubbornest person I ever met, outside of her mother. If you think she’s going to let a little something like a blizzard get in her way, well, you don’t know her. And from what I hear about your Jack, well, hypothermia shouldn’t bother him a bit. They are going to be fine, Eleanor. Just fine. They’re probably holed up in a cave somewhere right now, snarling right back at the bear they kicked out of it.”
