“It took us this long to receive permission to film around the African art collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art.”
“This would have been perfect,” Kasee fumed. “Now I’m going to look like a double idiot.”
“Just say he’s working,” Brock said in a bored voice.
Kasee had the suspicion that Brock had given her so little notice on purpose. What kind of storyline were they cooking up for her? She’d been hoping for some dignity after last season, regardless of what she’d claimed she’d been willing to accept. If things didn’t look up, she was going to have to start watching old black and white screwball comedies for inspiration. If she couldn’t be dignified she’d have to be funny. “Fine. I’ll throw on something fabulous.”
“I’ll send a car. Half an hour, Kasee.”
“Will there be a hair and makeup team at BMA?”
“No. You’re on your own.” Brock disconnected the phone before Kasee could beg for an assist. Some days she could hardly get her false eyelashes on in ten minutes, and hair took twenty.
“Argh!” Her fingers danced over her phone as she sent a text to Dion, then she ran for the bathroom.
No time for a shower. She plugged in her curling iron and washed her face, then went to work on her eyes. A neutral smoky eye, a full set of false eyelashes, and a sun-kissed look took fifteen minutes. She spent five on her hair, leaving it loose and wavy, then ran for her closet. What did she have that was designer and not worn on camera before?
At the back of her closet, she found a bag with a hot orange Versace that she’d bought on a whim last year as her life was falling apart, then never worn. In reality, it was probably the last designer dress she’d thought she could afford. But she’d be back on top this fall when season two ran, and designers would be clamoring to dress her for free.
“For free,” she said with satisfaction as she contorted her body to get into the dress without assistance. Then she ran downstairs, still in slippers, holding a box of Jimmy Choo five-inch heel sandals.
The car was already waiting, and she was whisked to the BMA. Once inside, Lizzie walked her to the African Art permanent exhibit on the first floor. Her stiletto heels made dramatic clicks on the wooden floor as they entered. Lizzie, in off-brand tennis shoes and comfortable, slouchy clothes, moved soundlessly. Kasee could see different-colored painted walls from one room to the next, to highlight different kinds of art. Masks, hangings, sculptures, even furniture, but it all felt antiseptic to her, too removed from their place of origin.
“We should travel to Africa,” she whispered to Lizzie, with a sudden burst of inspiration. “Do you think Brock and the cast would go for it if I planned a trip there? I can find out where Dion’s father’s family came from originally.”
“I doubt that’s in the budget,” Lizzie whispered back. “Besides, if you went on a trip, wouldn’t it just be for the girls? That’s really what the show is about.”
Kasee shrugged and tried to wiggle her toes to restore the feeling in them. Why was dressing for success so uncomfortable a lot of the time? “Just an idea.” But if she could talk about it here and now, it would make it obvious that she and Dion were very much together. Though this afternoon had concerned her a bit. After meeting his mother and brother today, she knew it was more important than ever to keep his family out of the equation. His mother was a disaster in desperate need of rehab, and his sweet younger brother Johan had no filter against the world. She’d hate to see him exploited for television. Thank God they hadn’t been there with cameras. What a made-for-television disaster that would have been. “One other thing, though?”
“Yes?”
“Do you know when we’re getting paid? I need to buy some new clothes. My wardrobe from last year isn’t going to stretch much farther.”
“Not any time soon,” Lizzie said. “You signed the season deal, not a scene deal.”
“At the time it sounded like a good idea,” Kasee muttered. She was going to have to take a mortgage out on her town home. Keith’s attorneys had eviscerated her, hiding his assets with all the cunning of a band of desperate pirates. She’d been lucky to get the townhouse and her personal effects. “Listen, I get it if you’re selling show secrets to the blogs, but leave me out of it, will you? I need a break.”
“You can’t expect me to have any sympathy for you, Kasee. I’ve been in your house. Your poor little rich girl act is a joke.”
“I doubt my bank account is any fatter than yours. I’m working hard just like you. Just don’t sell out the show? Leave something to attract the viewers, okay?”
Lizzie stuck out her lips in a pout and said nothing. Kasee stiffened her spine and walked away from the assistant.
As she entered the room, she looked enviously at Tammy’s new Vera Wang gown. Totally inappropriate for the event, but beautiful. The bodice was so deeply cut that it exposed all of Tammy’s bony protuberances. Her former best friend had lost a good fifteen pounds. Stress? Anxiety? Diet pills? And Kasee expected she had coated herself with that heavy spray tan to cover up the evidence. They’d been such good friends once that she noted every detail. She fought the urge to pull Tammy aside and ask what was going on.
“Evening.”
While she’d been staring at Tammy, Lizzie had drifted away, and…Keith had taken the assistant’s place.
Her ex handed her a glass of champagne. “Apparently we’re here to celebrate the acquisition of a new mask,” he said, deadpan. “Stephanie’s idea, of course.”
“What? Only the black girl can be interested in African art?” Kasee snapped, not wanting to hear one more racist word out of Keith. She didn’t have to waste her time anymore.
“No boy toy tonight? You a little tense?”
She ignored Keith’s lip twitch. “He’s working.”
“I hear he’s been ranting about all the money you’re costing him. His seventy-five thousand isn’t good enough?”
She stared at Keith’s Armani suit. It probably cost him three or four thousand dollars. “Only husbands are getting that. Not boyfriends.”
“You hoping for a proposal?”
“From Dion?” Kasee shook her head as his derisive smirk turned to amusement. “I-I mean we’ve only been dating a short time. Not all of us go from zero to sixty like you and Tammy.”
“I’d known her for seven years,” Keith said. “She was your friend, perpetually underfoot.”
Tammy had even lived with them for five months at one point half a decade ago. Kasee had never for one second thought Tammy was attracted to Keith. She’d thought the situation completely safe. Honestly, she’d loved Tammy like a sister. Apparently you couldn’t trust anyone when fame and money were on the line. Tammy had gotten greedy and wanted the entire Kean lifestyle, instead of just the side benefits. Her experience with Tammy was why she hadn’t pushed for Louise to be included in the show this season so far. She didn’t want to be betrayed again by someone she considered a friend. Dion was enough to handle.
Keith bent his head away from her. Kasee knew that signal, and traitorously, her body recalled it, too. He wanted to go somewhere alone with her.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said irritably.
“Just a private conversation,” he said. Cheekbones lifted in his still-attractive face as he enticed her. But she didn’t feel the zing she once had. Instead, she looked away.
She glanced at Tammy, who was fingering her collarbones. Could she be ill? What would she do if Tammy was? Restore their friendship? Pretend the past didn’t matter?
What if he wanted to talk about Tammy’s health? “Very well.” She followed Keith out of the gallery and into the antechamber. When she sat on a bench along the wall, out of sight of the cameras, Keith sat next to her, his thigh brushing hers. She tried to put inches between them, but she’d sat on the edge and there wasn’t room.
Behind them, though, were a few inches of space, enough for Keith to drape his arm across the back of the bench. He leaned close to her a
nd nuzzled her temple with his nose. She turned to protest and somehow he managed to get his lips on hers.
She pulled away, scrambling to her feet. “What on earth?”
He set down his flute and reached for her hands. Before she could pull away, he said, “Hush, darling. I’ll make it all right.”
“I don't need any more of this drama for the cameras.”
“It’s not for the cameras, Kasee.”
“You never know,” she said, “and we’re miked anyway. Don’t think you can pull the wool over my eyes.”
“I’m not trying to. I’m sure you can see it’s not working out with Tammy. She insisted on the wedding, and my heart was so broken when you left me that I acquiesced, but I’ve had reason to regret it since.” Keith sighed dramatically, looking older than his forty-five years.
“So you want to undo your mid-life crisis?”
“You left me,” he said in a tone of infuriating reasonability.
“Because you cheated.”
“Lots of men cheat.”
As if that gave him a pass. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of her not answering. “Not like this utter humiliation package you delivered. Yes, I know people cheat, and some of their marriages survive thanks to prayer or therapy or whatever. But the truth is, Keith, I didn’t want to get through it. You’d done enough, pressed every love-killing button there was. Better to leave now than later, while I’m still young enough to start over.”
“So what is Dion, then? He can’t be your do-over. Just a fling, before the real husband-hunting commences?”
She wished Dion was here right now. But was it because she wanted him to fight Keith on her behalf or because she really wanted to be with him? Ugh. So not the time to figure it out. “It’s not your problem, whatever is going on with me.”
“I care about you, and we’re stuck together.” He warmed to his theme. “Like I’m Brad and you’re Jennifer and she’s Angelina.”
“Get over yourself,” she snapped. “You’re no Brad Pitt.” She stalked away, formulating her revenge. God help Brock if he used that as a sound bite for the season. She didn’t want her storyline to be a reality TV Jennifer Aniston. She and Jennifer both deserved better.
~
Hours later, too amped up to sleep, she threw her journal aside. For the past year she’d kept a diary. Ironically, she’d started writing out her thoughts in a notebook Tammy had given her. As dangerous as it was, she picked up her journal again, and tore out the letter she’d written to her ex best friend. She knew it was a bad idea to put anything in writing, but as she reread her letter, it seemed generic enough, a letter of support for a one-time friend who looked ill.
She went downstairs and found an envelope, then sealed the note inside. The mere thought of doing something nice for Tammy irritated her enough that, back upstairs, she plopped down on the center of her white duvet and opened her notebook again. Then she picked up the phone.
“Kasee Kean!” shrieked a fey voice on the other side of the line.
“I guess I didn’t wake you up,” she said to the renowned reality TV blogger she’d called, one of those people who made a living on the edges of the industry. A spider in the center of a web, Toshi Satomi was just twenty-three and had started his blog during his sophomore year at Stanford. He had a contact or two at every reality television program. At some point in the second month of filming last year, he’d made contact with her, but she’d never contacted him herself, until now.
“Never sleep, darling. Do you have some dirt for me? A little birdie told me you’d been cast again.”
She wondered who fed him dirt on Ladies of Baltimore. Lizzie? “Exactly. And yes, I do have some dirt for you.”
“Spill.”
She plumped the pillow behind her head, getting comfortable for the negotiation. “I can’t do it for free, Toshi. I gave you all that the information about our fashion trend-setting last year for nothing, but I’m a single girl now.”
“A photo is worth a thousand words, darling. Do you have something about that hot new love interest of yours? Hmmm?”
She almost blurted out her news, then caught herself. “No, this isn’t about him. It’s bigger than that.”
“I’ll pay you ten Gs for a photo of your love and whatever this information is, darling.”
“I’ll tell you where to find a photo of him, and this information for ten thousand,” she bargained.
“Done. Give me your PayPal information, then. Spill.”
She gave him her email address, hoping Toshi was honest. What a backstabber she was being, first to offer support to Tammy, and then to do this. “Keith tried to kiss me tonight.”
Toshi shrieked again. “Oh. My. God. On camera?”
“On mike. Maybe on camera.”
“Oh, I’ll have to find out. Hopefully there’s hidden footage. Is he trying to get back together with you?”
“Let’s go with he’s trying to have an affair with me.”
“Love. It. Was Tammy there? Did she see?”
“She was there but we were in the next room.” She spent another ten minutes on the phone, gave him Dion’s website so Toshi could find a headshot, then hung up.
An hour later, she’d swallowed half a bottle of antacids, but she had ten thousand dollars in her online account. At least she could cover her credit card bill for Dion’s brother and buy some new clothes.
Though she didn’t remember ever getting into bed, much less falling asleep, she was jerked awake at nine the next morning by the phone ringing.
“Hello?” she croaked.
“It’s Lizzie. Brock wants you in his office, now.”
Kasee rolled over, spitting out the edge of her sheet that had somehow glued itself to the corner of her mouth. “Huh?”
“Brock’s office, Kasee. Pour a gallon of coffee down your throat.”
“Not going to do the trick.”
“I’ll send a car, okay? Be ready in fifteen minutes.”
“Why is she so perky?” Kasee muttered, tossing the phone on the empty pillow next to her. Was Lizzie getting her revenge for their chat by getting her fired? Remembering Dion, she picked it up again. No missed messages or texts. Where was he?
She jumped in the shower for five minutes, did makeup for seven minutes, then struggled into a long cream and pink sundress with a complicated set of shoulder straps, hoping the day was warm enough. By the time she made it downstairs, a car was waiting for her. No one was in the back, but there was a tray of packaged granola bars and other items. She opened a diet cola and drank it with her eyes closed as they drove through the morning sunshine, too sleepy to wonder what Brock wanted.
Her eyes jerked open as the car stopped. Yawning, she stepped out, still holding the cola can. Lizzie met her just inside the front door.
“What is this about? Keith? The blogs?”
Lizzie frowned. “No, but that was great television last night.”
“There was a secret camera. Am I right?”
Lizzie nodded. “Of course. Even if there hadn’t been, the museum has security cameras. But don’t worry, I didn’t sell the story. I don’t want to tank the show. I need my health insurance.”
Oh good. Lizzie had always seemed to be the reasonable sort. “So was Keith playing? Or is there really trouble in the new marriage?”
“That’s a question you should ask the other ladies,” Lizzie said. “On camera. Why don’t you call someone for lunch today? Amber or Stephanie? I’ll have a team meet you here.”
Kasee rubbed the corner of her eye. At least she had her makeup done, and she’d put her hair into a ponytail. She set down the can of cola on the edge of a garbage can. “Sure, set it up while I’m meeting with Brock.”
Lizzie whizzed away at her phone, typing texts as the elevator lifted them to the top floor of the office building. “Go right in to Brock’s office,” she said, walking in the opposite direction.
“Hello, Mrs. Kean,” said Brock’s assistant with a wave.
Her fingers were stained yellow.
“Hello, love,” Kasee said. “Any chance I could get a nonfat latte?”
“Of course,” said the pleasant smoker whose name escaped Kasee. “Go right in.”
Kasee stepped into the office. Brock had stills spread across his desk and he was scribbling notes into a series of boxes on a long sheet of poster paper. Storyboarding, she guessed.
“Kasee, Kasee, Kasee. Ten months away from us and you’ve forgotten how the system works,” Brock said, setting down his fountain pen.
“What?”
“You met with Dion's family off camera,” he chided.
“It was an impromptu meeting. How did you even find out about it?” Her stomach lurched as she remembered Sherry, Dion’s mother, gesturing drunkenly. It wouldn’t take much to send the woman into a full-fledged rant, she suspected.
“We know everything.”
If that were true, she suspected Brock would be at her regarding her secret call to Toshi, not her visit to Dion’s family. No, Brock didn’t know everything. “I have some standards, Brock. Besides, Dion isn’t getting paid for his show appearances. You can’t expect him to involve his family.”
“Most people would be thrilled to be on television.”
She wouldn’t say a word about the situation, not about Sherry or about Johan. “They are private people.”
“Does Dion want a paycheck?”
“He wants me to stop costing him money,” Kasee said. “He’s missed some big opportunities.”
“Well, he’s going to miss more tomorrow. Another couples’ event. Let him know.” He hit a couple of buttons on his phone. “There, sent you the information.”
Brock’s assistant entered with her latte. “Thank you so much,” Kasee said. She tore the paper cover off the straw, an important accessory for any lady with perfect lips, and poked the straw through the hole in the cup.
Brock waited until she had taken her first sip but before she swallowed to speak again. “I can demote you to friend status just like that if you don’t play ball with me.”
She managed not to choke, or cough, though her tongue burned as the liquid caught in her mouth. She took a moment to swallow carefully. “Don't worry, we'll be juicy on camera. I’ll do my job. But unless you offer him a paid spot, you get what you get with him.”
Wild Irish: Wild Image (Kindle Worlds Novella) (A Charisma series novel, The Connollys Book 1) Page 8
