Snark and Stage Fright (Snark and Circumstance Book 5)

by Wardrop, Stephanie

  Book 5 in the Snark and Circumstance series

  Stephanie Wardrop

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author makes no claims to, but instead acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the word marks mentioned in this work of fiction.

  Copyright © 2015 by Stephanie Wardrop

  SNARK AND STAGE FRIGHT by Stephanie Wardrop

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States of America by Swoon Romance. Swoon Romance and its related logo are registered trademarks of Georgia McBride Media Group, LLC.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Published by Swoon Romance

  Cover designed by Su Kopil of Earthly Charms

  Cover copyright © by Swoon Romance

  To Chimp, Grady, and the H-Bomb.

  Stephanie Wardrop

  1 It’s Just People

  You would think that on a cloudless, picture-postcard-perfect summer day, lying on a raft beside my boyfriend in his pool, I would be incapable of worry.

  But I am good at what I do.

  Michael’s pool is one of my favorite places in the world, because it looks like it was carved out of the woods by nature herself, like a little lagoon accidentally popped up in a New England backyard about a century ago. It’s very rocky and ferny and surrounded by beautiful exotic plants, lush green and fuchsia and orange-colored plants that shouldn’t thrive in Massachusetts but grow here like the happiest transplants ever. And a month ago, on the night of the school prom, when I was one of the least happy transplants to New England ever, Michael and I met here and finally admitted that we actually really liked each other. It’s where he kissed me for the very first time. So I should be luxuriating here on the raft with him, basking in the sun and the enticing smells of chlorine and sunscreen, but I’m not.

  I’m too busy panicking because in a few days I am going to be spending a week at Michael’s family’s summerhouse. Before I’d moved here to Longbourne a year ago, I’d never even met someone who has a different house for different seasons. I don’t even know what you wear at a summerhouse, but I tried to sound casual as I tugged at my Target tankini and asked Michael, “So it’s your dad’s sister’s house, right? And it’s on the beach?”

  Michael nodded and stirred the water with his fingers, making his own personal tiny tidal wave and watching it crash against the side of the raft. One of the reasons I love him is because he seems so serious on the outside but in private he does these silly boyish things like making private tsunamis in the pool. And I have to admit he looks really good wet, with his dark curls plastered to his head like one of those statues of Apollo at a Greek temple, only with a tan, since he’s been teaching little kids to swim every day at the YMCA in Netherfield.

  “Are people going to be, like, walking around in straw hats and white linen dresses all day, sipping smart cocktails and playing croquet?” I asked.

  Michael lifted his sunglasses, revealing his now squinting dark eyes as a familiar smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

  “We’re going to my aunt’s house on Cape Cod, George, not into a deleted scene from The Great Gatsby.” He laughed. “We’ll drive there, and traffic might be a pain, but we don’t require a time machine.”

  I could tell he was amused but a little weary of my pre-travel angst. But summer family get-togethers at my house involve rickety metal grills, inflatable pools for the kids, and lots of potato salad. I’m not sure Michael understands I feel about as comfortable walking into a weeklong celebration for his cousin Rose’s wedding as I would be to crash-land on an island overrun by cannibals. Cannibals wouldn’t care if I wore last season’s sandals or sipped out of the finger bowl. They wouldn’t even have finger bowls.

  I fretted, “Your mom said a bunch of your cousins will be there, home from college. And lots of aunts and uncles, and your grandmother, who doesn’t like me … ”

  He propped himself up on one elbow as best he could without tipping the raft and asked, “George, are you afraid of families in general or mine in particular?”

  “Yours in particular. Some families, from what I understand, are wonderful. Mine is just embarrassing. Yours is … formidable.”

  He shook his head and before I knew it, he’d grabbed my arm and pulled me into the water. For a few seconds I was so startled to find myself underwater I didn’t even move, and then I felt his arms wrapping around me and pulling me up to the surface and over the side of the pool, where we hung as I caught my breath.

  “No decent lifeguard would intentionally drown someone just to show off his skills in saving them,” I grumbled as I pushed my wet bangs out of my eyes with one hand.

  “I wasn’t drowning you, but I was saving you—from yourself. Because you’re building this trip up into something it isn’t,” he sighed and wiped some wet strands of hair off my nose. “It’s just people, George. My people.”

  “Exactly. And I am not good with people.”

  He hoisted himself up out of the pool, then held out a hand to help me up, saying, “If you’re going to worry about the trip to my aunt’s house, then it should be about the lack of unchaperoned moments like this for the next week. You’re right—a bunch of my cousins will be there, and my grandmother, and aunts and uncles, and my mom and dad for part of the time.” He took my hand and led me over to a big striped lounge chair, where we curled up together and he kissed the back of my neck, murmuring, “What worries me is the lack of moments like this.” He turned my head so he could put his lips on mine; they tasted like pool water and iced tea and I drank it in eagerly.

  “I’m sure we’ll be able to sneak behind a sand dune for a moment or two like this,” I assured him, and we kissed until I felt like I could brave that island of cannibals as I long as we got to do this, too.

  2 The Glass Boat

  But days later, when I stopped on the gray stone walkway in front of his aunt’s house so abruptly that Michael almost plowed into me, I knew that I hadn’t just been invited to Cape Cod; I had been invited to another world.

  “Don’t worry.” He laughed as he eased past me with his big, blue Ralph Lauren duffle bag. Walking backward, he explained, “This is my aunt’s house, not my parents’ place. We’ll be able to go to the bungalow tomorrow after my parents get here.” He grinned rakishly, saying, “My aunt and uncle didn’t think it proper to leave us un-chaperoned overnight. So your virtue remains safe for at least another twenty-four hours, Miss Barrett.”

  I wiped my brow with the back of my hand for dramatic effect and sighed, “What a relief!” Then I said, “It’s an impressive house. It looks like a glass boat.” I remembered then that one of the articles my mom had found online had described it as a “contemporary architectural take on an eighteenth-century sailing vessel.” Apparently the Obamas had “vacationed at a house just down the private road and hoped to be back again this year.”

  Sensing my hesitation, Michael sighed a little and resumed walking forward. “It’s too much like an aquarium, actually, with all the glass. And look, from here you can already see the people inside it, going about their business. I was serious when I said we’d have no privacy.”

  “It reminds me of a dollhouse we used to have,” I agreed, half worried that when we got inside, some giant h
and would grab me and, after changing me into some more elegant or fabulous outfit than the tan shorts and striped tee I had on, pose me on a divan or something. And that made me realize that even if I weren’t about to be turned into a human Barbie doll, none of the clothes in my suitcase would ever be good enough for a place like this. None of the clothes I had ever worn would be good enough.

  Michael explained, “The land belonged to my great-great-grandfather and it used to have a couple little bungalows, like my parents’ down the hill there, but when my aunt inherited it, her husband knocked down two of the houses to build this testament to his genius. He’s a pretty famous architect.”

  I considered feigning a sudden-onset and very contagious illness but instead said simply, “I know,” and he raised his eyebrows. But by then we were at the massive red front door so I was spared sharing with him the fact that my mom had been cyber-stalking his family’s properties. I took a deep breath, smelled sea air, and felt a little better for it.

  When he opened the massive front door, a voice within called with delight, “Michael’s here!” Almost immediately, he was swallowed by the arms of a woman with graying blond hair and a laugh like sleigh bells. “And he brought the famous girlfriend! Hellooooo!” She extended a soft-ringed hand and, before I could ask why I was so famous, she introduced herself as Marilyn, Michael’s father’s sister. “Come in, come in! Anthony will take your bags to your rooms. Let me get you some drinks and you can join everyone out on the terrace.”

  She swooped us along like a cartoon duck herding her ducklings through the massive living room in which all the furniture seemed to be made out of chrome and black leather and glass. It was obvious that these people didn’t have pets or small children, whereas at my house, on any given day, you can usually scrape enough feline fur off the couch to craft a whole new cat.

  “Who’s Anthony?” I whispered to Michael as we skirted a gleaming black grand piano and a rock wall fireplace. “One of your cousins?”

  Michael bit back a smile and took my hand as we walked out onto the terrace, saying, “Anthony is one of the servants.”

  “Oh. Got it.”

  All of his assembled relatives—and there appeared to be at least ten of them already—cheered when we walked out onto the flagstone terrace that swept over the meadows below. I headed right for a railing as people were starting to swarm Michael for hugs. Despite his recent interest in taking our relationship to a whole new physical level, he’s not exactly Mr. Touchy-Feely, but his extended family appeared to be the huggy sort. Before an older man could clasp him in a bear hug, Michael grabbed my hand and pulled me toward him.

  “Everybody, this is Georgiana Barrett. Georgia, this is my uncle Doug, my aunt Trudy, and my cousins Megan, Margot, and Jack. And that’s Rick, another cousin, and my uncle Don, who designed this place, and that’s Sterling, my cousin Rose’s fiancée, but she doesn’t seem to be here right now … ”

  I lost track of everyone at that point but just tried to smile and nod and shake hands with the right amount of pressure, not too firm but not too wussy, either, because I’ve read that people can tell a lot about you by your handshake.

  A short, middle-aged woman in a white, short-sleeved blouse and black skirt came up, and I automatically reached out my hand to shake hers but she just stared at me like I had burst into flames. The college-aged cousins, Jack and Margot, laughed a little.

  “Georgia, this is Ingrid,” Margot said to me with a smirk that was not unlike Michael’s. “Can she get you something to drink? How about you, Michael?”

  “Oh,” I said, and I could feel myself blush as Ingrid, the maid, scuttled off. Everyone resumed their happy chatter and when Ingrid came back, I took my glass of iced tea and said, “Thank you so much,” and then wondered if you were even supposed to talk to a servant at all, let alone thank them. I should have paid more attention to all of those episodes of Downton Abbey I’d watched with Mom and Leigh and Tori.

  I drifted back to the wooden railing running between short stone pillars and looked out at the meadow, which was wild with purple and yellow flowers. Michael came up behind me and set his glass next to mine, then nudged my elbow with his own. I could see that he was smiling with great amusement at Faux Pas Number One and was no doubt eagerly awaiting the hilarity of subsequent ones.

  “Riiiilllly,” I drawled in my best upper crusty accent, “they should have the help in uniform if we are to identify them properly.”

  He put an arm around me and said, “This place is called Fox Glen because in the mornings and evenings you can see foxes out there.” He pointed to the scrubby pine forest on the edge of the meadow.

  “I hope I see one.”

  “Get up early with me when I go running and you probably will.”

  “You never want me to go running with you because you say I’ll slow you down. Which is true.”

  “I didn’t say ‘come running with me’; I said ‘get up with me.’”

  “You know, the beach might be the one place on earth where I might willingly go for a run—without needing a rabid dingo or something to come out of the woods and chase me.” I breathed in deeply and said, “I just love the smell of the beach.”

  “It’s right down that path,” he assured me. “You can see the water through those trees. The bungalow is closer to it.” He pulled a few strands of my hair and promised, “We’ll walk down to the beach in a few minutes.”

  “I don’t know,” I teased, leaning into him and enjoying feeling the weight and warmth of his body against mine. “Maybe I should spend the afternoon in the library, researching which fork I’m supposed to use when dinner is served.”

  He laughed and pressed his hip against mine, saying, “It’s going to be a simple cookout. You may not even need a fork at all.” He finished in his stuffiest voice, “But I can assure you that Cook has been informed of your dietary preferences.”

  “‘Cook has been informed.’” I laughed. No one does stuffy better than Michael. He kissed the top of my head and was brushing my hair back to work his way to my neck when we heard a sharp voice behind us call out, “Michael!” At the sound, he jumped away from me as if a firecracker had gone off at his feet, then grinned at me sheepishly before turning to say, “Hi, Gram. How are you?”

  I turned to smile hello, but his grandmother just sort of sniffed and waved me aside as she walked over to one of Michael’s aunts. Dressed in a white straw hat the size of a beach umbrella, loose white pants, and a crisp pink tunic, she toddled away from us like a determined and very stern little bird.

  “I see she remembers me.” I laughed, and Michael’s mouth twisted into a smirk. “Fondly.” I had met Michael’s grandmother once before and she had practically tossed me out of the Longbourne Country Club that night, which would have been okay with me. I had only been there because my family had dragged me to a Harvest Ball there. But it had been the first time I’d danced with Michael and the first time, I think, that I had started to think there was something pretty appealing about him.

  “She’s doesn’t even know you, George,” Michael reassured me. “Don’t worry about her.”

  “Hey, I don’t want to cross her. She looks like she supplements her prunes each morning with a big ol’ bowl of nails,” I said. Then I let my head wag like a palsied dowager’s and pointed to various people as I scolded, “I don’t approve of you, and I don’t approve of you, and I don’t—”

  Megan, his cousin who goes to middle school somewhere in Boston, heard me and let out this high-pitched laugh that threw me into a panic. And that’s when I realized that their grandmother was now standing right behind me.

  I turned bright red and gulped, “I’m sorry,” and started backing up in an involuntary retreat—and I kept going, right over the waist-high railing around the deck and into a rosebush below.

  “George!” Michael yelled as I went over.

  I don’t know what hurt more—my pride or the thorns in my side as Michael leaped down the stairs and helpe
d pull me out to relative safety. I was vaguely aware as I brushed myself off that everyone was staring, but they were too polite to say anything or to snicker. Decorum obviously ruled the day here. Even the bees had the courtesy to refrain from stinging me when I had landed ass-first in their midst. Michael took my arm and called, “Do you want to take me and Georgia to the beach, Megs?”

  Megan jumped up from her chair, stifling a giggle, and motioned for me to follow her when I climbed back up to the deck. I looked back at Michael and mouthed before following her, “I’m sorry!”

  He just shook his head, but I could tell he had found my backflip off the porch an unappealing party trick.

  When we got into the house, Megan said, “I told my mom you can share my room tonight. I’ll show you where it is so you can change.” But she couldn’t help but snicker again, “A big ol’ bowl of nails.”

  At least I had one ally there, apparently, besides Michael.

  Megan took me up a metal flight of stairs that twisted like a corkscrew and down the hall into another wing of the house and into a bedroom that didn’t look like it belonged to any adolescent girl I’ve ever met. It didn’t look like it belonged to anybody, really, not anybody with a personality. It was neat and clean and tastefully furnished, with two twin beds and matching dressers and blue bedspreads with seashells stitched on them, but there were no posters on the walls or worn stuffed animals or anything that would mark it as a girl’s room. It reminded me of the pristinely fake rooms you find set up to display furniture at IKEA, though none of the furniture here had labels and prices on it and I doubt if it had been assembled with an Allen wrench and a set of inadequate instructions like our bookshelves at home had been. But I guess that’s because it’s a vacation house. Maybe the whole idea is to keep vacation houses neutral for guests; still, I felt a little like security would come and haul me out of there if I tried to open up a drawer or even sit on the bed.