She skidded to a stop. “Max? What are you doing here?”
“We need to talk.”
“You shouldn’t be here.” She looked desperately over her shoulder, where the other members of her shift were beginning to filter out of the station. How did he know where she worked? How had he found her, and why?
Max grinned at her, his white capped teeth gleaming in the sunshine. “Better get in if you don’t want anyone to see you.”
“This is kidnapping.”
“Semantics, my little munchkin.” His raspy laugh sounded like coffee percolating. “You look fabulous, by the way. I always told them they should let you grow up on the—”
Sabina yelped and ran to the passenger side. “Don’t say anything. I’ll get in if you shut up until I say you can talk.”
“Your wish is my command. Haven’t I always done whatever you asked? Didn’t I get you that tutor—?”
“Shut up!”
Max cackled and put the Mercedes into drive. It purred forward like a beige panther in heat. Sabina ducked down to avoid the openmouthed stares of the B shift.
“Sorry for the ambush. You forced me into it. Bad idea, ignoring my calls and texts. A power player like me isn’t used to that.”
Sabina cursed at him, using every inventive swearword she’d picked up during ten years on the fire lines.
Max cocked his head, showing off the sculpted waves of his artificially chestnut toupee. “Now that I am used to.”
Sabina peered out the window and saw they’d put a healthy distance between them and the firehouse. She sat up. “Okay, what’s the deal, Max? This is completely out of line. How’d you even find me?”
Max gave her a thorough, appreciative once-over. “I have to hand it to you, Sabina. I wouldn’t have recognized you if I didn’t know better. Where’s the adorable imp Taffy McGee, that chubby mischief maker, the modern-day Shirley Temple with curls like morning sunshine, according to USA Today? See how I still know all your reviews? My God. The most famous child actress in America, hiding in plain sight in a California firehouse. Who’da thunk it?”
Chapter Eight
She should have known. She should have known. Of course ignoring a manipulative Hollywood agent wouldn’t make him leave her alone. “What do you want, Max?”
“I take it your Bachelor Firemen don’t know who you are? Love the concept, by the way. Bachelor Firemen. Mmm. I bet Lifetime would snap that up in a second.”
Desperation ate at Sabina’s gut. “If I promise to play nice, will you forget about the station? My life has nothing to do with Hollywood anymore. And I don’t want them knowing. Please, Max. You were never an asshole. Well, you were, but not about everything.”
“Make sure you put that on my tombstone,” he said in a dry rasp. “Here lies an asshole, but not about everything. Where can I take you out to lunch that won’t blow your cover?”
Sabina played with the end of her braid. The feel of it grounded her; as Taffy, she’d always had short curls. “We’ll have to get out of San Gabriel. And I have to be back by three.” Today she was taking Carly, her “Little Sister,” to baseball practice, but that information was off-limits to Max. “Mind driving to Camino Ranch?”
“What’s another hour on the freeway?”
“I’m going to nap until we get there. I just got off a twenty-four-hour shift and I don’t have the strength for this.”
“Go right ahead, munchkin. When you wake up I’ll ply you with sweets like the old days. Hello, darling.” She started, until she realized he was now talking into his Bluetooth. He ought to get a phone chip implanted in his brain.
She tilted her seat back and closed her eyes. Max’s rocks-on-chalkboard voice was surprisingly soothing. Max had always been decent to her, in a half-assed, when-it-suited-him kind of way. For years he’d been the next best thing to family. And sometimes more reliable than Annabelle, who had a bad habit of falling for hot new directors and forgetting she had a daughter. Being with Max now felt kind of . . . nostalgic. As long as he didn’t mess with her new life, she could handle him.
When she woke up, they were outside the La Farfalla Bistro in Camino Ranch. Little white ironwork chairs and tables were scattered under a green canopy. She scanned the early lunch crowd for familiar faces. When she spotted no one from San Gabriel, she relaxed. “Good choice, Max. Thanks.”
Over Arnold Palmers and chopped salads, her former agent finally got to the point. “Your mother has hired me to revive her career.”
“I thought she was living in Paris.”
“She’s coming back. The Turkish director dumped her.”
Sabina shoved aside the familiar pang of worry. She’d been through enough of Annabelle’s breakups to know what happened next: some fabulous new project that would consume her life—and her daughter’s. Not this time. “If anyone can get her career going again, you can. Have you found something for her?”
He put up a hand and made her wait while he wiped salad dressing off his cheek.
“Your manners haven’t improved even a little, have they?”
He shrugged, totally unconcerned. Max Winkler’s hyperactive brain could engineer a multiparty, multimillion-dollar Hollywood deal, but it had no neurons to spare for mundane details like table manners.
Sabina concentrated on buttering her roll while he washed down a huge mouthful of salad with iced tea. Maybe this wasn’t so bad, going out to lunch at a fancy bistro, the kind of place she used to go with her mother. “You know, I always thought Annabelle should do some kind of independent film to really show her range, you know? Everyone still sees her as Peg McGee, but she’s so much more than that. She needs to play an older woman who becomes obsessed with a younger man, or a crusading Irish mother of ten trying to end the IRA bombings, or maybe a nun, she’d be a great nun. She could out-nun Meryl Streep any day of the week—”
Max rapped on the table, making her jump.
“Who’s the Hollywood genius here, munchkin? And who’s the girl who turned her back on fame and fortune?”
He leaned forward, quivering like a gerbil on the hunt.
“Two words, Sabina. Reunion show.”
Sabina’s jaw dropped. A sort of paralysis gripped her, as if she was in one of those dreams where no matter how hard she screamed, no sounds issued from her mouth. The clatter of dishes at nearby tables, the valley-girl cadence of the waitress—“You still working on that?”—filled the sudden silence.
“What?” she asked, or tried to. Only a whisper trickled from her lips.
“I know exactly what you’re thinking. You’re thinking where would we get a script, what director would be interested, would CBS even go for a reunion show.”
She shook her head, helpless to stop his flow of words. She was thinking none of those things. Her thoughts were more along the lines of whether it was too early for a double vodka tonic.
“Well, Uncle Max has been busting his nuts on this project. You and Me was groundbreaking in its time, but now everyone’s doing the dramedy thing, so what better time to bring you, your mother, and the other principals back together? I’ve got Sean Flaherty working on a script, and so far he’s knocking it out of the park, baby. Did you know Taffy’s a single mother too now? You married a rodeo star and traveled the circuit with him while you raised your adorable little munchkin, Tyler. Sadly, your husband got gored, off camera of course and now it’s Taffy and Tyler against the world. You’re only visiting your mom for Christmas—did I mention it’s a Christmas reunion show? That’s like the trifecta wet dream of TV shows. We’ll set it up for follow-up shows, of course, if the ratings are good. And they will be. Your mom still gets fan mail for you two.”
Sabina couldn’t make the nightmare stop. She stood up, knocking her iron filigree chair backward onto the flagstones. The crash made everyone in the restaurant look their way. She placed her hands on the table and leaned in. “How can we have a reunion show when we haven’t even had a reunion? I haven’t seen or spoken to my m
other in over ten years.”
“Munchkin. Don’t be dramatic. Sit down and eat your lunch.”
“I’ll be in the car.” She put her sunglasses on and stepped over the hedge that separated the seating area from the sidewalk. The Mercedes, of course, was locked. Fine. She’d window shop until Max got his ass out here. Gulping deep breaths of air, she stared blindly at a display of gadgets in an electronics store.
“You’re not thinking this through.” His caustic, screeching-gears voice came from just behind her.
She turned to face him. She needed to put a stop to this. Now.
“I’m not an actress anymore, Max. I’m a firefighter. I put out fires. Save lives. Risk my life. I’ve worked like a dog to make my life here and I’m not giving it up.”
He picked up on her serious tone. “It’s just one show. Two hours of prime time. It’s for your mother. One show, and then you can walk away.”
“I already walked away. And it cost me nearly a million dollars. Have you forgotten I signed all my earnings over to her? I’m not going back. Ever.”
“But munchkin, how can we do a reunion show without you?”
“Get creative. Taffy died in the same rodeo accident that killed her husband. Grieving Peg McGee befriends a young neighbor who happens to be a single mother with a little boy. Or lo and behold, the baby she gave up for adoption before Taffy was ever born comes looking for her mother. You’re the Hollywood genius, remember?”
“Yeah, but those ain’t bad.” Max gave her a look of sneaking respect. “You’re wasted on a fire engine.”
“No, I’m not. I’m a damn good firefighter.” She clung to the thought. Firefighter Jones, that’s who she was now. Affectionately known as Two. Much as she hated that nickname, she’d pick “Two” over “Taffy” in a white-hot second.
“Hmm.” Max scratched his chin. “Problem is, CBS won’t do it without you.”
“What?”
“I told ’em you weren’t available, but they say no Taffy, no show. Most of the fan mail’s for you, chickie. America loved Taffy McGee. So did Poland and Thailand, but that’s just icing on the cupcake. They want to know what happened to you. You left so suddenly and barely gave the writers a chance to cobble together a storyline that made sense.”
“I was growing half an inch a month. They had to bring in a body double.”
“I know, I know.”
“And I needed out. I’m not going to apologize any more for that.”
“I get it. No apologies needed. But are you going to deep-six your mom’s big comeback and, by the way, pass up a million-dollar payday, for your precious fires?”
She spun around and marched toward the Mercedes. “Take me back, Max, we’re done. I’m not doing it.”
“Just think about it.”
“If you mention it again, I’ll call CBS myself and tell them to fuck off.” She brandished her phone. “I still have contacts.”
“Fine, fine. Just tell me you’ll think about it.”
“I’ll think about what an asshole you are, how’s that?”
“It’s a start.”
Carly was waiting on her front steps, baseball glove in hand, when Sabina drove up. She raced to the passenger door and hopped in with the car still rolling.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
Carly’s ponytail hung over her shoulder in rich, fudge-colored waves. She was some mixture of black, Irish, and Mexican, Sabina had never determined precisely. Reserved, quiet, given to occasional moments of explosive fury, she’d crawled into Sabina’s heart the very first day the Big Brothers Big Sisters program had matched them four years ago, when Carly was nine.
“Home situation as usual?” Sabina asked as she steered her El Camino away from the curb.
“Hangover’s right on schedule.”
“How much longer do you give the boyfriend?”
One slim shoulder hunched. “Couple months. She really likes him. But he’s a loser. She knows it.”
Sometimes Sabina thought the parallels between their lives were eerie, even though their worlds were completely different. Did it matter if the boyfriend was a Turkish film director or a truck driver, if the same broken heart resulted? “Sorry.”
Carly didn’t answer. She didn’t like talking about her family, and Sabina didn’t push her. As a “Big Sister,” her role wasn’t to interfere but to provide other experiences and influences to Carly. They’d done all kinds of things—seen Wicked, gone to the state fair, attended the Nutcracker, attempted ice skating—but more than anything, Carly wanted to play baseball. She was so good, she’d won a spot on a co-ed team and played alongside some wickedly skilled boys. Lately, Sabina’s role in her life had mostly revolved around practices.
Sabina sped through the sunny streets of San Gabriel toward Los Feliz Park. She listened to the hoarse roar of her El Camino, so different from Max’s purring Mercedes. This was the soundtrack of her life now—rough and real. She loved the life she’d created here because it had nothing artificial in it. She did real things here. Fought fire. Hung out with real guys who weren’t playing a part. Helped out a girl who needed her.
Why did the past have to come back and threaten all that? Damn Max anyway.
Carly didn’t seem to mind her distracted silence. When they reached the park, she shot out of the car. “You’ll be in the stands, right?” she called over her shoulder.
“You know it.”
Sabina made her way toward the bleachers around the field. She waved and smiled at a few parents. She spotted Diane, a single mother whose son played second base, and clambered across knees and purses to sit next to her.
Diane waved and pointed to her ear. She was talking into her headset—she sold real estate and spent every practice on a constant series of calls. Sabina watched lazily as the players did their pregame warm-ups. The sun beat down on her forehead, urging her eyes to close. She put both elbows on the bench behind her and leaned back, tilting her face to the warmth. Everything would be okay. She’d escaped from Hollywood once already. She’d figure it out. She’d get used to Chief Roman. Their awkward history would be ancient history before long. Everything would be fine.
Diane’s voice penetrated her consciousness. “All right, doll face. Let’s have lunch tomorrow. Holy Mother of Pearl, who the crap is that?”
Sabina thought she was on her call until Diane poked her in the ribs. She sat up with a start. A tall man in jeans was striding toward the field, one arm slung around the shoulder of a tall kid in uniform. Make that a huge man. Make that—what kind of freakishly awful luck did she have?—Chief Roman. He wore sunglasses and a simple black T-shirt speckled with white paint.
She suddenly remembered him talking about his son at the Starlight. That’s why they’d moved here . . . for the year-round baseball.
For the first time since she’d arrived in San Gabriel, she considered the possibility that the station actually was cursed. Or at least she was.
With a knot forming in her stomach, she watched the pair stroll to the coach and engage in a long discussion. The boy looked wide-eyed and eager, his sandy hair standing up on end. The last time she’d seen him, he’d looked horrified by her thoughtless words.
“That’s . . . um . . .”
“Wait, you know him? It was more of a rhetorical question.” Diane was staring at Roman as if he were dancing naked on the pitcher’s mound. “That is one incredible-looking man, if you like them dark and hulking. Is he single? Where’d he come from? Who is he?”
“He’s, well, actually, he’s . . .” Before she could finish, Roman looked into the stands and went still. With his sunglasses on, she couldn’t tell if he’d seen her or not. But he must have, because after he finished with the coach, he gave his son a squeeze on the shoulder and took the steps two at a time until he reached her row.
“Firefighter Jones,” he murmured. “Baseball fan?”
“I . . . uh . . . mentor a girl on the team. Carly. She’s the pitcher.”
Sabina bristled. “Carly’s fastball’s been clocked at seventy miles an hour. Fastest of any girl in Southern California.”
“Like I said, this should be interesting. Luke wants a spot on the roster, but he’s got to earn it.”
“Carly’s been working for this since she was nine,” Sabina said hotly.
“Then he’ll have some competition.”
Next to her, Diane’s head whipped back and forth between them. “No need to get worked up over it,” she said. “Why don’t you sit down, mysterious stranger?”
Roman hesitated. Then shook his head. “Luke and I have a tradition. I need to sit in a certain spot, ever since he hit three home runs in one game.”
“Then we’ll . . .”
Sabina tugged at Diane’s arm. “Enjoy the practice. I hope your son does well.”
He nodded and made his way past them, down the top row to the far end. Sabina knew this because Diane gave her a blow-by-blow account, using her sunglasses as a mirror.
“Let him be. He’s my new training officer,” Sabina hissed.
“At the station? That’s just not fair. You already work with the hottest guys in town, and now him?”
“You’re welcome to him. As far as I know, he’s unattached.”
“You’re nuts. Single, gorgeous, sexy father, and heroic fireman. You sure that’s not worth breaking a few rules?” Luckily, another real estate call came in. Sabina blocked out the sound of “two bedroom, one bath” and focused on the field.
Carly and Luke were put on opposite sides for the practice. Carly’s side took the field first. As she stepped onto the pitcher’s mound, she looked nervous. She couldn’t seem to find the strike zone until the third batter, but once she had two players on base she settled down and threw two strikeouts and fielded a feeble grounder for the third out.
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