by Jo Frances
The accommodations in Vegas were an improvement from their hotel in Manhattan. He and his teammates went from sharing a standard room in a typical chain hotel---to their own suite on the Strip.
Sergei knocked on his door within ten minutes of their arrival. Pushing his way into Chase’s room, he announced, “what the hell, this is like fucking amazing, dude!” Chase grinned at his sincere attempt at American-slang. “You got a suite, too?” he asked.
In response, Sergei raced his hands in triumph. “Ha! My view is better.”
“What the fuck is it with you Europeans and the view?” Chase said, remembering his first day in Madrid. “But anyway, you’re wrong. What can be better than looking out on the Strip? Wait till it gets dark.”
“What’s better?” Sergei asked dramatically. “What’s better than your view of the street---”
“The STRIP,” Chase corrected him. “Not STREET.”
“What’s better than your view of the Strip,” Sergei continued, “is my view of the fucking pool! What am I, I’m a fucking middle aged tourist? I don’t need to see lights from the STRIP when I can see tits and ass.”
Chase shrugged. “Yeah, alright, if you think all there is to do with tits and ass is look at them through a glass window.” He put both hands on the glass and started panting.
Sergei gave him a playful push. “Who got laid in New York, you fucker? Huh? It wasn’t the great Chase---” Their scuffle was interrupted by a banging on the door. They opened it to Keith and Nick, already dressed for the pool in shorts and flip flops.
“Jesus, I can hear you two playing grab-ass from next door.” Keith told them as he walked in, looking around. Chase sighed and gestured across the room. One thing about athletes that never changed was their competitiveness. Whether it was a pair of sneakers or a free room in Las Vegas, they were driven to always prove they had the best. “Go ahead, take a look around, make sure my room isn’t better than yours. “ He nodded at Sergei. “Serge thinks his is better because he has a pool view.”
“Who gives a fuck, my room has a hot tub.” Keith said. Seeing Sergei’s crestfallen look, he changed the subject and told them both, “come on man, put on your pool stuff. Let’s go make some new friends.”
Ten minutes later they were settled into lounge chairs in the VIP section of the pool. It had its own private, smaller pool, which overlooked the larger, public one. A DJ was blasting music, and hordes of semi-naked bodies danced in the water, on the deck; anywhere there was room. But everyone’s eyes was turned up, towards the VIP section. Chase recognized a few TV actors, some rappers, and a few of their fellow athletes among them.
“Ma-aan, this here’s the real baller lifestyle!” Keith said, waving down to a few women who caught his eye. Sergei joined him at the rail, and before long the two of them had left to mingle. Chris stayed behind, studying the scouting reports on the other players on his tablet. Well aware that he didn’t have the size of Sergei, the quickness of Keith or the athleticism of Chase, Chris succeeded by being the smartest guy on the court.
Chase gave his buddy an approving nod, then stretched out on the lounge and yawned.
“You look like a great big cat doing that,” a distinctively feminine voice told him. Chase looked over at a petite brunette sipping her cocktail suggestively. He recognized her as the singer of one of the most popular songs on the radio. He couldn’t remember her name, but he could definitely hear the song in his head. It didn’t matter. Chase leaned over and extended his hand. “I’m Chase,” he said. “Who are you?”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Jamie
Things were moving quickly for Jamie and Adam. Just days after they exchanged “I love you’s”, the two of them were making plans for a trip back to North Carolina for Jamie to meet his family.
When she called to tell her mom, Frances Cameron had already heard the news. “I got a call from Lynn Bixby this morning,” her mother said casually. “She said you and Adam were coming for a visit as soon as both of you could clear your schedules.”
“It will probably be in the next two weeks or so…” Jamie hesitated. “Did Mrs. Bixby tell you they asked me to stay with them, instead of, um, at home with you and dad?”
“Yes, but I’m not quite sure why. When I told her that we only live an hour apart, and that of course you could use one of our cars to drive their anytime----” her mother broke off.
“What did she say?”
“She said that she wanted you to experience what it was like to be around their family. Apparently the two other boys are going to be there, and it’ll just be one Bixby family weekend.” Then she said in a too-cheerful voice, “but, anyway, they invited us to dinner on Sunday so I guess we’ll see you then.”
“Mom, I can always tell them that I’d rather stay home with you…” she said half-heartedly.
“No, no we’ve got it all worked out. Lynn and I made a deal that next time you and Adam will stay with us.” Next time?? Jamie thought, but decided to let it drop.
She hated awkward conversations with her parents, especially since they were so rare. “Oh mom,” she said consolingly. “You and dad have never been in this situation before, have you? I mean, Luke’s never wanted to meet any girl’s parents before---” they both laughed a little at that. “And, with Chase, he always stayed with us, so…” she stopped at the mention of Chase’s name. It seemed disloyal to bring him up, but her mom didn’t seem to mind.
“How is Chase, by the way?” her mother asked fondly, as if she were asking about Jenna Martinez, instead of the guy who broke her heart. “Have you talked to him?”
“Um, no, not lately.” She had already told her mom about the last phone conversation they had. Both her parents agreed with Luke, that Chase had done the right thing by keeping her out of it. However, the whole family also agreed that he had moved on when she told them about how attached he was to the little boy at the basketball game. “Actually, I ran into him at the airport a couple of weeks ago, but that’s about it.”
“Oh? Is he back in the country?”
“I don’t think so. He was with his teammates from the Spanish team. They were on their way to play in an international tournament in Vegas.” She hurried on to explain before her mom could ask more questions, “they were stopping for a few days in New York just to hang out.”
Frances waited a few seconds for her daughter to continue, but when she didn’t, they went back to talking about her visit and ended the conversation soon after.
Jamie had seen pictures of the Bixby home before, and knew it was impressive. But as they drove up the oak lined road, with the large white mansion at the end of it, Jamie felt a flutter of nervousness at what the weekend would bring.
Adam squeezed her hand. “What are you thinking?” he asked.
“That your house looks like something out of the movies,” she answered truthfully.
“Yeah.” Adam tilted his head slightly as if trying to look at his home from a different angle. “I love this house because this is where I grew up and my father and a hundred years worth of Bixby’s grew up. But right about the time I realized that I wasn’t going to raise my children in this house, I stopped thinking about it as mine.” He parked the car and turned to her. “This house, and what it stands for has nothing to do with me, OK?”
Before she had a chance to answer, the front door opened and a slightly older, heavier version of Adam walked down the steps to greet them.
Adam gave him a warm hug before introducing him to Jamie. “Jamie, this is my oldest brother,” he put on an effected formal voice, “William Bixby Jr.” Then, with a laugh-- “we call him Will for short”.
Will extended his hand. “Hi, I’m the better looking brother.” As she shook his hand and smiled politely, Jamie wondered if Will said this as a defense mechanism. While from a distance, Adam and his brother shared a family resemblance, up close it
became obvious that Will’s features didn’t yield the same result. He looked like a hurried, blurred sketch and Adam the finished product.
Adam shook his head. “Help me with our bags, will you?” he said in response. Adam took his own bag, and as Will pulled out Jamie’s small suitcase, he looked around the trunk. “That’s it?” he asked, clearly impressed.
Jamie nodded. “I travel a lot, and I’ve gotten used to fitting everything into a carryon.”
“Well, will you talk to my wife, then?” Will said as they followed him into the house. “We just live up the road here, but the makeup case she brought over is bigger than your whole bag.”
“Who are you talking about?” a female voice asked. A second later, a still young, but elegant woman with auburn hair walked into the foyer where they stood. “Well hello there,” she said she saw Jamie. “I’m Rose Bixby.” Her lilting drawl, like the rest of her, was Southern grace personified.
“Rose, this is Adam’s friend Jamie Cameron,” Will interjected. “Her daddy is one of dad’s golfing buddies, too. You’ve met him at the club---Peter Cameron.”
Instead of taking the hand Jamie extended, Rose reached over and gave her a hug. “I feel I know you already! We played a round of golf with him not more than a month ago. It was me, Willy, Willy’s dad and your dad.” She turned to Adam and gave him a peck on the cheek. “How’re you doin’ Adam? We sure don’t see enough of you these days.”
Adam nodded absently. “Los Angeles is a long way away from North Carolina, Rose.” Looking around, he asked, “where’s mom and dad?”
“Daddy went to pick up Henry at the airport and Mama is on her way from the capitol.” Will answered.
Adam made a face. “Come on! We rented a car and drove here, why can’t he? I mean, I know he has a driver in Hong Kong, but he hasn’t forgotten to drive.” Jamie was fascinated by the family dynamics. It had been less than ten minutes, and Adam---mature, capable, Adam---had reverted to the role of a sulky little brother.
Rose and Will exchanged glances. “Well… I guess he could rent a car,” Rose said. “Except he didn’t fly into a commercial airport. He flew here on a private jet and landed on some little airstrip.”
Adam looked confused. “From Hong Kong?? Wait---whose jet?”
Rose smugly delivered the punch line. “His boss’s. Victor O’Dell.” Jamie was having trouble following the conversation. She knew that Henry, the middle brother worked in Hong Kong, but what he did there, who Victor O’Dell was and why the other three were so impressed with him was beyond her.
Sensing her confusion, Adam gave her an I’ll-explain-later look, then turned back to Rose. “Where’s Mama gonna put Jamie this weekend?”
“Oh, she’s staying over in the guest wing,” Bill answered mischievously. “Mama said she didn’t want anything inappropriate goin’ on, and spoiling her friendship with Jamie’s parents and everything.”
“Now---was that necessary?” Rose scolded her husband. “You could have just told her that she was staying in the guest wing because it’s more private than staying with the rest of you boys.”
“I was getting to that!”
By way of explanation, Adam pointed his chin upstairs. “We’ve got an extra bedroom upstairs, but I guess my mom wants to put you in the other side of the house.” He picked up her suitcase. “Come on.”
“We’ll see you at dinner, then.” Rose called after them.
Jamie followed Adam through several rooms until they reached a part of the house that could be reached through a separate entrance. There were two bedrooms, each with their own bathroom, a tiny kitchen area with a microwave and sink, and an area that had been converted into a tiny office. As he showed her around, Adam explained. “This used to be the servants quarters, originally, I guess. And the only person who used this before was our nanny, when we had one. But after my mom became a Senator, she turned this into a kind of guest apartment for her DC staff to stay in. It’s probably the most modern part of the house.”
Jamie took everything in. “I guess that explains the extra large TV’s in the bedrooms and the computer equipment.” Adam nodded. “Those TV’s are probably pre-configured to only show the news channels.” He chose the larger room to drop her suitcase in. “I’m going to put my stuff away, then I’ll come back and show you around the rest of the house. Do you want to play tennis?”
“Sure, Adam.”
He paused by the door. “Thanks for not saying anything. About, you know---”
Jamie held up her hand. “I would never. You know that.”
The look of relief that washed over him was touching to her. Would it really have been so bad to tell his family? But then, it seemed as if this family kept a lot of things unsaid.
Fifteen minutes later, the next person to come through was not Adam, but his brother Henry.
“Hi Jamie.” They’d never met, but he said it as if they were friends.
“Hi Henry.” She answered in the same tone.
Henry Bixby looked like an opposite, darker version of his brothers, and was the best looking of them all. It wasn’t just his black hair; it was even in the way he smiled at her from the doorway. Adam’s was an open grin that drew people closer. Henry’s was a knowing half-smile that revealed nothing.
“So my mom stuck you out here, huh?”
Clearly the sleeping arrangements were a source of amusement for the older brothers. She decided not to feed into it. “Did you just get here?” she asked instead.
“Yeah. Long flight.” The one trait he shared with his brothers were their blue eyes. Eyes which he trained on her now. “How was your flight?” he asked, mocking her attempt at small talk.
Jamie got the distinct feeling that he was either laughing at her, toying with her, or a little bit of both. The sensation was familiar---it was how some of Adam’s friends treated her. Because she was young and didn’t have a high powered job moving millions of dollars around he was going to patronize her. Inwardly she sighed as she faced him directly. “It was great. The weather is beautiful in LA, by the way---in case that was what you were going to ask next.”
A look of confusion passed through his face for an instant. Before he could answer, they heard footsteps in the hallway. Adam appeared, and slapped Henry on the shoulder. Hard. “Hey, bud. How are you?” Jamie, who was used to her family greeting each other with hugs and kisses was surprised at the handshake-turned-shoulder-bump that the brothers exchanged. “Did you get lost on your way to your room, or something?” Adam asked him.
“No, Dad told me you invited a visitor for my homecoming, and I had to see who it was.” At Adam’s warning look, Henry waved him off. “Just kidding,” he said to her. “I’ve heard all about you, Jamie.”
“OK, I think we’re done with the introductions.” Adam interrupted him and began leading Jamie out of the room. “Let’s go to the tennis courts.”
“Sorry about that,” Adam said when they were out of earshot. “And sorry about Rose earlier. I hate when she pulls that lady of the house stuff. Like, it’s not your house yet, ok?”
“I thought it was bad to have one older brother---now I see what life would have been life with two. And maybe with three boys, and your mom being gone all the time, Rose is just filling in the gap.” Jamie said.
Adam looked away from her. “That’s nice of you to say. But I still don’t like being treated like a guest in my own home.”
Jamie said nothing more. Instead, she was thinking how complicated the Bixby family was, and how she couldn’t wait to see her own family tomorrow.
Dinner that night was served outside. “It’s casual,” Adam told her even though he came into her room changed into a freshly pressed collared shirt. Jamie knew as much and had already changed out of her shorts into a flowy white skirt and a sleeveless blouse. She suspected the theme was driven more from Henry’s request to have take out ribs f
rom a local barbeque place, and Lynn Bixby wanting to keep their massive dining room pristine for the sit down dinner tomorrow with her parents than from any attempt to make the weekend less intimidating for her.
As they sat down to dinner, Adam suggested they say grace. Rose said, “that would be lovely”. Lynn pursued her lips ever so slightly in disapproval. Henry said nothing but deliberately kept from bowing his head. William Sr. joined in the prayer and gave a heartfelt “amen” at the end.
After the briefest of pauses, Will said, “I swear Henry, you would think after six months away, you’d want something else besides Carolina barbeque!”
“What else would I want except what I can’t get anywhere else?” Henry said lazily.
“I suppose that’s true,” his father said diplomatically.
“I just thought that someone who’s flying around in a private jet would have more, um, refined tastes,” Will said.
In response, Henry took a rib and began gnawing it with gusto. “Really, Henry---” Lynn began, then decided deflection would be a better tactic. “Now, is that true? Did you really fly here in Victor O’Dell’s plane?”
“No, I was a hitchhiker on O’Dell’s plane.” Henry put the rib down. “He was flying to Boston, so after we got there, we refueled, got a new crew, and he sent me on my way. Unfortunately, I will have to fly commercial on the way back.” He glanced in Jamie’s direction. “Victor O’Dell is my boss’s boss.” He told her. “He owns the company I work for. Among other things.”
In a voice dripping with condescension, Adam repeated, “… he owns the company I work for. Among other things.” It was a dead on impersonation. “Get over yourself, Henry!” he said. At that point Adam and Jamie eyes met. We’re in this together, their unspoken look said. The rest of the family saw it, too and they all turned to the two of them as if seeing them for the first time.
“So. Jamie.” Lynn Bixby looked down the table at her. “Adam says you travel quite a bit for your job?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Jamie felt herself reverting to the manners she grew up with. “It’s the thing I like most.”
