Finding Mr. Right Now (6 page)

A guy from the camera crew was headed their way with an equipment bag slung over his shoulder. “Rental cars,” he panted. “That way.”

Paul frowned. “We’re renting a car? What about the plane?”

The cameraman beckoned Billy Joe over to where Paul and Brendan were standing. “No plane. We’re driving. Car’s already rented.” He shifted his bag to put himself a little more in balance. “This way.”

The cameraman headed off toward the exterior doors. After a moment, Paul grabbed his carry-on and followed. From behind, he could hear Billy Joe muttering about cheap-ass production companies. At the moment, Paul was inclined to agree with him.

The walk to the lot after they’d caught the car rental agency bus was far enough to have Paul stripping off his jacket and stuffing it in his bag. He hadn’t checked Billy Joe’s tropical whites, but he’d be willing to bet they weren’t exactly comfy in the bright mountain sunshine. They rounded another corner, and he saw Ronnie leaning against the side of a massive SUV. After a moment, Monica stepped around the rear end and waved.

Billy Joe and Brendan were both zeroed in on Ronnie, but Paul found Monica a lot more interesting to watch. She had on black jeans that hugged her hips and a dark blue cotton blouse that didn’t exactly hug her breasts but gave some intriguing hints about shape and size. And of course she still had that whole sundae thing going on with the hair and the lips and the skin like vanilla ice cream. He really wanted to nibble.

Unfortunately, right now she looked like nibbling was the last thing on her mind. If that was a smile, he’d hate to see what she looked like when she was upset. “Hi, everybody,” she said in a clenched voice. “We’re all going to be driving to the resort together. Faisal will do some filming. Consider this your first group date.”

“Hell,” Paul muttered.

“We got time to change?” Billy Joe asked quickly.

Monica checked her watch. “Make it fast. You can use the rental agency restroom.”

Billy Joe took off at a trot, his white linen glistening in the sun.

“Anyone else?” Monica asked.

Ronnie raised a tentative hand. “Could I use the restroom?”

Monica sighed. “Okay. But we need to leave in about ten minutes.”

Ronnie muttered something that sounded like “timing my bathroom breaks” and began walking toward the building, followed immediately by Brendan.

Monica sighed again. “So much for monitoring all contact.”

“Transportation foul-up?” Paul nodded toward the SUV. “So who’s driving this behemoth?”

“Me, I guess.” She took a deep breath, which added a little more stretch to the buttons on her shirt.
Very nice breasts.

For a wild moment he pictured himself cupping those very nice breasts in his palms, but then his sense of self-preservation kicked back in. “Have you done much mountain driving?”

She shook her head. “I’m a flatlander, born and bred. I haven’t even been up in the hills around L.A.”

He narrowed his eyes, studying the SUV. “This isn’t a great vehicle to start your mountain driving experience with. It probably handles like a truck.”

“There’s no one else who can do it, unfortunately. Faisal has to do the filming.”

Faisal gave her a narrow-eyed look. “Even if I wasn’t filming, I wouldn’t drive this tank. Particularly not at altitude.”

“Great. Thanks for your support.” She grimaced.

Paul shrugged. “I can do it.”

“Drive?” Monica shook her head, chewing on one of those maraschino lips. “No, you can’t.”

“Yeah, I can. I spent the first twenty years of my life around here. Hell, I first learned to drive on mountain roads.”

She shook her head again. “That’s not what I mean. I mean you need to interact with Ronnie. This is your date.”

“No it isn’t, and no I don’t.” He gave her a level look. “We both know I’m not really one of her suitors. Let the other guys interact. I’d rather drive.”

“Sounds good to me,” Faisal put in. “No offense, Monica, but I’d rather see him in the driver’s seat, all in all.”

She blew out a breath. “So would I. But I don’t think I can let you do it. My name’s on the rental agreement as the driver and I charged it to Fairstein’s account. If anything happened, we’d both be in deep shit. Maybe you can sit up front when we hit the mountains and talk me through it. You can have your conversation with Ronnie first. Faisal can take pictures. Then when we hit the mountains, you can switch to the front with me.”

Paul fought back a grin. Sitting with Monica for a couple of hours definitely beat out anything he might do with Ronnie. “Okay. But you’ll hit the mountains sooner than you think. You’d better let me move up front when we get to I-70.”

“Denver city limits.” She pushed her gold-threaded butterscotch hair out of her face again. “Deal?”

Something about that hair sent a direct message to his lower body. He told himself to cool it. “Deal.”

Faisal had gotten his video camera set up by the time everyone got back to the SUV. He had his back to the front seat so Monica and whoever sat beside her wouldn’t show up in any of the shots. Billy Joe had changed into what he probably thought of as Stud Casual: black jeans, black T-shirt, black cowboy boots. He was walking beside Ronnie, one hand planted protectively in the small of her back. Not that Ronnie was paying any attention to him.

Brendan wore a T-shirt too, and blue jeans that looked like they’d actually been worn before. He and Ronnie were grinning at each other.

Monica felt like grimacing. Usually Fairstein’s shows at least pretended that the competition was real, but they’d be stretching a point to make believe this trip was anything close to fair. Just yesterday she’d been worried that Brendan was too attentive, but now he and Ronnie looked like best buds.

By the time they got to Elkhorn Run, the contest for her heart might be over, and if it was, they were screwed. Ronnie wasn’t a good enough actress to pretend she was still interested in anybody else if she’d already made her choice.

Monica clapped her hands briskly, drawing their attention away from each other. “Okay, we’re going to shoot some conversations on the way to the resort. We’ll start with Paul and Ronnie, then Billie Joe, then Brendan. After he’s finished his part, Paul’s going to move up front with me so he can help me drive.”

Ronnie’s forehead crinkled adorably. “They’re going to talk to each other?”

Patience.
“No, sweetie, they’re going to talk to you.”

“But where will we sit?”

Monica gestured toward the SUV. “Faisal’s got everything set up. You’ll sit in the seat at the back, and he’ll run the video camera in the seat in front of you.”

“But…” Ronnie licked her lips again, her voice dropping to a whisper. “No. I mean, I can’t do that.”

Monica narrowed her eyes. “It’s okay, Ronnie. Glenn knows all about it and he’s fine with it.”

Ronnie shook her head vigorously. “I mean I can’t sit all the way in back. I just can’t.” Her complexion was turning green again.

That same icy sliver of dread inched its way down Monica’s spine. “You can’t? Why can’t you?”

“I get car sick,” Ronnie whispered. “Real bad. I have to look through the front windshield or I’ll throw up.”

And there it is, right on schedule, the final Full Monty screw-up of the day.
Monica took a deep breath. “Okay. Everybody into the car. Ronnie sits up front with me. And I don’t give a damn where the rest of you sit, but I suggest you get comfortable. This drive may take a while.”

Chapter Five

Monica decided that mountain driving probably wasn’t as nerve-wracking as brain surgery, but it was close. Even the first climb on I-70 from the outskirts of Denver to the mountain suburbs had her wiping her palms on her jeans. Cars passed her, other SUVs passed her, semis passed her. She kept pushing the gas pedal down, but they seemed to go slower rather than faster. She longed to ask Paul what to do, but he was two seats back.

Not that she could have heard his advice anyway. Now that Ronnie was enthroned in the front seat, she chattered happily about anything and everything she saw, while Monica concentrated on keeping their modified tank of an SUV on the road.
Just a few more miles and we’ll be down again, just a few more miles and we’ll be down again…

“Oh my God!” Ronnie shrieked.

“What? What’s the matter?” Monica gripped the steering wheel convulsively, jamming her foot on the brake.

“Buffalo,” Ronnie cried. “Look over there! Buffalo!”

Monica took yet another deep breath, replacing her foot on the accelerator to try to get the car up to speed again. “I can’t look, Ronnie, I’m driving.”

“But they’re so
cute
,” Ronnie cooed. “Like big, shaggy cows.”

“We got buffalo in Texas,” Brendan called from one of the back seats. He sounded a little desperate. Somebody else snickered—Monica’s money was on Billy Joe.

She started to say something reassuring as they crested another rise, but then she realized they were going downhill.
Very
down. She swallowed hard, lifting her foot quickly from the accelerator to the brake. Around another curve and they were going down faster. She pumped the brake again.
Sweet lord above!
There was no way she’d survive driving all the way to Elkhorn Run.

A car passed them on the next curve, the driver flipping up his middle finger as he did.

“Well, that was rude,” Ronnie said.

“Just part of the drive.” Monica wiped her hands on her thighs again.

Paul’s foot was going numb from pressing an imaginary accelerator. Even allowing for the fact that Monica had never driven in the mountains before, this was getting ridiculous. Each time the SUV managed to pick up some speed she’d hit the brakes again. At this rate, they’d probably burn out the brake shoes by the time they hit Dillon.

He leaned back in his seat, trying to relax. A rental truck pulled by them—he happened to know those suckers had a governor that kept the speed below sixty. Which meant Monica was creeping along at around fifty on the most heavily traveled stretch of I-70 heading for the Eisenhower Tunnel. They’d already gone through two smaller tunnels on the road to Idaho Springs. Ronnie had wailed in anguish. Apparently tunnels weren’t common in her part of Florida; also apparently they had some mysterious negative effect on her carsickness.

Paul closed his eyes, flexing his stiff fingers. Surely Ronnie wouldn’t freak out in the Eisenhower. If nothing else, it had lights all the way through. Hell, it even had tile all the way through. It looked like the world’s longest bathroom.

Monica managed to goose their speed up marginally as they approached the tunnel entrance. “Oh God,” Ronnie moaned. “Not another one.”

“It’s okay,” Monica said firmly, “this is the fastest way across the Continental Divide. It’ll just take us a few minutes to get through it, and then we’ll be on the down side.”

Two more semis passed them as they entered the tunnel. Monica had pushed up the speed some, but they still weren’t going as fast as they should have been. The tunnel walls sped past, the tiles yellow in the artificial light. The faint scent of exhaust wafted through the SUV’s ventilation system.

“Oh God.” Ronnie moaned again. “It’s so dark. And that smell! I think I’m gonna be sick!”

“No you’re not.” Monica sounded like she was speaking through gritted teeth. “We’re almost on the other side. Just hold on.” She stomped on the accelerator, speeding up to something that might actually have been close to sixty.

The yellow tiles flew by at a faster rate. Soon Paul could see the next range of mountains appear through the circular tunnel exit ahead of them. Up front Ronnie whimpered.

“It’s okay, Ronnie,” Brendan called. “You’ll be fine. Just look at the mountains up there.”

“You can see the exit now,” Monica said desperately. “We’re almost there. I’ll stop at the first town we come to. I promise, Ronnie. Just, you know,
don’t
!”

Ronnie whimpered again, but then they were out into the light and speeding down the other side of the mountain. “See?” Monica chorused. “All done. Everything’s okay.”

“Stop,” Ronnie croaked. “Just stop.”

Monica managed to pull into a scenic overlook around the next curve. Ronnie was opening the door almost before she came to a full stop. She rushed to the edge of the parking space with its spectacular view of the peaks and bent over, retching into the trees down below.

Brendan pushed open one of the back doors and trotted in her direction, a bottle of water dangling from his fingers.

The cameraman, Faisal, hoisted his video camera on his shoulder. He raised an eyebrow at Monica. “Candids?”

She blew out a breath. “Not even Glenn wants something that candid. Let her upchuck in peace.”

Faisal sighed. “Might as well get some scenery shots. Maybe we can use them for transitions.” He headed for the other side of the overlook.

Monica stepped slowly from the driver’s seat, leaning on the car. She rested her forehead against the door. Paul thought her eyes were closed. He had a feeling she was one step away from beating her head against the roof.