Together for Christmas (20 page)

“So
that’s
how you do what you do!” Victoriously, Kristen pointed at Casey. “You push people when they’re not looking.”

“Gee whiz. That makes me sound pretty gosh-darn awful.”

At his aw-shucks routine, she couldn’t help grinning. It was a
really
poor fit for him. “If the shoe fits . . .”

Appearing vaguely wounded, Casey shook his head at her. “Is that really what you think of me? That I’m
manipulative?
”

Kristen couldn’t deny it. “If the evidence is there . . .”

Before she could press him further, a PA from
Live! from the Heartland
dropped by his table. “Sorry to interrupt, you guys! But Casey”—here, she turned to him with grateful, shining eyes—“I had to tell you how glad I am that we talked yesterday. Like I told you, I was convinced the reason the director was such a bitch to me—pardon my French—was because I sucked at my job. I just knew she was about to fire me! But I decided to talk to her after I saw you yesterday, just because I was feeling so strong and pumped up, and you’ll never guess what happened?”

“What happened?” Again, Casey ignored his buzzing phone.

“She’s getting a divorce!” the PA confided. “She’d been feeling really alone and sad about it, too. So we went for drinks at The Big Foot after yesterday’s pickups were done, and you know what? We’re getting along
so
much better now.”

Casey nodded. “I’m glad. That was really smart of you.”

“I know! Who knew?” The PA brightened. “Maybe I
will
have a career in showbiz after all. I seem to have a knack for it!”

After a few words to Kristen about her “fab pie!” and other “awesome” menu items—including a request for one of Kristen’s top-secret recipes—the PA headed outside into the snow.

“All right. That’s a nice outcome,” Kristen told Casey. “But I still don’t see how creating harmony among the production crew is supposed to put Heather’s show back on track.”

“How else would I do it?” Casey looked truly mystified.

“I don’t know . . . make them work harder?”

He laughed. “Is that what you do here at the diner? You just crack the whip and expect everyone to fall in line?”

This time, it was Kristen’s turn to laugh. “Not exactly.”

“Problems don’t exist in a vacuum. Neither do solutions.”

“Neither do ‘fixers,’” Kristen pointed out. “Or anti-fixers. Even if Shane Maresca is as bad as you say he is”—and she still had her doubts—“he’s probably not working alone,” she reasoned. “After all,
you’re
not. Not technically. You have me, and your new Galaxy Diner fan club, and all my friends. You’re not alone. Everyone is falling all over themselves to help you—”

Casey only frowned, looking peculiarly fearsome.

“—including everyone on the set of Heather’s holiday TV special. Unless . . .” Kristen went motionless as something else occurred to her. “What if it’s
not
Shane at all—”

“You really have a thing for him, don’t you?” Casey grumbled. “I promise you, he’s not worth your goodwill.”

“—and someone on the
production
is sabotaging things?”

“That wouldn’t make you feel better about it.”

“It would make me feel better about liking Shane.”

Heaving a sigh, Casey shook his head. “You’re really going to make me do this, aren’t you?”

“Do what?”

“Defend Maresca. On purpose.”

“You have to consider all the options, don’t you?”

“Once I saw that jerkface, the options narrowed considerably.”

Kristen smiled. “Says you.”

“These problems didn’t start out of the blue,” Casey argued. “Someone has been deliberately causing trouble on set for a while now. The trouble began with location and wardrobe issues and is continuing now with interpersonal conflicts and oddball delays. Whoever’s at fault, they’ve been doing a pretty effective job of exploiting typical onset problems.”

“Making mountains out of molehills?”

“Exactly. Just like Shane would do, as someone who’s intimately familiar with these things. Turning small problems—like that PA’s lack of confidence or her boss’s sloppy divorce or the rigging crew’s ongoing lighting dispute—into big ones is the no-brainer way to create a believable disruption.”

“Or to turn a promising holiday TV special into a troubled one,” Kristen surmised, worried now that if Casey
didn’t
help her sister, Heather’s TV special would be history for sure. “All it would take,” she went on, “are a few well-placed rumors and a detailed knowledge of the people involved to stir up trouble.”

“The kind of trouble that would lead to the production being canceled and the company collecting the insurance money.”

But Kristen wasn’t ready to go with that theory. “Shane wouldn’t have enough knowledge of the people involved to
really
stir up trouble,” she guessed. “Not at first, at least—”

“You’d be surprised how quickly we can get up to speed.”

“But an
insider
would know all those things. Right?”

At Casey’s reluctant nod, Kristen felt a total rush.

She was right! Maybe. No wonder Casey liked his job. Figuring out problems this way was surprisingly engaging.

Feeling like Watson to his sexy Sherlock, Kristen asked, “But why wreck the special? These are people’s jobs! Surely whoever’s at fault doesn’t want to risk winding up unemployed.”

Casey made a face. Maybe he’d spotted another sidewalk Santa. “Evidently, someone feels their job isn’t at risk.”

“Well, the only person who fits that description—”

Is Heather,
Kristen realized with a jolt. Her brainstorming fun came to an abrupt end as she realized it was true. Her sister probably
was
the only person on the entire
Live! from the Heartland
set whose job was immune from being cut. She was the only one who was essential to the holiday special’s success.

Suddenly, Kristen wished she hadn’t leaped to Shane Maresca’s defense. No matter how friendly he’d been. She hadn’t expected her alternate theory to point straight at her sister.

“—must already know that
you’re
in town now, ready to raise hell and take names,” she prevaricated, unwilling to reveal her potential suspicions of Heather. They were still sisters. Kristen owed her that much loyalty, at least. But, all of a sudden, Heather’s “quarantine”
did
seem twice as convenient.

“Are you sure everyone you’ve dealt with is one hundred percent susceptible to your manipulation technique?” Kristen asked, suddenly hoping they
were
. “Because otherwise—”

“It’s
not
a ‘manipulation technique’!” Casey broke in, looking aggrieved. “You have got to stop calling it that.”

“Hey, I like to call a spade a spade.”

“And you look damn sexy while doing it,” he agreed roughly. “But you’re killing me here.
I’m
not the bad guy.”

She shrugged. “I like to come to my own conclusions.”

“And you’ve already decided the worst about me?”

On the verge of admitting that
of course
she hadn’t decided anything about Casey (because honestly, who could have?) except that she wanted very much to know if he slept in the nude, if he preferred Guinness or Budweiser, if he liked her as much as she liked him, and if there was any chance he
hadn’t
seen Heather’s sex tape, Kristen hesitated. Why did Casey seem so upset? Just because she’d said he manipulated people? He was The Terminator!

This couldn’t be the first time he’d come face-to-face with his own dubious conciliation techniques—but it
was
the first time Kristen had seen him looking so troubled. Granted, the major signs of his distress were a single ticking muscle in his jaw and a certain hard-edged glimmer to his eyes, but still . . .

“At least give me a chance to change your mind,” he said.

Kristen considered it. “How?”

Cheering up, Casey angled his head toward the back of the diner. “Let’s go in your office,” he suggested. “I’ll try to ‘manipulate’ you, and you tell me how you feel about it.”

“Why can’t you do that out here?” she wanted to know.

“Because I can’t,” Casey said vaguely. “But if you still think I’m a Machiavellian jerk afterward, I won’t complain.”

She examined him. “This sounds like a trap.”

“Only if you’re worried about being too easily led.”

The very idea was ludicrous. “
I’m
not worried.
I
know my own mind,” Kristen said. “I have the advantage of knowing what you’re doing, too, so I don’t see how—”

“You’re stalling.” His too-astute gaze challenged her.

Unfortunately, being challenged was catnip to an independent-minded person like her. “You’re goading me. It won’t work.”

“It’s already worked.”

Darn it. He was right. “Fine,” Kristen said. “Let’s do it.”

They both slid out of the booth. Casey left his things; she took a quick glance around the diner to make sure everything was still under control. It was, but her reflex to make sure only reminded her of what Casey had said earlier.

Most people like to think they’re in control . . .

Well, she
was
in control, Kristen told herself. Especially here, in her own diner, her unofficial home away from home.

Partway to her office, she realized she ought to try to prepare herself—just in case Casey really
was
as dangerous as Heather seemed to think. After all, she’d seen him convince people of some pretty unlikely things over the past few days.

What if he manipulated her into thinking that changing her menu was a good idea? Or becoming convinced that the only thing standing between her and the Tour de France was a better grade of Schwinn than her existing vintage cruiser? Or believing (like him) that Christmas was an overcommercialized waste of time?

“Hey.” Kristen tapped him. “What are you going to try—”
Manipulating me into?
No, she couldn’t say that. Otherwise they’d be stuck arguing semantics all day. “Convincing me of?”

“That’s easy.” Cheerfully, Casey glanced over his shoulder at her. “I’m going to persuade you to abandon your litmus test.”

At that, Kristen stopped. “My litmus test?”

“Yeah. The one that dictates who you’re interested in sleeping with.” Casey gave her a faux innocent look. “Or do you have more than one? Because that’s the one I’m targeting.”

Oh boy
. “Nope. Just the one!” Kristen said.

Then she edged in front of Casey and took the lead. Because while her own big, fat mouth might have gotten her into this fix, she was determined that Casey wasn’t going to get her out of it. Not on his terms, at least. Not today.

Chapter 13

Galaxy Diner
17 mixing, piping, cookie-spritzing, chocolate-dipped days
until Christmas

Walden first realized that he might be getting serious about Talia when he started having withdrawal symptoms.

After several exhilarating days of sneaking around Kismet, dressed as Heather Miller and her boyfriend du jour, and making out everyplace they were likely to be spotted and photographed, Talia and he had been forced—because of Heather’s chicken-pox quarantine—to cool it. After all, not even divalicious pop stars could be in two places at once. And everyone knew, thanks to an overconfiding
In Touch
cover story, that Heather was communicably ill. So Walden had, grudgingly, agreed to put a hold on his new favorite off-hours activity: being with Talia.

It wasn’t easy, though. Especially since they still worked together. Being near Talia and not being able to touch her was like starving while sitting atop an uncrackable vault full of caramel pecan pie and bourbon whipped cream. It was giving him the shakes. It was making him antsy and needy and distracted.

The worst part was, it wasn’t the making out that Walden missed most. It was
her
. It was Talia. He missed her smile and her laugh and her smart-mouthed comments. He missed her cute little wiggly walk when she sneaked around a corner to pinpoint a paparazzo. He missed her touch—and not just her sexy touch, either. He missed her tender touch, too . . . like when she fixed his collar or tugged his dreads to tease him or held his hand.

Walden didn’t know how he was supposed to survive losing that. Every day, he saw Talia doing something endearing and sexy, like delivering maple syrup to table three or reaching into the rotating pie case for a jar of peppermint chocolate mousse pie with candy cane sprinkles. Or—as was the case just then—innocently stepping into the diner’s walk-in refrigerator at the same time Walden was there to bring out some eggs.

“Oh! Walden! Hi!” Talia turned her cerulean gaze on him. Skittishly, she took a step forward. “Um, how’s it going?”

“Better now.” Walden stepped forward, too. It had been
hours
since they’d last touched one another. He could think of little else. He couldn’t remember what he’d come into the walk-in for. He could only gawk at her. Yearningly. “I miss you.”

“You don’t have to say that.” Talia picked up a stainless steel tub full of prepped sage-garlic butter. She hugged it to her middle like a shield. “There aren’t any cameras here.”

“You look great,” he said. “I like your skirt.”

“
Everyone
wears this skirt,” she protested in her usual wry tone. “It’s identical to the ones that Kristen and Avery wear.”

“And those boots. Those boots are sexy.”

“Again.” Talia rolled her eyes . . . but her cheeks took on a pretty pink glow. “They’re the same boots everyone else has.”

“Maybe. They look different on you.”

“Only because you’re myopic.” She seemed to forget the compound butter in her arms. “Did you forget your contact lenses today? Because you’re looking at me kind of cross-eyed.”

That was probably true. “I’m imagining you in my arms.”

“Oh.” A winsome smile spread over Talia’s face. “It’s too bad we agreed not to do any more ‘practicing’ here at work.”