Queen of the Universe (In Love in the Limelight Book 2) Read online

“Over here!” she calls from above me.

  “You're up there?” I holler. “Did you hurt the raccoon?”

  “No, she ran off into the trees.”

  “Stay right where you are,” I shout, ducking back in the window. “I'm coming around the other way.” I run to my office to go out onto the living room roof, figuring I'll hoist myself up to the higher roof from there. But when I start climbing out, I stop half-in, half-out of the window. “Mom?”

  She's standing above me, ready to give me a hand. She pulls me out onto the roof, where she has a picnic all nicely laid out on an old quilt from my linen closet. An old quilt that used to be on my bed back home. “Mom?” I say again.

  “I tricked you,” she says matter-of-factly. “I decided that this was important enough to resort to deceit. For your own good. And mine,” she adds.

  I stare at her, wide-eyed.

  “I didn't know there was really a raccoon,” she assures me. “I made that up. And even if there were, I wouldn't have hurt it. Don't you remember that gimpy possum I kept as a pet in the basement when you were little?”

  “Guy Smiley,” I say, recalling the little guy with the huge jaws.

  “Right.”

  “So … what? Are we bonding now?”

  “I'll settle for talking.”

  “I don't want to talk to you.”

  “I know where you work, Lola. And I will hit you where it hurts if I have to.”

  Seriously? My mom is blackmailing me? Threatening to bug me at work?

  Without a word, I walk over to the picnic blanket spread across the roof and sit down gently, remembering the tiles.

  As I stare into the glittery Los Angeles night on display, my mom opens the picnic basket. She hands me a turkey sandwich. Kaiser roll, crisp iceberg lettuce, generous slathering of mayo. My mouth waters. This sandwich was always my post-holiday favorite. “Did you put salt on it?”

  “Lots,” she says, and hands me a Pepsi.

  I take a bite but I do not moan or sigh or make any noise. But God, I want to. “This isn't fair. You know all my kid favorites.”

  “No, it's not fair. It is what it is, and I think you're tough enough to handle that. And don't tell me you've never tried to entice anyone with food. You Hollywood types are always doing lunch.”

  “I'm really good at my job, Mom.”

  She sighs. “I know. And I know you work damn hard. And I know it's taken titanium-plated will and determination and guts to get where you are now. I am very happy for your success.”

  I whip my head around to face her. “Now you're happy for me? Because you know I'm miserable?”

  “No,” she says, looking at her hands. “I've always felt that way about you. But I could never bring myself to say it. But now I have to because you're hurting and you need to let me in.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Yes, because you've gotten yourself into some sort of a crisis—the kind you might never bounce back from if you screw it up.”

  “Like you know me,” I scoff, shoving the sandwich into my mouth and taking a gargantuan bite.

  “But do you know me?”

  We look at each other and I don't know what to say.

  “You write all these characters,” she says. “Characters that millions of viewers identify with. You see into their souls. I know you make them up, but the responses they generate—it tells me you have the capacity to understand the human heart. Can't you just try to understand mine?”

  I tighten my jaw.

  “We can be like Apollo Creed and Rocky,” she suggests. “So much alike. Opponents for so many years. But they join forces eventually.”

  I consider. “Hmmm. Apollo dies in the ring.”

  She nudges me with her elbow. “Don't take the comparison too literally or you might end up with a Dolph Lundgren-type.”

  I don't say anything.

  “Please, Lola. Let's talk.”

  “Is it so important to you?”

  She nods. “You need me. You're hurting and you need me and to answer your question from before, no, it does not make me at all happy.”

  “I'm fine.”

  “So have I been,” she says. “My whole life. But I want better than 'fine' for you.” My mother leans back to rest on her elbows. “I haven't had it so bad. I married the gorgeous town bad-boy when he was ready to settle down and make money. I played the part of the ravishing but dutiful wife and dynamo mother until Colin went off to college. Most of my life I'd been surrounded by love. But I wanted glory too. So I took the world by storm and started my own business. Now I've got the glory. But I lost my daughter because of my bitchiness.” She sits up and turns to me. “I want you to have it all, Lola. All at once. The glory, but the love and tenderness, too. Tell me about Arlen.”

  I don't say anything.

  “Does he know about you?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was his reaction?”

  I smile. I can't help it. I can't deny how incredibly perfectly cool Arlen Black is. Why should I? Why should I take any credit away from this guy just because I can't have him? “He said that even if it meant that I had a penis, he'd shrug it off and figure he's gay now.”

  “Oooo-hooo-hooo,” my mother crows, a smile breaking across her face. “Lola, girl, you better tell me everything about this man right now.”

  So I do. But when I get to the part about the kids and Jon and what I did, I balk. “I'm not sure that the rest is my story to tell.”

  “What?” my mom squawks. “I have to call Arlen to get the rest of it?”

  “Mom, it's his life, his personal life.”

  “Don't even try to tell me it's not your life, too, Lola. Something that's hurting you this much is a part of your life, too. A big part.”

  So I tell her the rest of the story.

  When I'm done, she nods. “Okay. So you finally decide to tell him that you can never have kids so that he can make an informed choice about whether he really wants you in his life or not.”

  “Yes.”

  “And he decides he wants you, but you refuse to accept his choice.”

  “He's not thinking it through. I'm just trying to save us from a dreadful someday. You said yourself that I understand the human heart.”

  “Yes, but Lola, when you're not making up the story yourself, you've got to consider other people.”

  I just shake my head.

  My mom picks up a turkey leg and takes a big bite. “You know,” she says, after she swallows, “when you didn't win your first Emmy, I cried for three days straight.”

  “What?” I barely have enough breath to form the word. She told me she hadn't even watched.

  “Your poor father. He was upset, too. He took it hard, but he did not know what to do with my constant tears. I was a little better when you didn't win the second time, because I was angry. Your episode of The Tallyrand Proxy changed the face of television, for Christ's sake.” And I can actually hear the ire seeping into her voice.

  “Mom ...”

  “I've been following your career, Lola, tracking it like a falcon. I have subscriptions to Variety and Written By. Thank goodness social media has exploded the way it has—it makes stalking you and your accomplishments so much easier.”

  “Mom, what the hell are you telling me?”

  “That I've been loving you in secret for fifteen years, Lola. I made so many mistakes with you, but I was always too afraid to tell you how sorry I was. I was petrified that you would throw it back in my face. I was afraid you'd tell me how horrible I'd been and I couldn't bear to hear the truth. So I loved you in secret because I was afraid of what might happen if I took a risk.”

  I don't move.

  “It's no way to live,” she says. “All that love and no one to give it to. It does not feel great. I want better for you, Lola.”

  Her words are making my ears pound in time with my racing heart. My head hurts.

  “And think about how it's felt for you, having love withheld from
you for so long.”

  I can't listen any more. I just can't. “Mom, I ...” I'm not exactly sure what I want to say, but my tone is already on dismissive. It's automatic.

  “Lola, I'm not writing the story or re-writing it. I'm just telling you how it is.”

  “No!” I say trying to plow away everything she's churning up.”You're just reverting to the same old Charlotte, trying to convince me to marry him. Always trying to push marriage onto me as the way to true happiness. It's the same old tune.”

  “And what is it that you've always said?” she tosses back. “That if someday you met someone who you wanted to spend every single day with for the rest of your life, you'd marry him if he wanted to marry you.”

  I don't say anything. I just look at Charlotte as the silence of the night presses in on me like a sonic boom.

  Mom shrugs. “Looks like we were both right.”

  Chapter 73

  RAY

  Ray raps three times.

  “Come in.”

  Ray yanks open the door and hurries into Arlen's trailer.

  “Ray—chill. Why are you so nervous?”

  “Aren't you nervous? Your first location shoot.”

  Arlen looks up from the script he's marking up. “I think it's harder for production. I just say the lines. Wherever.”

  “But this is exciting,” Ray trills, rubbing his hands together. “The last show I was on with Lola was a sitcom and we never did any location shoots. But today, we go out into the world with the cast and crew.”

  “Is that why you're so dressed up?”

  Ray looks down at his sleek suit and to-die-for tie and brushes off a spec or two of lint. “I need to look the part of the mover and shaker that I am. When civilians see me, they will know I am somebody.”

  “Civilians?”

  “You know what I mean,” he says, striding to stand in front of Arlen. “Stand up. Let me see what you picked out.”

  Arlen stands and salutes. “Private Black, reporting for duty. Sir.”

  Ray stops in his perusal of Arlen's wardrobe. “That 'Sir' was kind of sexy.”

  Arlen raises a brow.

  “Anyway, at ease,” Ray says. “It's Saturday, so you don't have to salute.”

  “Are we going to have a lot of Saturday shoots?”

  “No,” Ray answers, brushing his hands across the shoulders of Arlen's jacket. “But the school's empty today, so, voila.” Ray turns Arlen around and pulls down the back of the jacket so it hangs straight. Then he turns Arlen back around to take in the look of the jeans, white T, and caramel colored sports coat, set off with a pair of brown jungle mocs. “Lola said you knew what Sam would wear better than anyone, and I gotta say, I like it.”

  Arlen flops onto the couch, undoing all of Ray's primping. “Yep. Lola just tells me to wear what I would normally wear, and wardrobe pretty much buys more of the same.”

  “But this is a kind of dressy scene. Outdoor school concert, and Celeste actually invites Sam. Wardrobe wasn't sure what you'd go for, but I think you nailed it.”

  “I'm not a freaking barbarian, Ray.”

  Ray shuts his mouth but a kittenish smile peeks out. “Anyway,” he says, “you look good. Casual, clean, dressed-up for you.”

  “For Sam,” Arlen corrects.

  “Right. For Sam. Are you comfortable?”

  “Sure.”

  Though Ray couldn't figure out why Lola cared if Arlen was comfortable. Fashion and comfort simply didn't belong in the same universe. But then again, Ray could never accuse Lola of residing in the same dimension as fashion. And Arlen was no better.Talk about unfair. Not a lick of fashion sense between them, but those two looked good on a whole different level. Still, Lola insisted Arlen had to be comfortable, and this was something Ray had to get right. “You're not just saying that?”

  “Ray!” Arlen snaps. “Those were my directions. Cleaned up, but comfortable and relaxed. For fuck's sake, I'm not an idiot.”

  “But you are a grump!” Ray swats at Arlen. “Seriously, lighten up. This is supposed to be an easy-going, happy scene. Celeste begins to think twice about Sam.”

  “I know what I have to do,” Arlen sighs.

  Ray looks at him. “Arlen, it's been a month. What happened the night of the rave? After Lola left me at the hospital? You two have been freaking glacial to each other since then.”

  “Has my performance of Sam suffered?”

  “No.”

  “Then shut up.”

  “Come on, Arlen. I liked you better when you were sad and dark and brooding. Now you're just all … angry. What did she do?”

  “What did she do?!” Arlen shouts. “Nothing. That's what she did. And what she does every damn day. Nothing. Nothing nothing nothing.”

  Ray steps back, hoping the hot red blush rushing into his face doesn't freak Arlen out. “Oh,” he says. “Uh … sorry I asked.”

  Arlen clenches his jaw. “Me, too.”

  Ray takes a fortifying breath. Then another. “Okay.” His head swivels toward the door when someone knocks.

  “Let's go,” Wendy calls from outside.

  Ray opens the trailer door and looks at her. They both smile and Ray looks right into her eyes. “Let's do this.”

  Chapter 74

  WENDY

  Christ on a crutch!

  Wendy can't believe Ray's acting so nervous. At least he has the fashion sense not to sweat through his suit. But Holy Batman! He better calm the fiddlesticks down before he ruins the whole day.

  Had Lola been addled to put Ray in charge of so much? But then, who else knew so many sneaky little details? Wendy, of course, but she could hardly be in charge of today. She shivers, knowing that she's using her powers for good by staying in the background.

  “Wow,” Arlen says as he steps out of the trailer and right into the shockwave of Wendy's chic black dress.

  “Mmmm ...” Wendy agrees. “I think it's perfect. Celeste has to go to a school function, but all of her good clothes are from her trophy wife days. So subtle and sensational is the best she can do.” But then she shoots a look at Ray. “It's not too sexy, is it?”

  “Just the right amount of sexy,” Ray assures her. “Let's go,” he calls, heading toward the parking lot.

  “Wait,” Arlen says. “What about hair and make-up?”

  “We're doing it on location,” Wendy explains, taking his arm. “We get the location lighting that way, and no chance for anything to melt or muss en route.”

  Arlen looks around the mostly deserted lot. “Where is everybody? Aren't we going in caravans or something?”

  “Everyone's already on their way,” Ray retorts. “We're late because of Wendy taking so damn long in wardrobe.”

  “I did not!”

  Ray shoots her a look.

  Then she giggles. “Okay, I did. This way, Ray gets to chauffeur just the two of us.” She leans her head onto Arlen's arm and sighs.

  Arlen looks at Ray. “Do you know where we're going?”

  “I'm not an idiot either,” Ray says. “The private school with the park on King's Road between Sunset and Gower. Just let me do my job.”

  “Like you let me do mine?”

  “It's part of my job to be all up in your grill.” Ray turns on point so he faces Arlen. “At your request, I understand.”

  And then Wendy actually sees the tension in Arlen's eyes snap away as he looks bleakly back at Ray.

  “Sorry,” Arlen says. “You're right. Man, that feels like a long time ago.”

  “Okay,” Wendy chirps, determined to keep things light and summery and full of sunshine. “Let's talk about ...” Drat! She had nothing! Nothing that she could say to Arlen, anyway. “... me. Yes, let's talk about me.”

  They slide into the car, Wendy pulling Arlen into the backseat with her. “Okay, it's been ages since I've been to a school function—not since I was in school. When my parents made me go to my brother's band concerts, they were so boring. So what's it like as a parent, Arlen? Is it th
at boring? I need to know what feelings Celeste should be channeling.”

  Arlen shows a scrap of a smile. “It's not boring. The whole time, you're fixated on your kid. First, picking them out. Then watching every move they make. Are they happy, scared, do they seem like they feel good about their performance? Bad? And then it's over before you know it.”

  “Hmmm,” Wendy says, nodding, as if taking it all in.

  Ray's phone jingles and Wendy sees him look at it.

  “Fuck!”

  “What?” Arlen and Wendy sit up toward the front seat a once.

  “Fucking Lola,” Ray says. “She left her script with all her notes at the house and she wants me to stop and pick it up on the way.”

  “It's okay, Ray,” Wendy chips in. “They can shoot establishing shots of the school and the kids in the concert if we're late.”

  “IF?!”

  “Don't worry,” Arlen says. “You're still a mover and a shaker, and I'm sure plenty if civvies will notice.”

  “Fuck,” Ray says again.

  But Wendy just giggles.

  Chapter 75

  ARLEN

  When they pull into the mouth of Lola's driveway, Arlen feels the spiky tension tugging at his gut. But he doesn't let it show.

  They stop at Lola's gate for Ray to punch in the code and Arlen doesn't even pay attention to see whether she's changed it or not. It sounds like it's maybe three digits fewer than it was before, but he doesn't really notice. When they get far enough up the drive that they pass the trunk of the tree downed in the storm, Arlen doesn't look. He doesn't even let his eyes wander to see if there's an errant stocking of Lola's caught in the grass. Why would there be? He's being stupid. She'd left all her clothes in the car that night.

  They pull up in front of the house, but Arlen doesn't even register that they've stopped until Ray cranks the parking break.

  “I'll be right back,” Ray says, hopping out of the car and slamming the door.

  Arlen looks at the headrest in front of him and hears Wendy begin her regulation breathing exercises. Whatever. Does that really calm her down? Center her? Every one of Arlen's nerves is jumping as he waits for Ray to come back. He really doesn't want to be sitting in Lola's driveway. Not when he can be at some closed-for-Saturday Montessori pre-school getting his face swabbed with make-up while Wendy tells the hair people what to do.