Pasta Imperfect - By Maddy Hunter Page 0,26

at me and scanned the room. "The bigwigs all sleep in this morning? They're supposed to make themselves available to us for consultations, or did they forget to read the small print?"

I narrowed my eyes at her. "Okay, here's the thing, Keely. I want my dress back."

"Yeah, yeah."

"Tonight."

"That might pose a problem."

"What kind of problem?"

She popped a bubble. "I'll have to go shopping to replace it with something else, and I need to put the finishing touches on my contest entry, so I don't know if I'll have time."

"Find the time."

"Yeah, yeah." She continued to survey the room. "I don't see too many of my fellow contestants here this morning. They're probably holed up in their rooms, working on their entries. A lot of good it'll do them. I have this contest all sewn up, so they're all just wasting their time." She shifted her position and glanced toward a point beyond me. "Well, well, well. Would you look at who just walked into the room? Philip Blackmore. Gee, can't have him eating breakfast all by himself, can I? Maybe he'd like to schmooze a little with the next best-selling author at Hightower Books. Ta ta." With a jarring crack of her gum, she headed off to intercept the publishing giant.

"I'm serious about my dress!" I called after her.

Her hand fluttered lazily in the air. "Yeah, yeah."

Was it my imagination, or had she just blown me off? Oh yeah, I'd handled that really well.

Nana shuffled around to face me and followed the direction of my gaze as I threw daggers at Keely's back. "Well, would you lookit that," she said, nodding toward the rosebud dress. "Her outfit's kinda like the one you bought for the trip. Same ruffled hem and everythin'."

"It's not 'kind of' like my outfit. It is my outfit!"

"No kiddin'? She find it in the same catalogue?"

"Not exactly. She found it in my suitcase." I latched on to Nana's arm and navigated her toward an empty table. "Let's sit. I have an earful for you."

When I finished informing Nana about my clothing crisis and Mom's unwitting part in it, she sat back in her chair and gave a little suck on her teeth. "I knew we shoulda done somethin' about your mother years ago, Emily, but your grampa was always hopeful she'd change." She shot a look heavenward. "Are you listenin', Sam? She changed all right. She got worse!" She exhaled a disgusted breath. "Okay, dear, short a killin' or maimin', you have any ideas what we should do about her? Now's a good time to plan 'cause she's back in the room, readin' the first contest entries that come in."

"Where's George?" I asked, aware of his absence for the first time.

She managed a hesitant smile. "He's makin' his way down to the dinin' room. And that's the other thing, Emily. We gotta figure out how to get her outta my room. If she hadn't went out with Alice and Osmond after the fire drill last night to buy some gelato, I never woulda had any time alone with George. By the way, I like it that this hotel has fire drills. They must have a real good safety record."

I let that pass. "You got together with George? Okay, 'fess up. Did you...do anything?"

She lowered her voice. "You bet. But we done it so fast, I'm a little fuzzy on the details. Don't mention it to George, Emily, but we mighta left out a step or two."

"You can't recall which ones?"

She shrugged. "I betcha it was somethin' in the middle. But I don't understand how we coulda left anythin' out. We was followin' the directions in that book real good."

"Book?" My smile morphed into a frown. "What book?"

She peeked around her to see if anyone was watching, then quietly unzipped her pocketbook and slipped out a ragged paperback. I glimpsed the title.

"The Barbarian's Bride?" I eyed the blond hair, bare chest, and bulging biceps of the male cover model and realized that he looked a little like Duncan. "Where's the bride?"

"Inside the barbarian's lair, havin' a panic attack. The barbarian kidnapped her in chapter one, so he's struttin' around in his animal skins, makin' like he's gonna ravish her, which is really upsettin' 'cause she made a vow to her father on his deathbed that she wouldn't 'couple' with no one 'til her weddin' night. My guess is, she's Catholic."

I shook my head. "You better read fast before your book falls apart. Where'd you pick that thing up