When Stars Collide (Chicago Stars #9) - Susan Elizabeth Phillips Page 0,50
strong similarities.”
“Such as?”
“You’re both a hell of a lot of work.”
What had only been the glimmer of an idea began to take shape.
* * *
When Thad pounded on her bedroom door an hour before they were scheduled to leave for Atlanta the next day, she politely suggested he go to hell. Unfortunately, that didn’t discourage him, and the next thing she knew he’d barged inside her room, grabbed her hairbrush from the dresser, and held it out. “Sing!”
“No.”
“Don’t mess with me on this, Olivia. We’re going to try a little of my kind of therapy.”
She pushed his arm away and tried withering him with her most condescending look. “Opera singers don’t use microphones.”
He was un-witherable. “Right now, you’re not an opera singer. You’re an ordinary singer. And they use mikes.” Once again, he extended the stupid hairbrush. “I was thinking I’d enjoy some Ella or Nina Simone.”
“Try Spotify.”
His lip curled, but not in a good way. “And you brag about your work ethic. What I see is a woman who’s given up. Instead of fighting the good fight and doing the work to fix what’s wrong, all you want to do is whine.” As if that weren’t scathing enough, he added, “I’m disappointed in you.”
Nobody was ever disappointed in Olivia Shore. She snatched the hairbrush from his hand and gave him Billie Holiday. A few stanzas of “God Bless the Child” sung so badly it was a good thing Billie was already dead, because if she’d heard Olivia’s choppy phrasing, she would have killed herself.
Thad smiled. “You could take that to Carnegie Hall right now.”
She threw the hairbrush at him. She targeted his chest instead of his head—unnecessary, as it turned out, because he plucked the hairbrush right out of the air before it could land.
“I’m that good,” he said at her expression of astonishment.
If only she were.
“And you’re not as bad as you think.” He patted her cheek. “I ordered us breakfast. Strawberry cheesecake French toast.”
She regarded him glumly. “Only for me, I’m sure. While you have an arugula-kale smoothie with a side order of garden grubs.”
“Now don’t you worry about it.”
As it turned out, she never got to enjoy that French toast because she made the mistake of checking her phone before she sat down to eat.
10
Her New Orleans attack had gone public. The mainstream newspapers restricted the item to a few factual sentences, but the Internet gossip sites were all over it.
Police are giving few details about a bizarre attack on opera star Olivia Shore. The assault occurred in a New Orleans alley. Shore was apparently unharmed, but what was she doing in a back alley? And what part did Thad Owens, the Chicago Stars’ backup quarterback, who is rumored to be involved with the opera diva, play in the incident? So many questions.
It couldn’t have looked sleazier.
Thad was still upset as they rode the elevator to the lobby where they’d meet the limo taking them to the airfield for their flight to Atlanta. “They’re insinuating that I beat you up!” he exclaimed.
They were doing exactly that, but she tried to minimalize it. “Not really,” she said weakly.
“Close enough.”
“I don’t understand why we’re getting all this attention.”
“Because I’m a dumb jock and you’re a high-class diva, and it’s too good a story to pass up.”
“The only thing dumb about you is your taste in T-shirts.” His, she happened to know, was a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar Valentino.
He gazed down at the navy-and-red graphic of astronauts floating in space. “Might have been a mistake.”
“You think?”
Only Henri and Paisley were waiting by the limo. Fortunately, Mariel had left the tour, but Olivia suspected she’d turn up again, like a head cold that wouldn’t go away. She’d probably run off to Uncle Lucien so she could complain about the rubes Henri had hired to represent the company.
“We’ll look on the bright side,” a less-than-cheerful Henri said as they arrived at the airfield, “two new radio outlets called to schedule an interview.”
“For all the wrong reasons,” Thad said.
Once they were on board, Thad received a phone call of his own. Since he’d taken a seat across from Olivia, she could hear his side of the conversation, which mainly consisted of unhappy grunts. When he pocketed his phone, she regarded him with concern. “Everything okay?”
“The Stars press office. Phoebe Calebow isn’t happy.”
Even Olivia knew about the legendary Phoebe Calebow, the owner of the Chicago Stars and the most powerful woman in the NFL.
He extended his legs as far as the space would allow. “Phoebe has