“He’s, uh, he’s all of those things.” Before she lost her nerve, or her dinner, Presley decided to get to the point. “I’ve always thought you were the one, you know?”
She let the bait dangle.
Carla cocked her head, smiled quizzically and then bit. “‘The one’?”
“Yeah. The woman he wrote ‘Lightning’ about. You two made a cozy couple. And you were together, what, eighteen months?”
“On and off.” Carla’s smile faded.
“Oh.” Presley hadn’t uncovered that nugget during her online research. “I just assumed... I didn’t ask him about you, or anything. He doesn’t talk about his past.”
“Believe me, I know. He never told me details about anyone he dated before me.”
“Really?” Presley was both surprised and unsurprised. Cash wasn’t exactly an open book, but she’d expected him to be tight-lipped with her, the reporter. He hadn’t shared his past with the woman he’d dated for a year and a half? Carla and Cash must not have been as close as the press had everyone believing. The words on and off suggested distance.
“Oh, to be the woman who inspired ‘Lightning’...” Carla’s smile didn’t seem forced, but amused. “I wish he’d felt a fraction for me of what he sings about in that song. Whoever she is, she’s a lucky girl.”
“Indeed.” Presley nodded tightly. One starlet down, one to go. Too bad Heather wasn’t also in attendance at the party tonight. The actress lived on the West Coast. She and Cash had met while Heather was filming a movie in Nashville. Presley wondered if Heather and Cash were also “on and off” in the six or so months while they dated.
Presley and Carla moved on to tamer topics, talking fashion and hors d’oeuvres and music. Carla introduced her boyfriend, also her producer, who seemed like a decent guy. Cash meandered over and met Carla’s boyfriend too, shaking the other man’s hand and politely kissing Carla on the cheek. No longing glances were exchanged, no stiff, nervous smiles, either. Presley was beginning to believe what Carla had said about the nature of her relationship with Cash.
It was oddly relieving to know that during the brief time Presley shared Cash’s bed, he wasn’t having any lingering feelings for the likes of the beautiful, famous, likable Carla Strouse.
They returned to the bar and Cash handed Presley another glass of champagne. He ordered a Coke with lime, hold the Jack Daniels, for himself.
“Staying sober for the press?” she teased.
“I have to drive the boat.” He bent and whispered into her ear, “And talk you into doing a host of bad-girl things on that boat.” Now he was grinning and she understood why. He wasn’t going to have to try hard to talk her into anything. “I have to be at the top of my game if I hope to...”
His words trailed off, his attention elsewhere. His arm at her back stiffened. “Get ready.”
“For what?”
But then Mags Dumond slithered over to stand in front of them and Presley knew exactly what. The First Lady of Beaumont Bay had finally made her way to them.
Mags had to be around seventy, but her smooth skin betrayed her age. Her plastic surgeon was good. The woman looked every year of fifty, but not much older than that.
“Well,” Mags drawled, the tassels on her ice-blue gown shimmering under chandelier light. The dress was weighed down with beads and rhinestones and should have made Mags look gaudy. Instead it only made her look wealthy. She was a woman who knew herself, knew her power in this town and reigned like the queen she believed herself to be. “Look who decided to grace us with his presence.”
“Mags,” Cash said through clenched teeth.
The woman turned to Presley. Her smile didn’t budge, her pearlescent teeth practically aglow. “Mags Dumond. Most people around here know me as—”
“The First Lady of Beaumont Bay,” Presley finished, offering a hand.
Mags’s eyes narrowed. “Why, yes.” She moved her martini from one hand to the other. When Presley took the other woman’s hand, cool metal pressed her fingers from Mags’s many chunky diamond rings, not one of them understated.
“Did you know—” Mags released Presley’s hand “—Cash refuses to record at my studio? Even after a storm knocked Elite Records to the ground. I’m all for loyalty but that’s just silly.”
“Elite Records wasn’t on the ground,” Cash muttered, the flash in his dark eyes a warning Mags ignored.
“Close enough.” Mags guffawed. “You’re Presley Cole, aren’t you? You’re interviewing our boy for your hometown paper or whatever.”
“Viral Pop is far from a hometown paper,” Presley defended. “They have eighteen locations all over the globe, and a reach of over 100 million.” Presley realized belatedly she’d stepped into the same snare as Cash. This woman was good.
“Huh. Who knew?” Mags shrugged with her mouth. “Well, I’ll leave you two to...whatever it is you’re doing. Anyway, Cash, even in the wake of your DUI and subsequent PR nightmare, my offer stands. Cheating Hearts Studio is not petty. Are you sure your brothers have your back no matter what?” She made a show of peering down at Cash’s drink. “I hope there’s no alcohol in that glass.”
Cash’s nostrils flared. If he hadn’t been sucking in a breath through those nostrils, Presley would have sworn rigor mortis had set in. His arm at her lower back was positively rigid.