Читать книгу Talk Dirty to Me - Dakota Cassidy - Страница 8

Three

Caine gripped the arms of his uncomfortable chair. Damn her, after ten years, for not only still being so sexy it made his teeth grind together, but for possessing the ability to suck any man—even staid Hank Cotton, into her vortex of charm.

Boom-Boom. The hell, Landon?

Why wasn’t he getting the hell up, forfeiting everything to Dixie, and going back home to Miami? He could reevaluate his life anywhere in the world. It didn’t have to be here. He didn’t need the money. He didn’t want the money. He wanted Dixie to go home and Landon alive so he could take him back out.

Worse, why was she still stirring things up in him better left unstirred? Just the brief glimpse of her with Em today at the funeral home dragged him right back to their short but tumultuous engagement.

When they’d both come home ten years ago, and she no longer felt like his kid sister, their constant sibling antagonism turned to something much bigger than he’d ever thought possible. When he’d stupidly believed Dixie wasn’t the reckless, cruel, entitled kid he’d left behind.

He mentally dug in his heels while she sat in her chair, daring him with her flashing eyes to come play the game. Not a chance she was going to sucker him again. Which brought him back to the same thought as he watched Dixie watch him. Why wasn’t he hauling ass outta here?

“What’s the matter, Caine Donovan? Are you afraid I’ll beat you just like I did when you bet I couldn’t spit watermelon seeds farther than you?” Dixie pointed to her pink-lipsticked lips, full and pouty-smug. “That’s right—this mouth beat you by almost eight inches.”

Caine made a fist of his hand, flexing and unflexing the tense muscles to keep her from seeing she was getting under his skin. “Your mouth was as deceptive as the rest of you. And you stood on a chair, Dixie. Hardly fair.”

Dixie tilted her chin toward her shoulder, letting it nestle in her long red hair, gifting him that smoldering eye thing she used to do, knowing damn well it made him crazy. “Why, where in the rules for watermelon seed spittin’ did it say I couldn’t use a chair, Caine?”

Caine’s jaw tightened to a hard line, shifting and grinding. Resist. “I don’t need Landon’s phone-sex company, or the money it makes. No matter how much.”

No amount of money was worth being around Dixie again. No amount of money was worth the constant reminder that he was an asshole who couldn’t tell the difference between the real thing, and the fake Dixie thing.

Yet. Here you sit.

* * *

Dixie rose to her feet, hurling her large handbag over her shoulder. That settled that. “Good for you, Richie Rich. Unfortunately, I do.” Wow, did she. After her drive here to Plum Orchard, her checking account was nothing but the kind of change you find in the cushions of your couch.

She needed the money. But did she need it enough to become a phone-sex operator?

Weren’t you the one organizing an ad for your kidneys on Craigslist just three short hours ago?

But what if she didn’t want to play Mistress Leather to dirty old men and oversexed college boys as a way to get herself out of this mess?

What if? What if you want to live the rest of your life never making the things you’ve done wrong right? What if you just sweep it under the carpet like you’ve always done? What if you just skip this part, the hard part, and fix something else you’ve broken instead? Something smaller, less difficult, maybe?

No. She didn’t have to do this. She could skulk back off to Chicago and continue to lick her wounds in her studio apartment with the peeling pink paint, a stove that had only one working burner, a shower that dripped exactly two drops of water per minute, and a punk neighbor who sold pharmaceuticals for someone named Dime.

She absolutely could go right back to living just barely above the poverty level while she tried desperately to pay back money she’d charmed out of her mother’s connections. Money she’d promised to handle with care—promised in the way the old Dixie promised everything. Loosely—offhandedly—with little regard for anything but what she wanted.

No. This was a way to finally do something because it was right.

Still, the more she played with the idea in her mind, the easier it was becoming to convince herself she could do this.

If getting back on her feet meant spanking a chair with a fly swatter for effect while she whispered the words, “You must be punished for disobeying me,” into a phone, she’d do it. It was either that or starve at this point. Food won. Food and a warm place for Mona and Lisa, her twin bulldogs to sleep. “So, it’s settled? I win. You lose. Where do I sign, Hank?”

Hank gave Dixie another “Hank look” translating to “not so fast.” “Let’s not be hasty. You have twenty-four hours to think about it, Ms. Davis. Mr. Donovan, too. Landon insisted upon a waiting period of sorts. In the meantime, Landon has offered his house and staff at your full disposal—to the both of you—while you mull this opportunity over. He wanted you both to be comfortable while you considered his offer.”

She’d already had two years of broke since her restaurant had gone bust. Why waste time? Dixie shot her hand upward to avoid more naysaying. “I don’t even need twenty-four seconds. I’m in. Pass the pen.”

But Hank shook his head. “I’m sorry. Landon insisted that you both take the time to thoroughly think this through and get your affairs in order. He knew the two of you well, Miss Davis. His notes, and there were many, many notes—” Hank held up a stack of paper “—claim, on occasion, you’re quick to jump before you think. Especially if it comes to any sort of competition with—”

“With me,” Caine interjected with confidence, quite obviously pleased with himself.

Hank’s lips pursed at Caine’s interruption. He held up the ream of paper again and pointed to it with a short-clipped nail. “Yes. Landon did say that, but Ms. Davis wasn’t the only one he left remarks about. He also mentioned you’re quite easily baited by—” he looked down at the paper, shifting his glasses “—the lovely and irresistible Miss Davis. His words, right here.” He tapped the mountain of white again.

Dixie shot Caine a triumphant gaze. If there were notes to be had, she was grateful she wasn’t the only one worth noting.

Caine’s fingers flexed and cracked, signaling his legendary simmer.

“Thus,” Hank continued, “he asked that you both take a hard look at his proposition. Landon was quite aware you both have lives and jobs elsewhere.”

Well, one of them did.

“So please, each of you use the maximum time given, and we’ll meet back here tomorrow at six with your decisions. Now, Landon had all the locks changed on the big house just prior to his death. I’ll go get the set of keys he had made for each of you so you can settle in after such an emotionally trying day.” Hank rose, whisking out of the office on expensively clad feet, quite obviously relieved to get away from Landon’s tawdry business dealings.

Em rushed to stand next to Dixie, peering down at her with an expression of guilt. “Before you rush to callin’ me a traitor, yes, I was the one who had the keys made and called the locksmith to change the locks. But I maintain, I only knew Landon owned a phone-sex company and he was leaving it to you two to fight over. I thought Cat and the girls were going to show you the ropes temporarily. He left me a beautiful letter to thank me for facilitatin’ his...his passin’, but there was nothing about keeping Call Girls here permanently.”

Dixie’s smile was as ironic as her tired nod. She patted Em’s hand. “You don’t owe me an explanation, and either way, I’m not staying at the big house.” Not with Caine. Not knowing he’d sleep in one of the eight or so bedrooms—naked. He always slept naked.

A fleeting visual of his wide chest with a sprinkling of dark hair and thickly muscled thighs spread wide to reveal his most intimate body part shuttled through her mind’s eye unbidden. Dixie bit back an uncomfortable groan.

“But the big house is so nice with every luxury available. Butlers and maids and a full-time chef,” Em said, as though all those things in a gloriously opulent setting would make it easier to answer to the name Mistress Leather. “And bidets. He has bidets. Who can resist a bidet?”

Dixie pulled her purse closer to her side, running her fingers over the surface. She knew everything Landon had. Scratch that. Almost everything. “Yes, I know Landon has a bidet, and a slide in the pool, and a screening room, and a camel named Toe he couldn’t bear to part with when he left Turkey so he hired a zookeeper to care for him at the big house. He told everyone all the time what he had. I’m not interested in his possessions—just the predicament he’s left me in.”

Dixie breathed deeply, pushing air in and out of her lungs to assuage her anxiety. “I don’t want to stay at Landon’s, and I don’t care about the chef.”

“You just care about the money, right, Dixie?” Caine interrupted, rising from his chair to saunter with liquid grace toward them. As confident as ever, he’d added a dash more smug to his repertoire.

Nice. Veiled innuendo.

Fine. She deserved all of the mud he could sling.

As she turned to look him directly in the eye for the first time in almost a decade, Dixie mentally reminded herself to stand strong and fight the bone-deep lust that never failed to consume her whenever Caine was in close proximity.

The way he moved with the sensual grace of a panther, the light bronze of his skin beneath his white shirt and navy suit, the ripple of his thighs, pushing against his trousers, still affected her.

But resist she would. Not an easy hurdle to jump when he moved in even closer and gazed down at her, waiting.

No. He wasn’t waiting. He was laying down a dare in much the way she had earlier, but his wasn’t based on desperation. It was steeped in anger.

Automatically, Dixie’s chin lifted, her pride raising both metaphoric fists to the sky even as a wave of shivers covered her arms and the back of her neck. “Don’t be coy about it, Boom-Boom. If you want to insult me then do it, but do it well. I’m not ashamed to say I need a job. So what?”

“And you’re willing to call men you don’t know ‘Daddy’ for employment?”

Her cheeks went hot, but her mouth flew open. “You’re just shy of accusing me of hooking for cash, aren’t you?”

Caine’s dark eyebrow rose while he jingled coins in his pocket. “Oh, I’m not shy, sweetheart,” he reminded her.

She swallowed hard, the room growing oppressive. No. Neither of them had been shy. Their chemistry was what legends were made of. Hot, sticky, soul-baring legends. Her legs wound around him while he drove into her with forceful thrusts until she screamed, was the hottest, rawest sex she’d ever had. Everything—everyone since was just lukewarm.

She forced that to the back of her mind. “Well, I’m not shy either,” she gritted, “as you well know. So here’s the truth of the matter. The economy stinks. My restaurant went bust. I lost hundreds of thousands of some fine people’s investment dollars. My 401K has tumbleweeds cohabitating in it, and I haven’t been able to find a decent paying job in two years. So shoot me, Caine Donovan, for having the audacity to entertain the thought that this might answer a couple of long overdue prayers.”

There was nothing Caine would love more than to hear the opportunity she’d jumped on when she’d left Plum Orchard had failed. He deserved to roll around in her failure.

Em stepped between them, casting Caine a pleading eye before turning to Dixie. “Suggestion? It’s been a long, chaotic day. How about we go to Landon’s and relax before someone says somethin’ rash?”

Dixie straightened, preparing to leave before she took the bait Caine dangled in front of her and things escalated between them. They were older—wiser—and their behavior should reflect that.

She tugged her purse back over her shoulder with resolve. “I’m ready now. That Landon wants us to wait twenty-four hours is just enough time to grab a shower, eat some of Martha’s infamous peach pie and Sanjeev’s lamb curry, get a decent night’s rest, and skip back over here to sign those papers.” Her choice was made.

“You do realize this is ridiculous, don’t you, Dixie?” Caine’s voice grumbled, still so sexy-rough. “Landon’s really yanking our chains, pitting us against one another. You know, just like back in the old days when the two of us competed over everything, and Landon looked on fondly at his two foolish best friends making asses of themselves? He’s having a good laugh, wherever he is. What I don’t get is why he’d do something like this. It’s not like Landon, especially knowing the way we feel about one another. I don’t suppose he left the reasons he did this in all that paperwork, Em, did he?”

Em’s hands folded and dropped in front of her. “No. I don’t know any more than the two of you know.”

It was clear Caine’s anger with Dixie hadn’t dulled after almost a decade, and he wanted her to know. Fair enough. “Then don’t stick around for the five W’s. Go back to Miami and sell some more million-dollar, oceanfront houses to leathery-skinned women who have pocketbook-size dogs. You don’t need the money. I do. You probably couldn’t handle the challenge anyway.” Dixie was methodically inviting him to try and best her. It was silly and childish and unlike the person she strove so hard to be, but gravy. Ten years was a long time to still feel this much hate coming from Caine.

The ripple of power Caine exuded reflected in his narrowed eyes. “Are you suggesting I let you have everything?”

“I’m suggesting you go home and admit defeat. Because, as you’ve mentioned, you don’t need the money.”

“And how is it that you’ve come to the conclusion I’ll end up the loser?”

“It’s simple logic. Me—woman—with a hot voice, if all the compliments I’ve been getting all these years are any indication. You—man, probably not a key component when attempting to arouse a male who wants to be called Daddy by his little girl.” Dixie had to fight the shudder those words evoked. That was most definitely not going to be her persona’s specialty.

“Ah, but you forget one little thing, Mistress Leather,” Caine baited, gracing her with a smile full of white teeth.

“What’s that, Candy Caine?” Her eyebrow rose with total confidence. She hadn’t forgotten anything. She had him by a landslide just by virtue of her gender.

Caine leaned into her, the slightest hint of his cologne dousing her nostrils before she took an unsteady step back. “You’re forgetting ‘Bond. James Bond.’”

The tip of Em’s index finger went directly into her mouth. She nibbled the chipped end of her nail, her brow furrowing, her eyes flashing danger zone signals at Dixie.

Oh, damn him and his Sean Connery bombs. Caine could create any persona he desired and melt the insides of millions of women into sticky goo. Dixie wanted to stamp her feet in frustration until she remembered one thing. Women didn’t call phone-sex lines, or if they did, they sure weren’t in the majority. Men were.

Hah!

Dixie was right back in high school when she said, “I think you’re forgetting one little thing, Boom-Boom, name one woman you know who calls a phone-sex operator. One.”

Caine’s lips flat-lined.

Uh-huh. “I bet you don’t have enough fingers and toes to count the men you know who’ve dialed a Mistress Leather, or variation thereof, do you, Caine Donovan?”

More flat-lining and nostril flaring.

She curtsied and winked. “Your serve.”

“Don’t be so quick to call me dead in the water. The women of today are empowered, unafraid of their sexuality, bolder about their needs and about expressing those needs. Add in Sean Connery, Johnny Depp, maybe a little Sam Elliott or for that matter, almost anyone they’d like to, uh...verbally play with, and I’m your man.” Then he grinned. Wide. Smug.

Her nostrils flared.

“So I’ll tell you what, Dixie Davis, you go right ahead and rev up your sexy, because I dare you to top that.”

He’d used the word dare. Such a bad, bad word. Resist, Dixie. Fight it. Fight hard.

Instead of reacting, Dixie gathered herself together, her body rigid enough to shoot an arrow and looked Caine Donovan square in the eye.

The second gauntlet of the day she threw down was again silent, metaphoric, but it was no less meaningful. “Then I guess this is Donovan versus Davis. See you here tomorrow at six. Don’t forget your thong and your flogging thingy.”

“Flogger,” Em corrected. “It’s just called a flogger.”

Dixie cocked her head at Em. “You know this how?”

Her face flushed red as she backed away from them. “I’m gonna go check on Hank and see if he’s found those keys,” she said over her shoulder, her embarrassment painfully obvious.

Caine rolled his tongue along the inside of his cheek, his expression once again arrogant. “You bet I’ll be here, Dixie, and I’ll see your flogger and raise you some latex and hot candle wax,” he retorted, still so smug.

Okay, conscience, fair is fair. I’m trying to be the best person I know how to be. I’m trying to leave my baggage at the airport carousel. But c’mon. He’s baiting me. It’s plain as the nose on my face. You can’t expect me to take it and just lie down and die.

Her blood pressure soared. “Funny you should mention the word see, Caine.” Dixie paused, putting the tip of her nail between her lips, widening her eyes with mock exaggeration. “You know, I wonder if Landon’s company provides live video chats? I bet he does in this age of technology. So, I’ll see your ridiculous latex and raise you one hot Southern belle in a leather corset, fishnet stockings and some ruby-red stiletto heels. A real live Southern belle, not someone just pretendin’ to be a celebrity,” she sniped with a smirk.

Caine leaned down, pinning her with his gaze, as though he were transmitting every last hot, lust-filled second they’d spent together to her mind’s eye.

He trailed a finger along her cheek, making Dixie fight a whimper for the weak-kneed hunger his touch left in its wake.

It was all she could do to remain defiant rather than curl her jaw into the digit and sigh with years of pent-up yearning. His hand snaked around her waist, hauling her to him so their bodies were flush, his taut, hers softer but no less aware of the fire brewing beneath all that sinew.

Her clit throbbed in reaction to the rigid line beneath his trousers, aching with familiar need. Her leg begged her to allow it to wrap around his trim waist.

His hard fingers dug into her flesh, but Dixie didn’t flinch. Instead, she issued what she was sure, if Caine actually decided to take Landon’s offer, would be just one more of her many challenges. “What do you have to say for yourself now, Caine?”

Leaning in farther still, his lips stopped a mere breath from hers, creating an all-over tremble of awareness. The scent of his cologne, sharp and musky, lingered in her nose. “I say you look hot in leather, Dixie. Your ass was the finest in all of Plum Orchard at one time. Maybe even in the entire state of Georgia.” Caine emphasized that point by reaching around her and grabbing a handful of it, kneading it until she thought her lungs had stopped working altogether.

Sliding his free hand along her bare leg, he traced his silken-padded fingers upward until they were under her skirt and had reached the edge of her panties, allowing his knuckles to skim the tender flesh where her leg met the apex of her thighs.

Caine pulled away then, almost garnering a gasp of disappointment from her, only to run his index finger along her cleft, pressing the silk of her underwear against the heat of her achy clit.

Shivers of need, desperate and wanton, made everything else fall away. Though her arms remained at her side, the all-consuming desire to twine them around Caine was a war she fought with steely resolve. He let his silken tongue dab at her lips, before he added, “Know what else I say?”

Her breathing was choppy, there was no hiding it, but she was delighted to find, Caine’s was, too. “What else do you say?”

The delicious movement between her legs stopped as suddenly as it had started. He smirked down at her. “I say you don’t have the guts. That’s what I say.”

Just as Dixie was considering wiping the smirk off Caine’s face with a good right hook, Hank and Em’s footsteps sounded. She pushed at Caine, taking two unsteady steps away from the astounding effect he had on her body, away from the memory.

Em held up the gleaming keys and shook them.

Dixie snatched her set from Em and dangled them in Caine’s direction with quivering fingers, and melting kneecaps. “I’ll see you here tomorrow, Caine Donovan, and we’ll see who has guts. Bring your impersonations. Bring whatever you think will help you win this. Just be sure to bring it, big boy.”

Dixie rounded on her heel with such fluid grace she owed herself a pat on the back for not collapsing. “Good night, Hank. I’ll see you tomorrow at six sharp.” She sashayed out of the office with the invisible words I dare you written all over the back of her suit jacket.

When she reached the top of the stairwell, she had to grasp the banister to keep from pitching forward. The throb in her temple returned, matching the unmerciful throb between her thighs, beat for agonizing beat.

She’d just consented to sell sex over the phone so she could win a new way to make a living, and in order to do it, she’d have to beat Caine Donovan, the one and only man who’d ever made her so insane with primal, wanton need, she would have done anything he asked.

Crazy must have taken a global vacation, but not before making one pit stop in her small town in Georgia.

Em skidded out into the hall, hot on her heels. As she reached the top of the steep steps she panted, “Don’t do it, Dixie! I can barely afford to feed our dog, Dora the Explorer. I don’t know if I can take Mona and Lisa in, too. And seeing as you have nothing left in your 401K, you won’t be leavin’ me anything to help.”

Dixie finally giggled, releasing her nervous tension. “I wasn’t thinking about ending it all. I was just thinking about getting out of that room.”

“Where all that hot man sucks up every last ounce of air? I know. I get it. He’s like a vacuum packer—or at least, when you’re in the room he is.”

“That’s not it either.” The lie fell from her tongue like honey dripping from a bottle. “I was leaving before we ended up thumb wrestling till someone cried ‘uncle.’ You know what we were like, Em—always trying to one-up each other—fight to the death. That was years ago. I’ve grown up. So the last thing I want to do is engage in a pointless ‘he said, she said’ argument. I want to go back to my hotel and mull—plan—plot how in the world I’m going to pull this off.”

Em clucked her tongue. “First, we’re going back to Landon’s so you don’t break the rules he’s set forth and forfeit everything because you can’t resist being difficult. My mama has the boys for the night, and I’m free. I can dine on cold, leftover crab and artichoke dip in Landon’s hot tub, which runs at a warm ninety-eight degrees. And second, remember this—your voice is pretty sexy, Dixie. All raspy and Kathleen Turner-ish. No doubt, you’ve made a million foolish men fall at your feet without ever having seen you. All they needed to do was listen. Bet you could beat the pants off Caine Donovan in a phone-sex-off with a voice like that if you set your mind to it.”

If only his pants were the issue. Anxiety churned in Dixie’s stomach. “But he can create thousands of different personas with his impressions, Em. He can be whoever a woman wants him to be. How can I ever top Sean Connery?”

“I can’t even believe I’m sayin’ this. What do you think the ratio of male/female callers really is? Ignore the story Caine was sellin’ you and focus. You could beat him with your mouth taped shut with those odds. Women might be empowered these days, but the truth is, they don’t have to work as hard as men out in the real world.”

Good point. But... There was still Sam. “Have you heard his Sam Elliott impression?”

Em waffled, probably because she had. And it was a thigh-clencher. Still, she shook a stern finger at her. “Then you’ll just have to work harder.” She paused then, her smile ironic. “Funny, isn’t it? You actually workin’ for what you want instead of everyone doing the work for you? And besides all of the obvious, we don’t even know if Caine’ll take Landon up on this crazy endeavor I’m hereby callin’ ‘Survivor, the Porn Edition.’ So before you even consider feelin’ sorry for yourself, just remember your new mantra—outwit, outlast, outplay.”

Em’s words of encouragement warmed her. True enough. You didn’t become a successful real-estate mogul by taking two months off. “You think?”

Em nodded with a vehement dip of her head. “He has a successful real-estate business back in Miami, Dixie, employees and everything. He can’t just up and leave for a long period of time. So I’d lay bets by tomorrow, he’ll be on a plane back to the Sunshine State. Today was just him blusterin’ like men do when a woman has the nerve to call them on their game.”

Dixie stood rooted to the top of the stairs while the phrase, “What can Mistress Lana do for you tonight, unworthy one?” ran like a stampede of elephants in her brain.

Em roped an arm through Dixie’s. “You’re thinkin’ too much. I can see it. Let’s go to the big house and we’ll talk it over.” She stopped on the step for a moment, turning to Dixie, her eyes clouded with suspicion. “Wait a minute. Did Landon know what was going on with you financially? Did he know you were pushin’ your last dime just to get here to be with him?”

Tears began to flood her eyes again, but this time Dixie didn’t stop them, she let them drip down her face and hit the steel steps. “No,” she whispered. “I could never tell him....”

“Because the first thing he would have done was meddle, and the second would be to set about making the boo-boo all better, and naturally, you have your pride.”

“So you know what happened?” That last bit of her pride floated upward toward the ceiling.

“The grapevine is thicker than ever here, Dixie. Some took great pleasure in it when they read the papers and saw Dixie-Cup had gone belly up. Though I will tell you, I wasn’t one of them. Honest.” Facing Dixie, she held her right palm up.

“I didn’t want him to rescue me. I went in with my eyes wide open. I left Plum Orchard to open the restaurant with them wide open, too—definitely one of my more harebrained schemes. But I never told Landon a thing. I lied to him and told him everything was okay, because he was so sick and he had enough to worry about. I let him believe I walked away from all of my investors.”

“You’re doin’ this to pay back all those investors, aren’t you? Because most of those investors were Davis family connections.”

Shame and humiliation tinged Dixie’s gut, but she refused to let it dampen her determination. “If I have to sell an organ on Craigslist.”

Em let go of a heavy sigh. “That’s what I figured. But it isn’t like your mama’s friends couldn’t afford the investment, Dixie. They’ll just write it off as a loss. And isn’t that what bankruptcy is for anyway? So you don’t have to pay anyone back?”

Dixie shook her head sharply. No. That was the easy way out. No more easy. “It was the easiest way to keep the bank at bay, but I still owe a debt as far as I’m concerned. I’ll repay it.”

Em’s pretty blue eyes searched hers, a hint of admiration in them until they clouded back over with skepticism. “I just don’t know what to think of you anymore, Miss Dixie,” she said, her tone clear with conflict.

“Then think about other things. Like how uproariously, ironically funny it’ll be when everyone in town finds out Dixie Davis, reformed mean girl in deep financial debt, is selling sex.”

“You should’ve told Landon, Dixie. He’d have wanted to know. He loved you. He said that often to me durin’ his last month. He said if he’d been hitting for the other team, it would always be you.”

He had said that on a million occasions. He’d said it when he admired the color of her hair or what he called the sexy half curve of her lip when she was thinking. He’d said it when she was singing along with the radio, and her sultry voice made every song sound dirty.

Dixie smiled at the memory, and it grew wider. He’d said, The only person I’d change who I am for is you, Dixie Davis. You make this gay man pause from time to time. But then I remember I can’t change, and you love Caine Donovan. Nothing can change that, girlie.

Something had.

Dixie shuddered a breath from her lungs and began to descend the steps one at a time, taking Em with her.

Maybe it was Landon’s spirit. Maybe it was just desperation, but an ember of hope sparked, and if she fanned it just right... “But he didn’t know, and he didn’t hit for my team, and now here we are. So let’s go back to the big house and research phone sex, because I plan to be the best Lady Lana Call Girls has ever seen. Caine Donovan will rue the day he talks dirty to some lonely woman with Johnny Depp’s voice.”

The pound of footsteps from behind them startled the women. Caine flew down the stairs past them, ruffling Em’s hair on the way. “Race ya to the big house, ladies!” he yelled as none other than Christopher Walken, taking the steps two at a time as if he was twelve, and they were still walking the halls of Plum Orchard Middle School.

“So we have some work cut out for us,” Em squeaked.

Dixie’s eyebrow rose. “We? Won’t that cause trouble for you with Louella and the gang?” Louella was going to have a kitten if she found out Em was helping Dixie Davis—once girlfriend-code breaker extraordinaire, now sworn enemy.

Em flapped her hand, but her eyes wouldn’t meet Dixie’s. “Bah. They pay me little mind unless they need somethin’ legal, so I pay little mind back. It’s the same as it always was—just like high school. I wasn’t born a Mag, so I’ll never be a Mag. And since Clifton left me for that no-good woman in Atlanta, they only tolerate me because I can be of help from time to time in the legal area. I was always an outsider, Dixie. That’s still just as true as it ever was.”

Dixie grinned. Em was bucking the system even though Dixie knew the lack of acceptance from the reigning queens of popularity and prominence stung. “Then we can be outsiders together.” She tugged at her arm.

But Em hesitated. “Wait. Before we go any further, there’s one more thing.”

Dixie stiffened. “Now what? Oh, wait, I know. Landon owned a brothel, too, right? Is this the part where you tell me I have to get rid of my flannel pajamas for crotchless underwear, but you couldn’t tell me before because it was confidential?” She accented the word with a roll of her eyes.

Em’s hand fluttered to her neck. “Why, Dixie, I almost think that would be easier.”

Hackles rose on the back of Dixie’s neck. “Than?”

“Telling you about the court-slash-Landon-appointed mediator. Remember Hank mentioned that?” Em’s feet were suddenly moving down the steps at a rapid pace, the skirt of her dress flying behind her.

Dixie followed suit, pushing the exit door to hold it open. “Vaguely. I was a little caught up in the ‘oh, baby, I like it like that’ at that point.”

Em stepped around her and held her hand out with a grimace. “Meet your court-appointed mediator.”