Love in Reality: A Contemporary Romance (The Blackjack Quartet) (4 page)

Silence.

The bartender wrapped her arms around herself as though she were wearing an invisible straitjacket. She opened her mouth to say something, then snapped it shut. Now she was acting like his business card might bite her.

She shrugged her shoulders and huffed her hair out of her eyes. Finally, she scrunched her face in an apologetic grin. With her chirpy, breathy voice, she said, “I’m sorry. Do you know, I actually forgot I even sent in an application?” She tried a wholly unconvincing laugh. If she thought she had a career in acting, Rand could set her straight. Good news for him was she definitely could seem ditzy.

“Look,” he said, “I know this is unexpected. At this stage we’re just asking people to let us tape them. You know, see how they look on TV. I think you’d be great.”

He tried out his kill-’em-with-charm smile, the one he shared with his dad. Rand wasn’t movie-star handsome like her uncle. Based on results, though, the smile was irresistible.

Lissa-the-Bartender was shaking her head, slowly. “Yeah, uh, about that. I think you’re wasting your time here. Uh, my—my circumstances have changed since I applied, and, um, I’m not going to be able to…participate.” Keeping one arm around her waist, she reached out the other hand to push his card back at him. She had tapered fingers, short nails, no polish.

“Are you pregnant?” he asked.

She looked stunned, then shocked and finally revolted by his presumption, all in a single glare. “Of course not.”

He waved away her outrage as an inconvenient trifle. “I had to ask. That’s the only changed circumstance that really matters to us. Everything else we can work around.”

“Look, Mr. Jennings,” she said after a glance at the card. Her voice was back to business casual. “I’m sorry you’ve wasted your time coming to Philadelphia. If you’d called me, I could have set you straight and saved you the plane fare. I may have—”

Here she stopped and rolled her eyes in self-disgust. “In a moment of insanity I must have thought I wanted to be on your show. I’ve changed my mind. And I doubt you could get me to change it back.”

He ignored the speech, although it was deliciously cogent. There was a cool flash of contempt in her brown eyes that convinced him she’d be perfect for his plan to hijack
The Fishbowl
. He had to figure a way of talking her into it without promising her the part. Rand wasn’t sure why she was dragging her feet. It should be a piece of cake to convince a bartender from South Philly to be on national TV.

He tried the smile again. “Hey, I know. It’s a surprise. You applied last summer, six months went by, nothing. People forget they even sent in a tape. But we loved yours—” he trailed off as her eyes got even larger, and not in a “Oh, is this all for me?” way. She looked horrified. Where was the ticker-tape parade? The rush to call all her friends?

What was up with this woman?

After a pause, she pursed her lips and squinted at him. “Mr. Jennings, I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to be on your show.”

Rand heard a loophole in that last sentence. “Pretty sure? C’mon, Lissa-the-Bartender. You did apply,” he cajoled in a teasing voice.

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. She pressed her lips together, annoyed with herself. She sighed, rubbed her forehead, then reached over and took his card. “Okay. I’ll try to find out what my situation is for the summer. This is your cell phone number?” He nodded. “I’ll call you tomorrow.” She stalked off, evidently disgusted with him, the show, something.

Rand visualized her as a contestant. Smart, not eager to be on TV, definitely a thinker, and over all that was an odd film of ditziness, or maybe it was distraction. Plus, of course, she was attractive in an interesting way—he really liked her nose, with its almost-bump—and she’d look great in a bikini.

Sold. He had his Ditz.

All he had to do was convince her to make a tape he could sell to Marcy.

* * *

He called her “Lissa-the-Bartender.” She was still fuming about that at the end of her shift. Okay, so that’s what she wanted people to think, but to have him say it out loud?

Normally when Barney locked the door on their way out, a switch of some sort tripped inside her head, and she stopped being Lissa-the-Bartender, as “Rand-the-Producer” called her, and went back to being Libby-the-law-student. Barney always offered a ride home, she always declined, he got into his car and drove away. Watching his taillights shrink down the road meant she could stop being Lissa. Which was a relief. Relief mixed with just a hint of loneliness.

No relief tonight, that was for sure. She pressed #1 on her speed dial. She was halfway down the block when she heard her twin answer.

“Lib, what’s up?” Lissa’s happiness grated. Libby clenched her fist around the phone as she headed for Walnut Street.

“Hey, in the rush to get to your love nest in Alaska, did it never occur to you to tell me you applied to be on
The Fishbowl
? A heads-up would have been nice.” Libby felt the words grind against her teeth. Lissa’s irresponsible life choices were legendary, especially the decision to run after her boyfriend to Anchorage. Even after all the high school antics and college flakiness, though, this Fishbowl stunt could easily be the new Number One on the list.

“Have you been drinking on the job?” Lissa asked.

“Don’t get cute.” Libby scowled at the sidewalk. “I’m the one with my ass on the line trying to juggle school and work at the bar and keep Mom and Dad happy in their ignorance. The least you can do is tell me everything I need to know.”

“Wait a minute. What was that about
The Fishbowl
? You mean the TV show?”

“Yes, the TV show. The TV show you want to be on, apparently. The producer came in to the Cork this evening and asked me—you? I don’t know, one of us—to be on the show this summer.”

“Holy shit, they actually saw my tape?” Lissa shrieked. “Whoo-hoo!”

Lissa’s glee annoyed Libby. Although tempted to hang up, Libby had to sort out this mess. She’d dodged one bullet already—

“Oh, that’s right. I forgot to mention Uncle Jack knows I’m me and not you,” Libby said.

That stopped Lissa’s happy dance.

“No way.”

“Yup. Walked in for the first time since you left, took one look and knew. I have no idea how he can tell us apart when no one else can.”

“What were you wearing?” Lissa demanded.

“I was not wearing baggy jeans and a Franklin Law sweatshirt, if that’s what you’re thinking. I have on your black Juicy Coutures, the cute blue top from Sugarcube, large gold hoop earrings and boots, although I don’t know how you manage in these things. My feet are killing me.”

“Makeup?”

“Of course.”

“Okay, so you looked like me,” Lissa said, mollified. “Anyway, what did Uncle Jack say?”

“You can imagine. I got the acid cold prosecutor routine—he demanded to know why I was in the bar, where you were, why we switched, how had I managed not to have gotten kicked out of law school, and whose social security number was on my paycheck. You know—the basic Blackjack grilling to make sure we’re not violating any federal laws.”

“Kicked out of law school?”

“I can’t work more than twenty hours a week under the ABA rules.”

Lissa groaned. “Don’t ever let me go to law school. I hate rules.”

“I know,” Libby said in a tight voice. “That’s why you’re in Anchorage with Duke, even though you’re still working at the Cork because of Sheila’s cancer. The universal rule prohibiting being in two places at the same time simply doesn’t apply to you.”

“Hey, you agreed to do this,” Lissa said. “Do I really have to grovel and thank you every time we talk?”

Libby caught the late-night Walnut Street bus, found a seat well away from the small number of passengers already on it, and took a deep breath.

“Okay. I admit I agreed. Because of Sheila and because Barney would never let me work there as me even though I love him as much as you do. But
not
because of your little igloo love nest with Mr. Junior Senator. Who names their son ‘Duke’ anyway? It’s a dog’s name.”

“Wow. You really are in a pissy mood.”

Libby could tell she’d finally penetrated Lissa’s imperviousness.

“Sorry,” Libby mumbled into the phone. “I have moot court in two days. I’m tired and my feet hurt. Just ignore me and tell me what to do about this producer guy.”

“How did you leave it?”

“I said no. Only he pressed—I have no idea why—and I hedged because I couldn’t be certain you wouldn’t want to.”

“Want to be on this season’s
Fishbowl
?”

“That is what we’re talking about, yes,” Libby said.

“Jesus, Lib. I don’t know what I want to do next week. How am I supposed to know in March if I want to be on TV in June?”

“Why did you apply to be on, then?”

She could hear Lissa take a deep breath. “I don’t know. It was a spur of the moment thing. You went back to law school, the job at the bar was boring, I hadn’t met Duke yet. I guess it seemed like fun. I never thought I had a shot of getting on. That must be like winning the lottery.”

Libby had watched
The Fishbowl
with Lissa last summer. It was mindless garbage, of course, but they sort of bonded over it. “Maybe they have a secret twist this season and they need a bartender—?” Libby offered.

“Then you should do it.” Lissa started to get excited again. “Of course, that’s the answer—tell the guy yes and go on as me. You told me Sheila’s better, so you can quit the bar. You’d have fun.”

Libby was so tired and battered from her roller-coaster day that all she could do was laugh.

“What?” Lissa demanded. “It would be a hoot.”

“I have a job this summer, if you’ll recall. My dream job at the law firm that only takes one or two associates each year, remember? I have to work hard so they’ll offer me a job for after law school. No scantily-clad TV appearances for me.”

“Oh, right. The fancy-ass law firm. I forgot.” Lissa made it sound like a stint in prison.

Libby closed her eyes. Her sister was her best friend, but not always her biggest cheerleader. Or the most practical person.

Lissa had a big heart, sure. That’s why she insisted Barney needed her to keep working at the bar even through Sheila’s chemo. But she frequently solved problems by involving Libby. Case in point—making Libby work at the bar as Lissa.

It wasn’t entirely fair to be annoyed with Lissa. Libby didn’t hate the bar gig. She liked the money, and it gave her a break from acting smart all the time. In her oddly narcissistic way, Lissa had done her twin a favor.

Libby sighed. “Okay, so what’ll I tell this guy? Do you want to be on the show or not?”

“Why tell him anything? Can’t you put him off?” Lissa whined.

“Fine. I won’t call him back. I’ll give you his cell phone number, so if you want the gig, you call him and make the appropriate arrangements.”

Knowing Lissa, she’d forget all about it. Just in case, Libby added, “If you do decide to go, give me some warning, okay? That way, when you show up on a giant fishbowl set in L.A., I’m not in Philly still trying to convince people I’m you.”

There was a pause, then Lissa said, “Yeah, okay.”

Libby read out the digits from the thick business card, then tilted it back and forth so the holographic image flickered in the bus’s fluorescent lighting. “Oh, God, I should send this to you. They’ve printed the
Fishbowl
logo as a hologram so when you tilt it, the little fish appear to be swimming. That poor man.”

“Who? The producer?”

“Yeah, Rand Jennings. Seemed a nice enough guy.”

“From the tone of your voice, I’m guessing paunchy with a comb-over.”

Libby pictured Rand Jennings at the bar, munching on Goldfish crackers. He was actually really cute. Maybe thirty, brown hair, eyes the color of an eighteen-year-old scotch, and a killer smile. Tell Lissa that? No way. “Not quite a comb-over,” she said, as though she was trying to be kind.

“Oh. Too bad. I’d been hoping he was a hottie SoCal surfer-boy.”

“Duke isn’t man enough for you?”

“Of course Duke’s man enough for me. I was talking about for you.”

“I have no time to date,” Libby said automatically, although he had been cute… “Anyway, he’s not a surfer dude type.” Rand Jennings looked too polished for the beach. And less tanned. But still hot. Keeping that detail to herself seemed a harmless lie.

Libby looked out the window and saw the bridge over the Schuylkill coming up.

“Oh, my stop. Look, call me if you decide to be on the show, okay?” Libby said swiftly, before closing the phone. She trotted down the bus’s back steps and into the converted warehouse.

When she got to the apartment, Libby checked the landline for voicemail. Blissfully empty. Her parents didn’t call often, but she had to intercept any calls for Lissa.

Precisely why Lissa didn’t want Mom and Dad to know she was living in Alaska with Duke, Libby hadn’t figured out. Maybe they weren’t thrilled she’d taken up with a guy determined to succeed in politics, but as long as Duke wasn’t a convicted felon, abuser, alcoholic, or addict, they kept quiet on the subject.

Lissa was their “we worry” twin and she was the “no problem” one, Libby reflected as she dumped her backpack on the desk. Another reason why it would be good if she never saw Rand Jennings again.

She went into the kitchen and got a Diet Rite. Not even midnight. Still time to prep for her moot court competition on Thursday.

* * *

Rand leaned back on the hotel bed and started making notes. The beauty of his plan to write a successful movie script was that the actual
Fishbowl
contestants would provide tons of material. He’d work on the screenplay during the summer, incorporating the best bits from the actual show and inventing even better stuff to fill in the gaps. That way, fans of the show would want to see the movie while detractors of reality TV would go for the snark.

He paused and looked out at Philadelphia’s skyline. Why had Lissa-the-Bartender been the one to spark this plan? At face value, she was no more than what she said on her application—a bartender in a South Philly bar. When he got there, though, everything was off, like one of those fun house rooms where the angles are screwy.