The picture posted with that headline and blurb certainly didn’t make Derrick appear very upset to have lost the woman he’d planned to marry. Judging by all the shopping bags, he and Crystal had been out buying Christmas gifts and were finishing up with an intimate lunch.
“Definitely not business,” she muttered, and it was obvious from the comments that everyone who’d read the article agreed with her. Below the picture, the journalist had included three facetious multiple-choice answers.
Crystal takes Lourdes’s place on more than just the music charts.
That one stung—and brought back the panic she’d been feeling when she first arrived in Whiskey Creek. Everything she’d built was ruined, gone. She was twenty-nine and it felt as if her life was over.
Don’t freak out. You’ve been doing so much better, she reminded herself. Kyle had such a calming influence on her. She thought of him briefly and told herself he’d be home soon. But she couldn’t turn off her computer before reading the rest of those multiple-choice answers.
Quit assuming the worst! Crystal isn’t leaning close to intentionally show Derrick all that cleavage. She’s merely discussing the possibility of creating a baby...er...Christmas album with him.
Baby. “Good luck with that,” Lourdes muttered. She was fairly certain Derrick didn’t want children and that he wouldn’t be a very devoted father if he had any.
The last choice was:
No judgments here. Give the guy a cigar. Any man who’s slept with both Lourdes Bennett and Crystal Holtree is hands down the luckiest man on earth.
Lourdes grimaced, disgusted that anyone would applaud his infidelity.
There was a noise at the door—the key in the lock. Instantly relieved, she looked up as Kyle came in.
“Hey, how was your day?” he asked when he saw her.
As usual, he’d left for work before she got up. That was becoming their routine. He’d head off at the break of day, she’d get up an hour or two later, do some yoga and then write until it was time to cook dinner. Fortunately, she hadn’t seen a soul since Noelle had dropped off that meal. Even Noelle hadn’t been back for that photograph she’d requested.
“My day was good until I got on the computer,” she admitted.
He tossed his keys on the counter. “Word’s out?”
“Yeah. The vultures are circling, looking for any opportunity to pick my bones. You should see what these people have written...”
When he walked over, she thought he was going to read what she’d found. Instead, he closed her laptop. “Don’t look at that stuff.”
“You’ve seen it?”
“No, and I don’t want to.”
“It’s just like I said it would be—crazy.”
“I believe you. But who cares what they say? Let them say what they want. You’ll show them when you put out your next album and it goes platinum within a few weeks.”
She drew her legs up and wrapped her arms around them. “You really think I can do it?”
“I have no doubt.”
That helped. The past couple of nights she’d sung him snippets of what she’d been working on during the day. She didn’t have a lot done—a couple of melodies with partial lyrics. But they were seeds, good seeds, and she was grateful to have at least started her next album. When she’d arrived in Whiskey Creek, she hadn’t been able to come up with a single new idea. She’d been too anxious, too preoccupied with all the wreckage in her life.
Until she’d met Kyle.
“Derrick’s betting against me.” She rested her chin on her knees as she gazed up at him. “He doesn’t believe I can stage a comeback.”
Kyle pulled out the closest chair and sat down. “How do you know?”
“He thinks Crystal has a greater chance of succeeding. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be sticking with her.”
“Then Derrick’s a fool.” His lips curved into the crooked grin she liked so much and, in spite of everything, she felt an answering smile tug at her own lips. When Kyle was around, her career and even her relationship with Derrick didn’t seem as important as when she was alone.
He gestured at her computer. “I hope you didn’t spend your entire day on the internet.”
“No.”
Angling his chin, he said, “Prove it.”