Lissa- Sugar and Spice (The Wilde Sisters 3)

“Nick?” she said breathlessly

“So,” a woman’s voice said, “it’s true!”

Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse.

Lissa cleared her throat.

“Hello, Jaimie.”

“And me,” Emily said. “It’s both of us, Melissa—and don’t you dare hang up!”

“Why would I do that?” Lissa said, and hung up.

The phone rang again. Rang and rang. She considered shutting it off, then pictured the zillion voice mails and messages her sisters would leave. And what if Nick called and she didn’t know it was him?

The sixth time the phone rang, she took the call.

“I don’t want to speak to you right now,” she said, before either of her sisters could speak.

“We’re sure you don’t,” Emily said, “but we sure as hell want to speak to you.”

“Em. I know you mean well—”

“What on earth did you think you were doing, Melissa?”

Lissa gave a gusty sigh.

“Look,” she said, “I really don’t have the time for this.”

“Telling me you were the chef at a tony spa when you were chief cook and bottle washer at a broken-down horse ranch!”

“I never said a word about a spa!”

“A ranch owned by a has-been hack!”

Lissa’s jaw tightened at the sound of her other sister’s voice.

“Hello, Jaimie,” she said coldly. “It’s nice to talk with you, too. And you’re both wrong. The ranch is not broken-down, and Nick is not a—”

Her eyes met the cabbie’s in the mirror. If he eavesdropped any harder, his ears would flap.

“You know what?” she said. “I am not going to have this conversation.”

“Yes, you are,” Jaimie said grimly.

“No, I’m not. Neither of you is saying anything sensible.”

“Where are you?” Emily said. “You’re not in your apartment. We already know that!”

“How can you possibly know that?”

“We were there. Well, not there. We didn’t stop and go in, not once we saw all those reporters.”

“Those ghouls,” Jamie said, all but hissing through her teeth.

Lissa blinked. “You mean—you mean, you’re here? In Los Angeles?”

“Where the heck else would we be when our sister is in trouble?”