Hook, Line, and Sinker (Bellinger Sisters)

“And then the day Hannah left to return to LA, there it was. On my porch. Fox went back and bought it without her knowing.”

Opal made an O shape with her lips. “Oh my. That is romantic.”

“No. No, you have it all wrong, ladies. It was kind.”

Piper and Opal traded a very superior look.

Part of her couldn’t even blame them. Fox buying her that album was the one thing she couldn’t seem to define as one hundred percent friendly. It sat in a place of honor back home, facing out on the hanging rack that displayed her albums. Every time she passed it, she replayed the moment at the convention when she’d gasped over the find, tracing the square edge of the album with her fingers. The warmth of his arm around her, the unsteady pound of his heart. How for the first time, she’d let someone into the music with her, instead of disappearing into it alone.

Hannah shook herself. “You’re actually helping me prove my point, Pipes. If he wanted to . . . appreciate me, why would he wait until I was leaving to hand me his golden ticket like that?”

“She makes a good point.”

“Thank you, Opal. Case closed.”

Piper rearranged the perfectly curled ends of her hair, physically accepting the end of the subject. “So. How is LA? Does she miss me?”

“She does. The house feels even bigger without you in it. Too big.”

Their mother, Maureen, had left Westport over two decades earlier in a cloud of grief after Henry Cross’s death, relocating to Los Angeles where she’d worked as a seamstress for a movie studio. She’d met and married their stepfather at the pinnacle of his success as a producer. Seemingly overnight, the three of them had gone from residing in a tiny apartment to a Bel-Air mansion, where Hannah still lived to this day.

With Piper in residence, the mansion never failed to feel like home. But ever since Piper moved to Westport, Hannah felt more like a visitor. Out of place and disconnected in the gigantic palace. It had become obvious that their parents led a separate life, and lately, she’d started to feel like an observer of it. Instead of someone who was happily off living her own.

“I’m thinking of moving out,” Hannah blurted. “I’m thinking of a lot of things.”

Piper angled her body to face Hannah, head tilted. “Such as?”

Being the focus of the conversation was unusual, to say the least. It wasn’t that it embarrassed her to be the center of attention. There was simply no use involving everyone in problems she could fix herself, right? Like finagling a trip to Westport because loneliness and a sense of missing something had started getting to her. “Never mind.” She waved a hand. “How are things going with Brendan’s parents?”

“She’s changing the subject,” Opal pointed out.

“Yeah. Don’t do that.” Piper poked her with the tip of a red fingernail. “You’re going to move out of Bel-Air?”

Hannah shrugged a shoulder. “It’s time. It’s time for me to . . . grow up the whole way. I got stuck halfway through the process.” She thought of Brinley. “No one is going to consider a promotion for a girl who lives with her parents. Or they’ll consider me less, anyway. If I want adult responsibilities, I have to be one. I have to believe I am one first.”

“Hanns, you’re the most responsible person I know,” Piper said, hedging. “Does your interest in Sergei have anything to do with this?”

“There’s another man in the mix?” Opal split a glance between her two granddaughters and sighed. “Lordy, to be young again.”

“He’s my director. My boss—only. Nothing has changed on that front,” Hannah explained. “What I want from a career and my love life are totally separate, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want Sergei to look at me like I’m a woman, you know? Instead of the scruffy PA.”

The guy was jealous, you know. Back at the bus when I came to pick you up.

Fox’s voice filtered in through her thoughts. She’d been busy over the last four days, getting everyone settled in their temporary housing, unpacking supplies in the trailers, meeting with the local business owners. But she hadn’t been so busy that she wasn’t aware of Sergei. Of course she was always aware of him on set. With his passion on full display, he was a magnet for attention. But if the director had really been jealous of Fox, he’d forgotten all about it and gone back to treating Hannah with polite distractedness.

Trust me, if he’s worth a damn, the fact that I got to bandage your bump will make him jealous enough. There went Fox’s deep rasp in her head again, when she should be thinking of Sergei. Still . . . she couldn’t stop replaying what the fisherman said to her in the kitchen. About his reputation. About how he wouldn’t want people assuming they were an item, because he thought it would be a bad look for Hannah. He didn’t really believe that nonsense, right?