Facing the Music (Rosewood 1)

“Of course you do,” he whispered back. “You’re wearing the same brand of perfume I bought you in high school.”

Ivy turned to look at him, one brow subtly raised. “So you were sniffing me.”

There was no point in arguing now. “So maybe I was,” he admitted. Ivy opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by cheering and applause.

“Three . . . two . . .” the mayor counted down with the crowd. “One!”

Ivy and Blake closed the scissors and the yellow ribbon fell to the ground in two pieces. Blake was ready to take off, but he was certain that wasn’t the way this was going to work. They went back onto the stage to get out of the way of the crowds and return the scissors. Before they could drop them and go, several photographers approached the platform.

“Could you hold the scissors up and smile?”

Ivy didn’t hesitate to lift up her half of the scissors again and smile brightly for the cameras. Blake went along with it for the sake of the cause, although he felt like the third wheel in every photograph.

“Right there, beautiful!” one man said.

Ivy did as she was asked, smiling graciously and posing in a way that seemed awkward but would probably make her look thinner in the pictures. It really must suck to think about things like that all the time. The casual, relaxed Ivy he remembered from school had made a brief appearance here in Rosewood, but the arrival of the press had chased her away. Now there was only the music icon.

She looked good. He couldn’t deny that. But his mind kept drifting back to her first day in Rosewood. Half-naked, hiding in the bushes. She had been nowhere near camera-ready that day. The only blush she’d been wearing was courtesy of her own embarrassment.

“Can we get one more of the two of you without the scissors?” one of the guys with a camera yelled from the back. The crowds had drifted past them into the fair, leaving behind only the photographers.

“Just one,” Ivy directed. Pointing to the large banner overhead, she added, “And you’d better get the fair sign in the shot! If I see one headline about Blake and me out on a hot date together, I’ll stop cooperating. Got it?”

Blake tried to smother his smile as the group of grown men nodded in agreement. His Ivy had grown a pair while they were apart. She wasn’t the victim of the press, at least not all the time. He was certain those men would cross her boundaries when the headline called for it, but there seemed to be an arrangement between them and their subject that got them the pictures they wanted and got Ivy the press she needed.

Blake leaned into Ivy and wrapped his arm around her waist to pull her against his side. He smiled as a flurry of flashes went off, and then she immediately pulled away. For a moment Blake was a little insulted, but he realized she was moving to keep the photographers from taking another picture.

“Go take some pictures of the rides,” she said, shooing them off. “Nothing more to see here.”

Blake stepped down off the stage and offered Ivy a hand getting down herself. She was wearing a pair of black leather boots, but the heel was a little high for trolling the gravel grounds of the fair.

“Our work here is done,” Blake said as they stood looking at the fair beyond them. The sun was down now, and the lights had really begun to twinkle in the darkness. He turned away to look at Ivy and found an odd expression on her face. Her lips were twisted in thought as she watched the Ferris wheel slowly rotate.

“What’s the matter?” he asked. “You’re not thinking about standing me up, are you?”

“No. I was just trying to remember how long it’s been since I’ve done something like this.”

“Don’t worry,” he said with a grin as they walked under the archway and into the fairgrounds. “It’s like riding a bike.” He reached for his wallet and bought two wristbands for the rides at the ticket booth. The woman snapped on the hot pink plastic bracelets and pointed them in the direction of the rides as though the giant, lit-up machines weren’t visible for miles.

If Ivy was nervous about tonight, she hid it well. They screamed on the kiddie rides, ran through the fun house, and rode blankets down the gigantic plastic slide. He bought her the requested bag of pink cotton candy and they ate it together on a bench near the midway.

Every now and then, someone would stop Ivy to ask for her autograph. The fair drew people from all around the county, not just residents of Rosewood. They weren’t used to seeing a star like her just roaming around in a public place.

Blake would stand back watching as she graciously complied with every request. She was especially great with her younger fans. She would crouch down to talk to the kids, signing whatever they had with them with the pink Sharpie she apparently carried in her purse.

“Do you always have a marker with you?” he asked after the last fan disappeared.

“Always. You can’t autograph T-shirts and posters with a pen. I never know when someone will ask. I’m surprised it took this long. I think people in town are too polite to ask me.”

?

?I’ll tell Otto and he’ll sell your autograph to raise money.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” she said with a casual shrug. “I wouldn’t—” She stopped midsentence and sighed. There was a photographer only a few feet away, shooting as they walked. “I wish he would go away. I’d like just ten more minutes of peace. Is that too much to ask?”

Blake eyed the man, and then his gaze shifted to the giant Ferris wheel behind him. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “Come with me.”

Ivy seemed hesitant, but she didn’t argue. They got in line for the Ferris wheel and piled into one of the carts together.