“Mother wouldn’t hear of it,” Eunice declared before she could finish the thought.
“She might have to,” Callie said grimly. “Especially if it meant she could keep the house and hire someone to help out.”
“But that land is our inheritance,” Eunice protested.
That, of course, was the real source of her sister’s objection, Callie knew. She and Tom wanted that land. Tom envisioned himself as some sort of land baron, the corn king of Iowa.
“Let me think about it,” Callie repeated.
“I’m giving you until the end of the week, then, so help me, Mother will be on the first flight to New York.” She slammed the phone down, apparently so Callie would get the message that she meant business.
“Well, that was pleasant,” she muttered to herself.
A key turned in her door just as Terry called out, “Knock, knock, dollface. I know you’re home because I can hear you talking to yourself.”
“Unless you have a very large bottle of gin with you, go away.”
Terry ignored the warning and came on in. “Uh-oh, Eunice must have called again,” he said, regarding her sympathetically. “Why don’t you change your number and not tell that witch?”
“Because that witch is my sister,” she said, unwilling to admit how much appeal his suggestion held, especially after a conversation like the one they’d just had. Maybe she’d move while she was at it, so no one could find her at all.
Terry sat down beside her, shifted her bare feet into his lap and began to massage them. This, she reminded herself, was why she put up with Terry’s tart tongue and his interference in her life. She sighed with pure pleasure, finally beginning to relax.
“I thought sisters were supposed to share some special bond,” he said.
“So they say,” she said wearily.
“On a scale of one to ten, how much guilt did she dump on you this time?”
“Seven,” she said. “But that wasn’t the worst of it.” She summarized Eunice’s threat to send Regina Gunderson to New York, if Callie didn’t come home to take over her care.
“There’s an obvious solution,” he said with such nonchalance that every muscle in Callie’s body tensed all over again.
“What?” she asked cautiously, though she knew perfectly well where he was headed. She’d taken a trip down that very road herself only moments before.
“You could become a star, darling.”
She promptly removed her feet from his lap and drew her knees to her chest. “Forget it,” she insisted. She might have been down that road, but she’d turned back.
He gestured toward Jason Kane’s latest floral offering. “Am I wrong or is Mr. Kane still in hot pursuit?”
“So it seems.”
“Would it be so terrible seeing your face on the cover of all the soap opera publications? Would it offend your sensibilities to be envied by several million women because you get something they all want—namely, me.”
“I already have you.”
He leered at her suggestively. “Who knows, a couple of love scenes with you, and I might go straight.”
She scowled at him. “I know for a fact that sexier women than I have tried and failed. Besides, you and Neil have a better relationship than most heterosexual couples I know. Why would I want to interfere with that?”
“The challenge, of course.” He regarded her speculatively. “Unless you’d prefer the challenge of getting Jason Kane’s pants off, something I hear is not all that difficult, by the way. Be careful with that one, dollface. He’s wicked.”
Callie prayed she wasn’t blushing, since that very idea had crossed her mind a time or two over lunch. The reaction had stunned her. She’d been pretty much convinced that all men were lower than slime ever since her divorce. Not that she intended to admit that Jason Kane had stirred any sort of response at all, especially to a man who would use it against her every chance he got. Badgering and blabbing were two of Terry’s less attractive traits.
“I am not interested in getting anybody’s pants off,” she said adamantly. “And aren’t we getting a little far off the subject?”
“Which is?”
“What to do about my mother.”
“I thought that was what we were talking about. If you become a rich, successful star, you’ll be able to set your mother up with twenty-four-hour companions, if that’s what she needs. You’ll be able to hire some big burly guy to run the farm.”
Terry seemed unduly fascinated by the latter. Callie shook her head. “You are such a fraud. I can’t imagine how Neil puts up with you.”
“That’s personal, darling. Now, come on, say you’ll at least give serious consideration to Jason Kane’s offer. If I have to do one more love scene with Penelope Frogface—”
“Her name is Frontier,” Callie chided.
“Whatever. She wears too damned much Giorgio. One of these days I’m going to start sneezing and never stop. They’ll have to close down the set and have it fumigated before I’ll go back to work. It’s up to you to save us all from that.”
“It is not up to me to do any such thing.”
“Besides that, a good friend would want to help out,” he added slyly.
Callie eyed him warily. “With what?” she asked, certain that the subject had slipped away from excessive perfume.
“I seem to be getting these odd little notes,” he confided with an air of mystery.
“Fan mail?”
His expression turned rueful. “Not exactly. My fans love me.”
Something in his voice alerted her that this was more serious than he was pretending with all of these enigmatic hints. “Terry, exactly what’s in these notes?”
He hesitated so long, Callie doubted it was just for dramatic effect. He seemed almost frightened to describe the notes aloud. “Terry?”
“I suppose someone totally paranoid might call them threats,” he conceded eventually.
Callie stared at him. “Threats? What kind of threats? Dear heaven, have you told the police?”
“Darling, first of all, I am not that paranoid yet. Second, I couldn’t possibly tell the police and risk the publicity.”
Since Callie had never heard of an actor being averse to publicity, she guessed that these threats must have something to do with Terry’s relationship with Neil. “Is someone threatening to reveal that you’re gay?”
“It’s nothing as overt as that,” he admitted. “But it sure is pointing in that direction. I mean, what else could it be?”
“And you think someone on the show is behind them?”
“It has to be. The notes keep turning up in my dressing room with no postage, even though they’re usually stuck in with the fan mail.” He looked vaguely shaken by the implications.
Callie thought of the file cabinet that had inexplicably fallen during her one scene on the show. “Terry, is it possible when that file cabinet fell it was no accident?”
The question shook him visibly. The color drained from his face. “Of course not,” he denied a little too heatedly. “I’m sure someone just tripped and knocked it over.”
“Who?” Callie asked reasonably. “No one admitted to it.”
“With