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“It’s okay, Tika!” he called, voice rising so everyone could hear. “I know you hate the alarm!”
He sidestepped, prepared for Tika to lunge, but she wasn’t that kind of dog. She just fixed him with a look that said she was not happy at this reversion of character. Not happy at all.
Chris strode to the alarm panel, its red light flashing. And then he remembered that Daphne had offered to show him the code… and he’d said no.
He didn’t know the security code for his own house.
Chris lifted his chin. Calm. Imperious. He lived in the wilderness. He was a bestselling author. He had an MFA.
He tapped random numbers on the keypad. Then he frowned, his most thoughtful, authorial frown. “How odd,” he said. He tapped the same numbers.
“Mr. Remington?” the woman said.
One bead of sweat formed at his temple. “How very odd,” he said, and prayed his voice sounded steady.
Uh, don’t worry about that, buddy. She can’t hear it over the screaming security alarm that you cannot turn off despite it allegedly being your house.
A blur appeared to his right. It was Daphne, running for the alarm.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said, wedging between him and the panel. Her fingers flew over the keypad, and the alarm stopped.
She shook her head at Chris. “You forgot the new code, didn’t you?” Without waiting for an answer, she turned to the woman. “I changed it yesterday when we had a security concern. I told Mr. Remington the new code but…” She rolled her eyes. “You know writers. He was so caught up in work that he obviously wasn’t listening. Again.” She passed Chris an affectionately exasperated smile.
“And that is why I have you, my dear,” he said, finding his Zane voice and ignoring Tika’s warning growl. “You keep me on track even when the muse steals me away.” He turned to the woman. “May I introduce my incomparable and indispensable housekeeper—”
“—Dana,” Daphne said. “But the person you’re here to see is Mr. Remington. I’ll just trot upstairs and make coffee while he dresses.” She stage-whispered with a smile, “Clothing, sir. I know that brain of yours is busy plotting the next book, but you should probably put on some clothing.”
She headed for the stairs. “Coffee, tea, and freshly baked muffins will be ready in twenty minutes.”
DAPHNE
I’m not ready. I’m not ready at all.
As Daphne baked the prepared muffin batter, that was the refrain that kept running through her head, only to be countered with another.
You don’t need to be ready.
This isn’t about you.
It’s Zane. It’s all Zane.
And how did she feel about that? Such a good question. It was what she wanted, wasn’t it? Let a professional be the center of attention while she melted into the background, freed to focus on her work. That was what she did as an architect, and it was the way she liked to work.
Write the books. Stay in the background. Let Chris do his thing.
Yet she really was putting her career in his hands, wasn’t she? How much did she trust him to play Zane Remington?
Such a good question.
She’d come to trust him to do short interviews. They got the same questions on repeat, and he riffed on her database of answers.
But this was live. It was up close and personal… and he hadn’t even read the damn book.
The timer went off. As Daphne grabbed the oven mitts, voices drifted in from outside.
Chris took them outside?
She should have shown him around yesterday. A fifteen-minute tour of the property so he could give the same to the crew when they arrived.
