Page 1 of Home to Me

1

“All right, people. Talent is still on his way. We’re looking at, minimum, thirty more minutes,” a man wearing a trucker’s hat called through a megaphone.

Seriously?!

That was the fourth “announcement” they’d had today claiming the same thing—a thirty-minute wait. The first one of its kind had been delivered almost eight hours ago.

Lauren Harrison was highly annoyed, although no one would ever know it from her placidly calm demeanor.

Not many things ruffled her. She was a high-powered woman in a high-pressure career. If she were easily rattled, she would have fallen apart long before. But there was one thing that got under her skin every time, even if she refused to show any outward signs of it.

She absolutely could not stand it when people behaved as if they were too good for everyone else around them. She detested it when people displayed any sort of attitude of entitlement. After working hard to get where she was by doing her job well and without complaint, she respected others who also worked hard at their jobs without regard as to whether she might consider their job on a lower rung of the social ladder than hers.

To that end, she had no patience for people who treated restaurant servers like their personal servants, for people who treated administrative and secretarial staff like second-class citizens, or—more to the point in this moment—people who were willing to make an entire television production crew of more than twenty-five people wait around for six hours because they didn't consider it important to be on time.

Lauren was at the home of one of her best friends, Karina Blackstone—known to the rest of the world as pop superstar Karina Black. Karina agreed to have her stunning Hope Falls mountaintop mansion featured on the celebrity edition of the real estate reality show Home Sweet Home.

The show offered a glimpse inside fabulous residences that the public would never ordinarily be afforded the chance to see. Lauren, a real estate agent who loved homes and architecture, would reluctantly admit to watching it every once in a while—although, she would be quick to point out that she was interested solely in the beautiful homes that were showcased and was not impressed one little bit by the appeal of the host; a charismatic and almost-too-good-looking-to-be-a-real-person Ben Stevens.

In fact, it was the complete lack of professionalism and courtesy currently being shown by the hours-tardy Mr. Stevens that was the cause of Lauren's irritation. The shoot was scheduled to begin at seven a.m. The crew was set up on time, ready to go. Lauren, the real estate agent who’d originally sold Karina the house and who was on hand to give Ben a personal rundown of the architectural details, was there and ready to go on time.

Even Karina was on time and she was one of the most famous people on the planet. She was the one person in this fiasco who would have the right to throw around her diva weight, and she was the height of professionalism.

Ben Stevens could take a lesson, Lauren fumed to herself.

It was now four o'clock in the afternoon and the host still hadn’t seen fit to grace them all with his presence. Lauren sighed as she glanced at her watch for the twentieth time that hour.

Shaking her head, she walked over to where Karina sat in front of a vanity mirror getting her hair and makeup touched up by the professional stylists who’d flown in for the shoot.

Lauren gracefully slid into the chair next to Karina's, making eye contact in the mirror because Karina couldn’t turn her head to face Lauren without disrupting the stylists' work. Lauren studied herself in the mirror side by side with Karina. They were both tall and slender, but where Karina had the dark, dusky-brown skin and silky, midnight-black hair befitting her Native American heritage, Lauren had light peach-toned skin and white-blonde hair, which was usually swept back in a chignon, not a hair out of place. The combination of her reserved and controlled manner and her Nordic good looks inspired more than one competitor or colleague to dub her “The Ice Princess.”

Lauren said regretfully, “Kar, I don't know how much longer I can stick around at this point. I know I agreed to do the segment but I have already pushed appointments that I had this afternoon to this evening and I'd rather not reschedule again. I was actually supposed to be…what do they call it, out of here a few hours ago?”

“Wrapped,” Karina replied.

“That’s it. I was supposed to be wrapped a while ago. I mean, I hate to bail on you, but...”

“No, hey, don't even give it a second thought,” Karina said genuinely. “I can fill him in on the details of the house. Sure, it won't be as brilliantly or professionally done as it would be by you, but it will be fine. If you need to take off, go ahead. You have a job to do.”

Lauren nodded, torn. On the one hand, she didn’t like to break her commitments, which is what made the thought of rescheduling her appointments so distasteful. But on the other hand, she didn’t feel right about leaving Karina with the job of remembering and relating all of the real estate minutiae that she would have no real reason to keep in her mind. Square footage and ceiling heights had little meaning to an artistic soul like Karina. She’d bought this house because of its stunning view and the fully equipped music studio it offered.

Before she could make her decision, she heard the distinctive voice of Karina's manager, Bernie Kaplan, as he made his shuffling way across the room to where the women were sitting. Bernie was a stooped, balding, white-haired little man who was not even a fraction as spry of body as he was of mind and spirit.

“Hello, beautiful women,” he greeted them cheerfully. “I have news regarding when we might be getting this show on the road.”

“Excellent!” That was exactly what Lauren wanted to hear. “When might that be?”

“No one knows. That's the news,” Bernie said matter-of-factly. “But I'll keep you posted.”

Karina laughed. “Oh, yes, Bernie. Please do. Your little updates are so helpful.”

Bernie shrugged. “Can I know what I don't know?”

Lauren and Karina looked at each other, each silently puzzling out the grammar of the riddle to themselves.

“No, I cannot,” Bernie answered for them. “But here is a small tidbit of information that you may find more enlightening. When I was waiting to speak to the producers about when we might get started, I happened to hear a very interesting conversation they were having.”

“Were you eavesdropping, Bernie?” asked Karina reprovingly.

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