Page 22 of Spicy Sapphic Christmas

How much had she heard?

“Siena.” Bea immediately plastered on her business face, shot Jo ashut uplook and stood up with her hand outstretched. They shook, and Bea immediately stepped to the side so Jo could also join in on the conversation.

“Come on in.” Siena led the way to her office.

They were all seated in chairs to the side of Siena’s desk, a small table between them. Bea had to work really hard to tame her nerves so that she could make reasonable conversation.

Once they were settled, with water bottles for each of them, Siena gave them a patented smile. “I’m glad I was able to speak with you today.”

“We’re glad we could meet as well,” Bea said, taking over their side of the conversation.

“We’d love to work with you,” Jo chimed in loudly. A definite sign that she was nervous.

Bea shot her sister a sharp look. “Jo’s not wrong, we would love to see if we could work with you. But we understand there’s a lot of conversation that needs to happen first.”

“Right, there is.” Siena’s smile faltered. “Your show the other week was good. I’m surprised you’re not represented by anyone already.”

Bea shrugged slightly. “We’ve worked with several publicists and production managers in the last few years. None of them worked out.”

“Why’s that?” Siena twisted the cap off her bottle and took a long sip.

“A number of reasons.” Bea sighed. “I’m sorry, but I have to ask because it’s been weighing on me. How’s your daughter?”

“My daughter?” Siena halted, the bottle of water right in front of her lips.

“She broke her arm?” Surely, Bea was remembering that correctly. She hadn’t been able to get the thought out of her mind. Siena had looked so worried that night.

“Oh! Yes.” Siena put her water bottle down. “She fell out of her bunk bed. My ex insisted that bunk beds were the only beds that would fit in the room, and of course, since Harley is older, she’d have to be on the top.”

“So you have two kids?”

Siena waved her hand. “Only Harley. She’s fine. She has a bright pink cast that her friends have drawn all over, and she’s absolutely loving the attention. She hates the fact that she’s not allowed to do any writing at school, though. I’m pretty sure she’ll figure a way around that one by the end of the week.”

“Good.” Bea let out a breath of relief. “I was worried it was more serious than that.”

“No, just typical kid clumsiness, I suppose. At least that’s what my ex keeps telling me.” Siena glanced from Bea to Jo and back again. “I’m surprised you remembered.”

“I’m a big sister to quite a few siblings. I think the worry comes naturally.”

“Ah.” Siena smiled, genuinely. “Well, thank you for asking.”

“No problem. I didn’t mean to disrupt our conversation.”

“No, don’t worry about it. You were saying that you’ve worked with several managers.”

“Yeah. We have. None of them worked long term, and right now we’re without representation.” Bea squared her shoulders. Just that small interlude of the personal had given her enough strength to find her center and continue this conversation in a manner that would get them somewhere.

“What didn’t work out with them exactly?”

This was where honesty could either work in their favor or not, and Bea had a strong suspicion with Siena that it would work for them. She’d told Jo as much when she’d initially brought Siena to Jo’s attention.

“Most wanted us to tone down our queerness.”

Siena coughed. “I’m sorry, what?”

“They said we were too gay.”

Siena’s jaw dropped. She focused her gaze on Bea, her head shaking slightly before looking at Jo. “Is she serious?”

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