What Happens on Vacation...
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Brenda Jackson
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One
“You’re not coming home to Fairbanks during the monthlong summer break in the Senate, Jess?”
Senator Jessup Outlaw moved around his bedroom packing while talking to his oldest brother, Garth, on his cell. “No. I met up with Spencer last month when he was in DC on business. Reggie and I joined him one night for drinks.” Spencer Westmoreland was their cousin from California who owned a huge vineyard near Napa Valley. Reginald Westmoreland was Spencer’s brother and also a fellow senator.
“Spencer invited me to visit him and Chardonnay at the Russell Vineyards. Since many of you are busy right now and will be down there for the anniversary celebration at the end of the month anyway, I decided to accept his invitation.”
“What about town hall meetings with your constituents?”
“I held several while home for Sloan’s wedding, so I’m good there. Everyone needs a vacation, even senators.”
Jess, as he was known to his family and friends, was thirty-eight and a senator for his state of Alaska. He also had four brothers and a sister who kept him busy. All Jess’s siblings worked for the family-owned business, Outlaw Freight Lines. He’d worked there as a corporate attorney for over ten years before deciding on a career in politics. Garth had taken over as CEO a few years ago when their father, Bart, had retired, or more specifically, when the company’s board had threatened to oust him.
Garth was the oldest sibling, with only a two-year difference in their ages. Garth and his wife, Regan, would soon be flying to Florida to visit his in-laws for the first time since the birth of their son, Garrison, who was born in the spring.
As of last year, Jess’s brother Cash, who was two years younger, had made his home in Wyoming on the dude ranch he’d inherited. He was married to Brianna and they had twin sons, Cason and Cannon. Jess’s brother Sloan was four years younger and the most recent Outlaw to marry this past June. Sloan and his wife, Leslie, had recently returned from a monthlong honeymoon.
Maverick, Jess’s youngest brother, was seven years younger and was on a business trip to Ireland, while Jess’s sister, Charm, who was eleven years younger, had made plans to visit the Westmoreland cousins in Atlanta. The only other family member left was their father, Bart. They’d talked a couple of weeks ago and Bart had mentioned that during August he and Charm’s mother, Claudia, would be taking a trip to London.
“You’re right. All of us have plans to arrive at the Russell Vineyards at the end of the month for the anniversary celebration, so I guess we’ll see you then,” Garth said.
Spencer and Chardonnay were hosting a seventy-fifth wedding anniversary party for Chardonnay’s grandparents, Daniel and Katherine Russell. It was always a fun time whenever the Westmorelands and Outlaws got together.
“Well, enjoy yourself and give Spencer and Chardonnay my regards.”
“I will and I’ll see everyone at the party.”
A short while later, Jess had finished packing and glanced up at the television when a familiar face flashed across the screen. Grabbing the remote, he increased the volume to hear what the reporter was saying.
A week after illicit photos popped up on social media, actor Kemp Pierson and actress Maya Roadie still refuse to comment. It seems they really got into their roles while in New Zealand filming the movie Midnight Heat. Apparently, they had their own midnight heat going on in spite of Kemp’s serious relationship with actress Paige Novak. Ms. Novak, who just wrapped up filming in Japan, was unavailable for comment. In fact, nobody knows her whereabouts...
Jess flipped off the television and shook his head. If the allegations against Kemp Pierson were true, then the man was an asshole. No one deserved that type of betrayal. Jess, of all people, should know. Thanks to Ava Sampson, he’d experienced a similar betrayal ten years ago, and he wouldn’t wish that sort of heartbreak on his worst enemy.
It just so happened that Paige Novak was the sister of Pam Westmoreland, who was married to his cousin Dillon. Every so often, his and Paige’s paths crossed at some Westmoreland family function. She was a very beautiful woman. A woman he’d been attracted to from the first. But he hadn’t acted on that attraction because the timing hadn’t been right. He’d needed to focus on his campaign. But he could now say that not hooking up with Paige six years ago was a missed opportunity, one he’d come to regret.
If this vacation offered another such opportunity with a beautiful woman, he wouldn’t miss it.
Paige Novak turned away from the window when she heard the knock on the door. After crossing the floor, she glanced out the peephole and smiled as she opened the door. “Chardonnay.”
“Hi. I’m just checking to see if you want to join us for dinner.”
Paige’s smile widened. “I’d love to, and I appreciate you and Spencer letting me crash here for a while.” This time last week she had been at the airport in Tokyo when she’d gotten a call from a good friend and neighbor letting her know the paparazzi were camped outside her door. It hadn’t taken Paige long to find out why. The affair between Kemp and Maya had been all over social media.
“You don’t have to thank us, Paige. You were overdue for a visit anyway,” Chardonnay said.
Paige appreciated that, since she’d been at the vineyards a week already and had worried about overstaying her welcome. “I love it here,” she said. “I was just looking at the view and thinking it’s so beautiful and peaceful.”
“Well, you can stay as long as you want. It’s nice seeing the guest villas being used.”
“Thanks, and I’d love to join everyone for dinner.” She enjoyed Spencer’s and Chardonnay’s company, as well as that of their three children and Chardonnay’s grandparents.
“Great. We’ll be eating around five.”
“Okay. I need to make a few calls. Nadia has been blowing up my phone for some reason, so I need to call her back.”
After Chardonnay left, Paige tried calling her younger sister, who had called four times while Paige had been taking a shower. She wondered what the urgency was. When she got Nadia’s voice mail, she figured her sister was in a meeting and left a message for Nadia to call her back.
Paige decided to call her sister Jillian to see if perhaps she knew why Nadia had been trying to reach her. Jillian, who was two years older, was a neurosurgeon and working at a hospital in Florida. “Hi, Jill. Do you know why Nadia has been blowing up my phone?”
“I have no idea,” Jill said, sounding rushed. “You might want to check with Pam. I’m due in surgery and will call you back later.”
“Okay.”
Crossing the room, Paige then sat down on the sofa to call her oldest sister, Pam, who had married Dillon Westmoreland thirteen years ago when Paige had been fifteen. To Paige, Westmoreland Country—a rural area outside Denver where thousands of acres were owned and occupied by the Westmoreland family—was more home to her than the Novak Homestead she and her sisters still owned in Gamble, Wyoming.
Paige had considered going home to Westmoreland Country after leaving Tokyo, but had decided against it. Pam had enough on her plate with a second set of triplets due to be born any day to Dillon’s brother Bane and his wife, Crystal. Pam and Dillon would look after the first set of triplets—who would be barely six years old when the new babies were born. Everyone in Westmoreland Country was excited about the births. The last thing Paige wanted was to allow her issues with Kemp to cloud everyone’s happiness.
She speed-dialed Pam’s number, and not surprisingly, her sister picked up on the first ring. “Paige? The family wants to make sure you’re doing okay.”
Paige smiled. She’d only called Pam twice since arriving in Napa Valley last week. Although Paige was twenty-eight, she knew her family still worried about her. “Tell everyone I’m doing fine.”
“I wish I were there to give you a hug. I don’t like that Kemp betrayed you and now the press will keep it front and center until one of you makes a statement about it.”
Since Pam had once been an actress herself, she knew how the media worked. “I’m not keeping up with anything on television or social media, so I’m fine,” Paige said. And she definitely had no plans to make a statement.
“Have you heard from Kemp?” Pam asked.
Kemp had called last week when the story first broke, and he hadn’t bothered to deny the allegations. Instead, he’d said the affair meant nothing, that he and Maya had had a few drinks too many. He apologized for their reckless behavior and wanted to know where Paige was so he could send her flowers. Flowers! He honestly thought flowers would remedy what he’d done.
What bothered Paige more than anything was Kemp’s attitude about the whole thing. He honestly expected her to accept his apology and for them to move on like nothing had happened. She had informed him that wouldn’t be happening and for him to get on with life because she intended to get on with hers. He’d refused to accept she was breaking up with him and then had the audacity to get upset when she’d refused to tell him where she was.
“I blocked his number,” Paige said.
“Well, just so you know, he’s called here three times looking for you. Not that we care, but I think he got mad with us for not telling him where you are. I have a feeling he believes what Nadia said.”
“Nadia?”
“Yes. Have you talked to her? Has she told you what she did?”
“No. I see I missed several of her calls, but when I called her back, it went to voice mail.”
“She’s probably in a meeting,” Pam said. After graduating from college with an MBA, Nadia had moved back to Gamble, Wyoming, to manage the acting school Pam owned there.
“What did Nadia do, Pam?” Paige could just imagine. Of her sisters, Nadia was the youngest and was known to be outspoken.
“I’d rather Nadia told you herself, Paige.”
Paige didn’t like the sound of that and was about to say so when she saw another call coming in. It was Nadia. “Well, she’ll get her chance, Pam. I have a call from Nadia. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okay.”
Paige then clicked to the incoming call. “Nadia, what’s going on?”
“Have you listened to the news lately?” Nadia asked anxiously.
“No. Why?”
When Nadia paused, Paige then asked, “Nadia, what did you do?”
“Well, several reporters assumed since you weren’t in LA or in Westmoreland Country that you were here in Gamble.”
“Reporters showed up in Gamble?”
“Yes, and at the Novak Homestead.”
“And?”
“And they were parked outside the house when I left for work. They surrounded me, put their mics in my face and tried to get me to tell them where you were.”
Paige swallowed. She knew how insistent reporters could be. “Please tell me you didn’t tell them.”
“Of course I didn’t tell them. But one particular reporter got on my last nerve, so I told him something else.”
“What?”
“Well, that particular reporter, a real ass, suggested you were somewhere dealing with a broken heart and that maybe the incident had left you needing intervention.”
Paige frowned. “That was a cruel thing to say.”
“I thought so, too, which is why I said what I did.”
“And just what did you say?”
“I told them that we didn’t have to check on you because Kemp was the last man on your mind. That you’ve already moved on and are seeing someone else.”
Paige shrugged. That wasn’t true, but it didn’t sound too bad. At least, she thought that until Nadia added...
“And that the two of you were involved in a hot, romantic entanglement.”
“What! A hot, romantic entanglement? Honestly, Nadia,” Paige said, wondering how Nadia came up with such a phrase. She had news for her sister. Paige had never been in a hot, romantic entanglement in her entire life. Even Kemp had left a lot to be desired in the romance department. Although Kemp assumed he was fantastic in bed and took her over the moon whenever they’d made love, in truth, she never even came close to reaching the stars.
“Well, that reporter pissed me off, Paige. You were getting ready to kick Kemp to the curb anyway.”
Well, at least Nadia hadn’t told that to the reporter. Paige had confided those plans to her sisters the last time they’d been together, during the holidays. After almost a year without developing feelings for Kemp, she’d planned to end things when they were back together after filming next month. Although she wasn’t brokenhearted by Kemp’s affair, she felt hurt and betrayed, nonetheless. He had disrespected her in the worst way a man could do to a woman.
“Now it’s all over the media that you’re dating someone else, and they’re trying to find out where you are and who’s your new guy. At least they don’t know you’re hiding out at Russell Vineyards.”
Paige rubbed a frustrated hand down her face, wishing Nadia would have just ignored those reporters or given a “no comment.”
“First of all, I’m not hiding out here, Nadia.”
“Aren’t you?”
“No. I’m visiting our cousins-in-law. My filming project is over, and I consider this a vacation.”
“Vacation? Right. I bet you haven’t left the vineyard to go into town to shop or anything. To me, that’s hiding out.”
Deciding to end the conversation with Nadia, she said, “I’m having dinner with Spencer, Chardonnay and the family in a few, and I need to get dressed. I’ll talk with you later. ’Bye.”
She quickly clicked off the phone. Nadia didn’t understand that the media was a force to reckon with. Paige didn’t see herself as hiding out. She was merely preserving her privacy for as long as she could. She would make an appearance when she was ready, and not because the media felt she should.
In less than an hour, Paige was walking out of the guest villa to head to the main house. The walk wasn’t a long one and she enjoyed strolling around Russell Vineyards—three hundred acres of beautiful land in the Napa Valley.
When she got closer to the main house, she saw a car parked out front next to her rental and wondered if Spencer and Chardonnay were having guests for dinner. The door to the house opened, and Russell—Spencer and Chardonnay’s sixteen-year-old son—came out to greet her with a huge smile on his face. Chardonnay had warned Paige that Russell was a huge fan, and his mom suspected he had a crush on her.
“Hi, Paige!” he said, coming down the steps to meet her.
“Hi, Russell. Where’s Chablis and Daniel?” she asked. She thought Russell Spencer Westmoreland and his younger brother, Daniel Timberlain Westmoreland, were the spitting image of their father, Spencer; whereas their sister, Chablis, looked like her mother. All three—Russell, Daniel and Chablis—had inherited Chardonnay’s family trait of beautiful gray eyes.
“Chablis is helping Mom and Grammy with dinner. How was your nap?”
Normally, she took an afternoon nap every day. “It was wonderful. Thanks for asking.”
When they reached the door, Russell opened it and stood back as she entered. He had impeccable manners for someone his age.
When she stepped inside, a deep, husky voice said, “Hello, Paige.”
She turned and her gaze connected to that of Jess Outlaw, a cousin to the Westmorelands. A smile touched her lips. “Jess.”
When she’d seen the car outside, she hadn’t known who would be visiting and had hoped it wasn’t someone who would recognize her. The last thing she needed was word of her whereabouts getting leaked. But this was Jess and she’d gotten to know him over the years. He was someone she felt comfortable around. She recalled the first time they’d met, over six years ago, and how she had been attracted to him the moment their gazes had met.
There had been a sensual pull, which had been a first for her where a man was concerned. So much so that she’d felt bold enough to do a little flirting. But what woman wouldn’t when Jess was tall, handsome and possessed a demanding presence? Definitely swoon-worthy. Regretfully, he hadn’t reciprocated the interest.
Leaving Spencer’s side, Jess crossed the floor and reached out to give her a hug. “You’re okay?” he asked her in a gentle, concerned voice.
She leaned back and smiled up at him. Obviously, he’d heard what was being splashed all over the media. “I’m fine. What brings you from the nation’s capital, Senator?”
A warm smile touched his lips. “I’m here on vacation. Spencer invited me last month when he was in DC, and I decided to take him up on his invite.”
“You’re going to love it here.”
“I do already.”
At that moment Mrs. Katherine Russell, Chardonnay’s grandmother, appeared in the kitchen doorway with a huge smile on her face. “Dinner is ready, everyone.”
Jess offered Paige his arm, and she took it as he escorted her into the dining room.
