Center Stage: Magnolia Steele Mystery #1 Read online

  We had forty-five minutes until the party was scheduled to start. The bartending crew had arrived, and they’d checked in with Momma and Tilly before splitting off to set up four stations. One of the men walked past me as I placed the last shrimp in an elaborate display.

  Tilly grabbed his arm, and he shifted the box in his arms. “Colt, wait up. Take Magnolia up to help you.”

  I sucked in a breath when he turned to face me. He was movie-star handsome, and his bright blue eyes would rival Zac Efron’s. His dark blond hair was cut close on the sides but swept up and gelled on top. He had a light hint of stubble.

  A slow, country boy grin spread across his face, and his voice was pure silk and honey when he said, “Magnolia? As in Mrs. Steele’s daughter?”

  He had to be a wannabe country singer. He was too smooth to be a Christian artist. Too pretty to be just a song writer. Nashville and Franklin were teeming with all three. You could practically trip over them when you walked out your front door.

  “One and the same,” Tilly said, dropping her hold on him and pushing me toward him. “We’re in a bind tonight with Patty being off, so she’ll be filling in. She used to work for us when she was in high school, so it’s been over a dec—”

  “A few years,” I interrupted, giving him an innocent smile. No actress ever wanted to volunteer her age, and while I took offense to my mother’s supposition that I always liked to be center stage, I wouldn’t deny a little vanity. “I think Tilly’s sayin’ I’m a little rusty and could use a refresher course.” The words were spoken in a slight drawl, unintentional this time. I’d been in Tennessee for less than four hours, and I was already reverting to my roots.

  Colt gave Tilly a mega-watt smile. “Of course. I’d be happy to. Come on, Magnolia, you can help me stock the bar.”

  I grabbed a box and followed him through an elaborate dining room with a table that looked like it could easily seat twenty, then into a large round foyer with a gray and white marble floor and a massive chandelier. Large, sweeping spiral staircases flanked each side, leading up to a large landing.

  There had to be twenty or more people bustling around, covering high-top tables in crisp white cloths and centerpieces filled with candles and seashells. Bartenders were stocking two bar stations downstairs, and a few of Momma’s staff were setting up the obligatory chocolate fountain.

  Colt led me upstairs, shifting the box in his arms, and I struggled to keep up with him.

  “Magnolia Steele, huh? I’m surprised you’re working this event. Aren’t you some big Broadway star?”

  “No,” I said, trying to keep my tone breezy. “I’ve spent the past eight years auditioning and working my way up the ladder. You know, chorus and secondary roles.”

  “But you got the lead in some new play. Lila couldn’t stop talking about it.”

  “She did?” I asked before I could stop myself. My mother always seemed so disinterested in my acting aspirations. “I mean . . . yes, but it didn’t work out. I’m taking a little break.”

  “But you haven’t been home in years. Why now?”

  I forced a smile. “It’s always good to return to your roots, don’t you think? Where are you from, Colt?” If my time with the Broadway crew had taught me anything, it was that people liked to talk about themselves. What better way to deflect his question than to make him the subject of our conversation? “Your accent sounds Georgian, but not Atlanta. Further south.”

  His eyes widened in appreciation. “Very good,” he said, coming to a stop beside a bar station on the top level of the party. He hefted the box down next to a couple of others already waiting by the bar. “I’m from a place you’ve probably never heard of—Waycross. How’d you know I was from southern Georgia?”

  “You’re right,” I laughed. “Never heard of it. And it’s part of my job to know accents, although I confess I’m a bit obsessed about the differences between southern ones, mostly because a lot of actors try to pull out an Alabama accent for the role of a Texan.” I stopped talking, realizing I’d inadvertently shifted the conversation back to me. “So let me guess why you’re here in Nashville—you’re a country singer. Colt what?”

  “Colt Austin. And not just a country singer. A song writer too.” I heard the defensiveness in his voice. “I know what you’re thinkin’.”

  “If it’s that you’re here for the same reason every other male in his twenties who wasn’t born in the Nashville area is here, then yeah, but you have the right look, which isn’t true of all of them. The real question is if you can sing.”

  “Oh . . . I sing. And play the guitar.” He flashed his grin, and this time I noticed the dimples on his cheeks. Sexiness exuded from him like the delicious aroma from cookies fresh out of the oven. I suspected he couldn’t help himself. “I’ll play for you, Magnolia Steele. After we finish tonight.”

  Holy seven circles of hell, I didn’t usually fall for his type, but I was feeling a slight tug in my ovaries. I suspected most women probably fell at his feet, and even I was a bit affected by his charm. I put my hands on my hips. “It’s my first night back in town, Colt Austin. What makes you think I want to spend it with you?”

  “The fact that you’re working Luke Powell’s party and talkin’ to me now.”

  I pulled out my best sassy attitude. “I’m working this party because my momma was in a bind. You’d do the same for your momma, wouldn’t you, Colt?” Any self-respecting southern boy would practically lay gold pavers in a path for his mother if she asked him to. “And as for standing here, talking to you now, Tilly asked me to help you. And since she’s like a second mother to me, I’d do anything she asked. Don’t read anything more into it.”

  He clasped his hands over his heart. “That was a mortal blow.”

  “And yet, somehow you’ll survive. Now tell me what to do.” When he gave me a devilish grin, I added, “To help set up the bar.”

  We unpacked the boxes, setting out the various bottles, and Colt flashed me a grin as he arranged his tip jar. It was undoubtedly an open bar party, but I was sure Colt would get plenty of tips from the female guests and a few of the male ones too.

  “I better head back to the kitchen. My own job calls.”

  “I’ll be watching you, Magnolia Steele.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. “I think you’d do better to pay attention to your own job.”

  A trickle of guests arrived soon after, and I fell back into serving like a duck took to water. I had so many years of waitressing under my belt that it was practically second nature at this point. The party was in full swing within an hour, but there was still no sign of the host. I was glad Tilly had assigned me to the relatively sedate downstairs living room area. Most of the guests were milling around the upstairs landing, the large entry foyer, or the public area of the pool. I caught Colt watching me from upstairs a few times, but I did my best to ignore him and do my job. The last thing I needed was a man in my life. For the most part, I blended into the background. I caught the attention of a few men, but I was sure none of them recognized me.

  Then my luck ran out. I was walking around with a tray of bacon-wrapped shrimp and mini sliders when I heard a voice that sent chills down my back.

  “Maggie?”

  I froze and turned around in slow motion.

  “Tanner.” I hadn’t seen Tanner McKee since the night of our graduation. The night I’d lost my virginity to him. The night my whole life had changed.

  His mouth dropped open in shock. “It’s really you.”

  “Hey.” I gestured to him with the tray of sliders, the buns scooting dangerously close to the edge. “You look good.” And he did. He was dressed in a gray suit paired with an ice-blue tie. His light brown hair was shorter, but his brown eyes were the same milk chocolate color I remembered. “What are you doing here?”

  He swallowed. “Me? What are you doing here? And working as one of the wait staff . . .” He looked around, definitely confused. “Why aren’t you in New York?”

 
“Uh . . . research,” I said, coming up with the idea off the top of my head. “I’m researching a part.”

  “Well, you look good too. Just like when we were in school and you worked your mom’s parties.”

  I glanced down at my uniform, then back up into his face. “How are you?”

  His eyes clouded. “It took me a long time to get over you, Magnolia.”

  I truthfully couldn’t say the same—the fight we’d had that night had revealed our utter incompatibility—but seeing him was a reminder of everything I’d left behind. Of all the people I’d hurt, him included.

  My eyes started to burn, so I widened them slightly. I couldn’t afford to break down in public. Or in private, for that manner. I needed to live up to my last name.

  He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry for what I said that night. For what I accused you of . . .”

  I turned back to him and forced a smile. “That’s all water under the bridge.”

  “Why didn’t you answer any of my phone calls? It wasn’t our first fight. We should have at least talked it over.”

  I didn’t feel like going for a stroll down memory lane, and besides, I’d long ago decided that walking away from Tanner was the best thing that had come out of me leaving Franklin. If I’d stayed, I probably would have married him and been miserable. I needed to end this conversation and end it soon. “It had nothing to do with you, Tanner.”

  I tried to walk around him, but he blocked my path.

  “How could you say that, Magnolia?” His voice was thick with anger. “You slept with me, and then you ran away and never came back. You didn’t answer my texts or calls or even my emails. It’s like you fell off the face of the earth.”

  “I’m sorry if I hurt you . . .”

  “That’s not enough, Maggie. Your apology is ten years too late. Why? Why did you leave?”

  “Apology?” I spat out in a whisper as I glared up at him. “You’re the one who owed me an apology!”

  “And I would have given you one if you hadn’t run away like a spoiled little brat.”

  People had turned their heads to listen to our conversation, and I wished the floor would open and swallow me whole. So much for staying under the radar. “The reason I left had nothing to do with you.”

  “You said that already,” he said, his voice hard. “But that’s not an answer. You owe me an answer.”

  Maybe that was true. But how could I give him an answer I didn’t have? How could I tell him that something terrible had happened, something that had shaped my life despite the fact that I remembered it in feelings instead of words? And besides, if I owed him anything, it wasn’t a fraction of what I owed my momma and Roy. What I owed Maddie.

  “I—” I didn’t have the faintest idea what I was going to say, so perhaps it was a blessing that we were interrupted.

  “Tanner.” A tall blonde in a tight red dress sidled up to him. “You’re talking to one of the wait staff?” She was nearly his height, which meant she had to be five foot nine without the heels. She looped a possessive hand around his arm.

  He blinked. “Oh. Chelsea. This isn’t one of the wait staff. It’s Magnolia.”

  Her face froze and her gaze turned icy. “Magnolia? Magnolia Steele?”

  “One and the same,” I grumbled, wishing I could hide in the kitchen.

  “Uh . . .” Tanner stammered. “Magnolia, this is my fiancée, Chelsea Coleman.”

  My blood turned to sludge. Tanner was engaged. The regret caught me off guard, but it wasn’t the kind of regret that comes of jealousy. It was regret for myself—for eighteen-year-old Magnolia Steele who’d had simple dreams and a clear path. Here was another reminder that the girl I’d been was lost to me. On top of my disaster on stage the night before, it was too much. “Congratulations to you both.”

  Her eyes narrowed, and her grip on his arm tightened. “I thought you were in New York?”

  I wasn’t so sure it was a good thing she knew so many details about me. I tried to step around them. “I need to get back to the kitchen.”

  Tanner let me go this time, but I heard Chelsea say behind my back, “Her boobs are so obviously fake.”

  I stopped in my tracks. Let it go, Magnolia. Just let it go. I’d let my temper get the best of me the night before, and look where it landed me. Nevertheless, I found myself spinning around to face her. “My boobs are not fake.”

  The surprise in her eyes told me that while she’d intended for me to hear her, she hadn’t expected me to confront her on it. She gave a little shudder, as if settling her icy exterior back in place. “Then they must be the only thing about you that’s real.”

  I put one hand on my hip, balancing the catering tray with the other. The food sloshed around like the wave pool at Nashville Shores. “You don’t know the first thing about me.”

  Sadistic glee filled her eyes. “Oh, I know plenty about you, including how you broke poor Tanner’s heart.”

  What had Tanner told her about me, and what else did she think she knew?

  But she must have decided she was done. She jerked on Tanner’s arm like he was a stubborn puppy. “Let’s go.”

  He followed her, but he cast a glance back at me, looking like there was more he wanted to say.

  Tears burned my eyes. I had never expected to see him here. In fact I’d never given much thought to seeing him at all. Momma had told me he’d moved to Memphis years ago, and the Facebook stalking I’d done a few years ago had confirmed it. Did my mother know he’d returned?

  I found her in the kitchen, barking orders at a server.

  “He’s back,” I said, placing my tray on the island.

  My mother swung to face me. “Who’s back? Luke Powell? Last I heard he hadn’t even deigned to make an appearance yet.”

  “No. Tanner,” I said, feeling lightheaded. “Tanner McKee. You told me he’d moved to Memphis.”

  There was a flicker of sympathy in her eyes, but it was gone so quickly I would have missed it by blinking. “Last I heard he was still there. I saw his mother a few months ago, and she was braggin’ that he was engaged.”

  “Well, he’s back.” I pointed to the swinging door. “And he’s here. With his fiancée.”

  My mother looked exasperated. “Magnolia, you moved away. He moved on. Literally. Why do you care if he’s engaged?”

  “I don’t know.” And I didn’t. It was just that everything at home was so different. A secret little part of me had hoped my old life would be waiting for me if I ever chose to come back.

  “You have a job to do, Magnolia. Now get out there and serve.”

  I grabbed a new tray and exited through the swinging door, taking a deep breath to compose myself. Coming home had been a mistake, but I still had nowhere else to go.

  For better or worse, I was in Franklin to stay.

  Chapter 4

  Tanner and Chelsea had left the living room, and I spent the next half hour looking for them in my peripheral vision. I still hadn’t figured out if I actually wanted to see him or not. At least there wasn’t too much time to think—the party had picked up, and it was plenty busy. Tilly had moved me out to the large marble entryway, which was a grand hall in and of itself. I was offering a crab puff to a country music power couple when I heard my name again, but this time I knew it wasn’t Tanner.

  “Magnolia Steele. My, my, my. How quickly things change.”

  I sucked in a breath and slowly turned to face Max Goodwin, agent and mega sleazeball. We’d met at a rehearsal, after which he’d invited me to dinner. Over tiny pieces of prosciutto-and-Muenster-cheese-stuffed quail breasts, he’d offered me representation. He said he had big plans for me—a country music album, fame, and movie stardom—and it would all be mine if I went back to his hotel room with him.

  I’d lifted my black camelback shoe to his crotch and started to gently roll the ball of my foot over his important parts.

  “You want my undivided attention?” I asked with a sexy smile.

  His eyelid
s lowered, his jaw tensed, and his breathing sped up. A knowing smile spread across his face. “You make my dreams come true, and I’ll work on yours.”

  “That’s such a generous offer, Mr. Goodwin,” I cooed as I increased the pressure.

  He gripped the table, his diamond-studded ring flashing in the candlelight. “I can be a very generous man.”

  “And if I don’t feel like going to your room . . . ?”

  He gave me a sly grin. “There are plenty of others who will.”

  “Well . . . When you put it that way, I know exactly what to do.”

  He leaned back, giving me better access to his crotch. “I knew you’d see it my way.”

  My smile fell. “Oh, I see it your way all too clearly.”

  I slid my foot higher and pressed my four-inch stiletto heel over his favorite body part. “That’s why I’m willing to give you this.” Then I jabbed, admittedly harder than I’d intended.

  Max had to be taken to the hospital by ambulance to receive some kind of hush-hush emergency medical treatment. I was lucky he hadn’t pressed charges, but what man wanted to admit that his penis had been shish-kebabbed by a woman’s heel?

  But now he stood in a room full of close to hundred people—along with probably fifty more on the upstairs landing—and judging from the look on his face, he still held a serious grudge. He was going to fry me alive.

  I started to walk away, but he grabbed my arm and spun me around to face him, sending crab puffs flying off the tray.

  “Let go of me, Max,” I growled in a low tone.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be on a Broadway stage right about now? The curtain went up about an hour ago.”

  I jerked out of his hold and took a step back. “What I do is none of your business, Max Goodwin.”

  “You’re no talent wannabe, Magnolia Steele. You got that role because you were sleeping with the director. And once he realized you were only good at one thing, and it wasn’t acting, he knew he had to fire you. That was quite a temper tantrum you threw on stage. You’ll never get another theatre role again after that performance.”