Aleks got her settled with
Finding Nemo
in the den connected to the living room. "Be good, Squish." He ruffled her curls and went back to the living room. Remey set down his glass of wine as he came in. "There, that should keep her occupied long enough so we can get through this. I'm sorry about the chaos. We were running late. I'd hoped to have her settled down by the time you got here."
Remey shook his head with a small smile. "There's no need to apologize. My time's my own right now, so it's no big deal. I'm actually starting to get used to waking up in a bed, not on a bus." He shook his head, waving one hand. "Anyway, on to business."
Aleks turned to face Remey on the couch, pulling a sheet of paper from the folder. "So I guess first of all is figuring out when you want to do the concert. The festival runs for four days, December 14th through the 17th. Here's a list of each day's events, starting with the fireworks display and culminating in the lighting of the town Christmas tree in front of St. Agnes' Church at the center of town, followed by my students' winter performance at the high school."
Remey took the sheet of paper, smiling as he read. "Wow, lots of stuff. Sleigh races, a snowman village..." He broke off with a laugh. "Wait, what's a cardboard sled race?"
"Exactly what it sounds like. It's for kids twelve and under. They make sleds out of cardboard, paper mâché, duct tape and paint. Then they race. Everybody gets a trophy, for best design, most spectacular crash, stuff like that." He grinned. "It's lots of fun."
Remey let out a soft sigh and smiled. "I feel like I tumbled into Bedford Falls or something. Where's Jimmy Stewart?"
Aleks's brows furrowed. "Oh. Well, yeah, it's probably not your thing, but you're not required to be there for any of it, only the concert part." He imagined it probably sounded very trite to someone used to red carpets and film premieres.
Remey glanced up at him, shaking his head. "I didn't mean that. I think it sounds charming." He let out another sigh, tilting his head. "Why don't you like me, Aleksander?"
Aleks straightened. "What?"
Remey gave him a knowing look. "I'm not stupid. You've made it pretty clear since the second I walked into Carl's shop you wish I'd go away. Why?"
Aleks lifted a shoulder. "I don't dislike you personally, Remey. I don't like having my town overrun by paparazzi clogging up the streets, littering everywhere, and hanging around asking people questions about you. There's probably some parked outside right now, with their telephoto lenses trained on my windows, trying to figure out why you're here."
"I get it. Believe me, I do. I don't like it, either, but I've learned to live with it. They'll get bored eventually, when they realize I'm not doing anything interesting here. Except for when I'm touring, they're nearly always there. I've always looked at them as the tradeoff for getting to have my dream career."
"For you, maybe. But how do you think they affect other people?" Aleks asked. "Maybe in L.A. it's different. They're everywhere anyway, so no one notices, but Haven isn't like that. I don't want them to ruin my town. There are a hundred small towns like Haven in New England. Why mine?"
Remey sighed, taking a long sip of his wine, then looking up to meet Aleks's eyes. "This is going to sound corny. I was in this area about... I don't know, maybe six months ago. And my tour bus--we had a new driver--took the wrong turn off the highway and got lost. So he stopped at a visitors' center to get directions, and a couple of the guys and I went in. I saw a postcard, with a picture of the town square in wintertime. I'm not going to tell you it called to me or anything, but I couldn't get the image out of my head. Every time I wanted to relax, I'd picture it in my head and imagine I was here. And after about two months, I started looking for a house here."
Aleks sighed, shaking his head. "Look, I'm not blaming you. Not personally. You can't control them. I get it. But what's normal to you is a nightmare for the rest of us. How relaxing is Haven going to be for you, for anyone, with the media focused on us twenty-four/seven? Doesn't it strike you as ironic that, in trying to get away from it all, you've brought it all with you?"
Remey pursed his lips. "Maybe. I'd hoped it'd take them a while to figure out where I was."
"They were here practically before you were. Are you sure someone didn't leak?" A publicist, maybe? It sure did seem like good publicity--Remey Dufresne holed up in some cozy little New England town for the winter, playing at being a real person.
"Someone did leak where I was actually."
Aleks's brows shot up. "They did? Who?"
Remey gave him a sheepish look. "Me." He held up his hands in a supplicating gesture. "It was stupid. I didn't check the GPS settings on my new phone and when I tweeted a picture when I got here--one of me--it had the geotagging on and, poof, here comes the media, with me leading them right to my door without realizing it."
Aleks was finding it difficult to be annoyed. The poor guy looked exhausted and frustrated. Aleks tried to imagine what it must be like to have your every step dogged, not to be able even to tweet a picture without it being used against you. Hell, just imagining it made him exhausted, so he couldn't fathom living it.
He glanced down at the schedule of events, then met Remey's gaze again. "Do you want to stay for dinner? Sort of... an apology. I haven't been very neighborly or welcoming, and if my mom ever finds out she'll thwap me, all the way from Florida."
Remey smiled, visibly relaxing and taking another sip of wine. "Your mom can pull the long-distance discipline thing off, too, huh?"
Aleks groaned. "I think all mothers can. So will you, to save me from her wrath?" He wasn't going to pretend he liked everything Remey had brought to Haven, but he could still be hospitable. Despite everything, the guy seemed nice. Real. Not at all what Aleks had thought.
It also didn't hurt that he was seriously growing on Aleks in the attraction department, despite Aleks's best efforts.
"I will. Thank you. So... the concert?" he asked, gesturing at the schedule he'd set down.
"Yeah, we should get this pinned down. Probably an evening would be best. Saturday is traditionally the tree lighting and Wednesday night is the fireworks."
"How about Friday?" Remey asked, pointing at an empty space on the printout. "There's nothing going on after six, and you said it'd probably be at the high school or the theater, right?"
Aleks nodded. "Probably the theater. It's got a bigger capacity. I mean, it's no Madison Square Garden..."
Remey laughed. "Oh man, it was the most surreal night of my life. That or the Grammys. I'm actually more comfortable in smaller venues. My first tour was all clubs and small theaters. It was awesome."
Aleks leaned over to scribble in the concert time and venue on the printout, with a note to call Marc Jefferson, owner of the theater, to see about donating the space for the concert. "The owner of the theater owes me a favor, so we should be able to get the space for free. So more of the proceeds can go to the center funding."
Remey leaned back against the arm of the couch, smiling at him. Aleks couldn't help but squirm a little under the direct focus of the young man's gaze. It was like having a spotlight turned on him. "Tell me about the center. What do you have planned?"
Aleks exhaled. "Oh wow, well... well, we want to be sure there's something for everyone--art classes, music classes, dance and crafting. After school programs during the school year and all day programs in the summer time. All free, all charitable-donation funded. With the economy the way it is, everyone's looking to cut, cut, cut." He shrugged. "It's usually the stuff seen as 'extracurricular' or unnecessary that gets cut first and most."
Remey shook his head. "Such a shame. Because without those things, what's all the hard work for?"
Aleks chuckled. "Exactly." He fiddled with his pen. "So I was thinking we could maybe do a couple of radio spots over the next month, make sure everyone knows you'll be doing this concert, maybe raffle off some kind of 'Meet Remey Dufresne' thing, if it'd be okay? Flyers will be going up all over town and, of course, we'll get a picture of you and the concert info on there. Do you have a picture your management prefers for stuff like this? You could e-mail it to me?"
Remey nodded, pulling out his phone to make notes about the concert date and a reminder to send Aleks the picture. "Yeah, I'll call someone and have them send it to me, since I'll have to let them know what I'm doing anyway."
Aleks looked up at him, his face concerned. "They can't... I mean, don't they have to approve stuff you do?"
"Technically, yeah. Concerts anyway, but they've always been supportive of my charity work, so I can't see them giving me a hard time with it. I can do radio spots--let me know when--and a meet and greet is fine. Like I said, my schedule's pretty open." He scanned the printout of the festival schedule again, smiling a little. "Willow must love all this stuff."
Aleks smiled. "She does. She was too young for a lot of it last year, but she loved the stuff we did do, the sleigh rides and the face painting and the tree lighting. She's already angling to try and get me to help her build a sled for the race, but she's too little yet."
Remey laughed. "Heck, if it weren't only for kids, I'd try it myself. It sounds like loads of fun. How long has the town been doing the festival?"
"Almost a hundred years, I think. Way before anyone who's here now can even remember. It's a tradition, always has been. I loved it when I was a kid... still do now."
"Did you grow up here?" Remey asked.
Aleks nodded. "I did. Moved away for a while in my twenties and then came back here three years ago. This is where I wanted to make a life."
Remey glanced toward the den, where the sounds of the TV drifted into the living room. "With Willow?"
It was pretty clear Remey was curious about her, about Aleks and her, but he wasn't ready to share those kinds of details yet. Besides, it wasn't a secret. If Remey wanted to be nosy, there were plenty of people in town who would accommodate him. "Yeah. With Willow." He set the event calendar down on the couch and pushed to his feet. "I better go check on her actually. She can go from zero to naughty in no time flat."
Remey nodded, watching him go. Remey did that a lot, Aleks had noticed--watched him. There was definitely an attraction there, and Aleks wasn't dumb enough to try to pretend it was one-sided. It didn't matter, though, because he did not intend to get involved with a celebrity, let alone one who was using his home as a sort of "small town safari" temporary adventure.
Remey would be gone before the snow melted, if he even lasted that long.
"Daddy, sketti?" Willow looked up at him with hopeful blue eyes.
Aleks smiled. "Yeah. Do you want to help?" It was only a little after five, early for dinner, but that was okay.
"I could help, too," chimed in a voice from behind him.
Aleks turned, surprise whipping through him. "You? You want to help me make spaghetti?"
* * * *
Remey smiled. "Why not? Unless you have some kind of hands off rule about your kitchen? Are you territorial?"
Then Aleks did something Remey hadn't expected, gaze raking down and then back up the length of him, before meeting his eyes. "You have no idea." He pushed away from the doorway and headed for the kitchen. "Well, come on. If you two are going to help, let's go."
Remey did his best to gather himself as he followed Aleks and Willow out to the hall, then back to the kitchen, Willow chattering away about the movie she'd been watching. The look Aleks had given him... Remey had been wondering before now what Aleks's deal was, and while he still didn't have any concrete answers, that look had made it perfectly clear Aleks swung his way. It made Remey feel better about the blatant flirting he'd done yesterday.
When they reached the kitchen, Willow tugged open a lower cabinet door and hauled out a pasta pot, handing it to Aleks so he could slide it under the faucet and start filling it. Remey watched as Aleks lifted her onto the counter and let her sit and watch while the water ran, then while he washed his hands.
"What can I do?" Remey asked when Aleks was done, stepping up to the sink to wash his own hands. Aleks eyed him consideringly.
"How comfortable are you in the kitchen?"
Remey smiled. "Very. My mama taught my brother and I enough we could make meals and help with dinner duty, since my dad didn't cook. I liked it a lot, even thought a little about going to culinary school instead of pursuing music."
Aleks nodded, opening the fridge and pulling out a bunch of fresh vegetables, passing them to Remey. "Then if you wouldn't mind making a salad? I'll warn you, little Miss Squish here has a habit of reaching into the bowl to swipe veggies, though."
Willow giggled, and Remey shook his head as he started unwrapping the vegetables, setting them on the counter near a big cutting board. "That's the cutest nickname ever. And nothing's more fun than chomping on raw veggies, huh, little one?"
Willow shook her head, bright curls flying. "Nope! I likes the carrots best. Daddy says I nibble like I's a bunny! See?" She bared her little baby teeth at him, and Remey laughed, giving the lettuce a quick rinse and then took a vegetable knife from the butcher block to start breaking it down.
"I do see. I bet those are just right for munching carrots and all kinds of other yummy stuff, huh?" Remey loved kids, had always wanted them, but he'd been figuring for the past few years he'd have to wait a little longer, until he settled down from his career enough to have a chance to meet someone. He'd had a few serious boyfriends in the last couple of years, and one or two more short-term things, but nothing had ever stuck. He was happy on his own and loved his life exactly the way it was, but Remey definitely wanted to spend his life with one person. He just had to find him first.
Several times, Remey caught Aleks watching them out of the corner of his eye. Willow was chattering away, but her daddy still seemed pretty reticent. That was okay. Remey didn't mind a little work. He focused on Willow, teasing her, handing her a slice of carrot.