Not So Snow White Read online

  Tess glanced over at Max, expecting to see, at the very least, a bit of grudging respect. Only to find him on a cell call, doing business or something. He wasn't even watching! She turned back to the court, not sure why it mattered what Max thought. He was butting out and leaving them to their practice session. That's what she wanted from him. Right?

  "Again," she called out, much to the chagrin of a now panting and sweating Petra. So much for that media-perfect blonde ponytail, hm? Tess thought. Not that Gaby's hitting partner was Tess's concern, but getting the most out of her for Gaby's sake was. It wouldn't hurt Petra any to have to think about tennis first for the next hour. Do her some good.

  That hour went by fast, but both players had gotten increasingly competitive as the practice progressed and they'd accomplished a lot by the time Tess waved them off the court. She turned to Max. "Hey, can you pull yourself away from whatever is so fascinating and join us for a sec?" Everytime she'd looked over at him while they'd been practicing—which had maybe happened more often than she'd like to admit—he'd either been on the phone or buried in his daytimer.

  Once he was close and the two girls were in front of her, she said, "We need to coordinate our exit strategy here." The size of the crowd watching practice had ebbed and flowed a little during the past hour, but the reporters, sensing practice time was over, were congregating again. Sort of like flies on roadkill.

  "I can handle the press," Gaby said.

  Petra immediately started fussing with her hair.

  "I know you can," Tess told her.

  "Wait a minute," Max began. "You're not going to—"

  "If you'd let me explain," she interrupted, "I'll tell you what I am going to do, okay?"

  "I've just spent the past hour talking to what feels like every reporter in Europe. The ones who aren't here, anyway."

  Gaby's face lit up. Petra started dabbing the sweat from her forehead.

  "Don't get excited," Max told her. "I turned them all down."

  "What?" Gaby and Tess exclaimed simultaneously.

  He raised his hands in a placating gesture, to which Tess immediately faked a laugh and playfully pushed them away. Through a gritted smile, she said, "Keep the hand gestures to a minimum. We have a lot of eyes on us, more than a few with digital capabilities. One big happy family, okay?"

  "You're the one who agreed to talk to these guys," Max told her. "So why don't you go engage your adoring public and I'll get the girls out of here. I've already called security to escort us to the players' area."

  "You did what?" Tess rolled her eyes. "Listen, we need to play this a little differently. The more unavailable Gaby is, the more the hounds will want to hunt her down. What we're going to do is go over there, offer everyone a few photo ops of me and Gaby together. Something to splash all over the place with the stories that are already going to come out. I've learned if you give them what they want up front, the whole thing dies down much quicker because it's not a 'big get' anymore."

  "She knows what she's talking about, Max," Gaby added.

  "Tell me something I don't know," he muttered.

  "We're only going to field a few questions." Tess turned to Gaby. "All of which you're going to let me answer first, or toss to you. But let me do the tossing, okay?"

  "But—"

  "I know what I'm talking about, remember?"

  Gaby huffed a little, but she knew she'd been beaten at her own game. "Fine. This time."

  Both adults just gave her a look and she relented, just a little. "I'll behave, promise."

  "Smile," Tess advised her. "Save the pouty looks for later when we don't have a dozen cameras aimed at us."

  Gaby gave her the fakest smile ever. Tess just smiled back. "Perfect. Now you're ready."

  "This is a mistake," Max told them.

  "No," Tess told him sweetly, "this is the pro tour. The idea is for us to control the game where we can, not let them direct it for us."

  "Smiles on, girls. Everything is rosy, your outlook couldn't be cheerier. Off we go, then," she said, tossing in a bit of a British accent on that last part. She winked at Max as she ushered the girls past him. "Keep your pencil handy." She nodded at his notebook. "I might surprise you."

  "Oh, of that I have no doubt," he said so only she could hear. "But for once maybe you can do me a favor and make the surprise a good one."

  "Stick in the mud," she shot back.

  "Instigator."

  He really was the most frustrating male she'd ever met. Outside her own family, anyway. So why was she smiling for real now?

  Tess walked to the far, walled-in side of the court.

  "Okay, your turn," she called up to the spectators and media lining up two and three deep. She dragged a chair from the sideline and stepped up on it so she could reach up to the top of the wall and take the pens and pieces of paper being offered by fans for autographs. Might as well kill two birds with one stone. "Ten minutes. Fire away.''

  One reporter, a short, mousy woman with a horrible haircut, stepped forward first. Tess didn't recognize her. Must be new. Pen poised over her notebook, the young woman addressed her in a soft British accent. "Miss Hamilton, Margaret Tompkins with the Daily Sentinel. Would you tell us, please, how long have you been working with Miss Fontaine?"

  Another reporter elbowed in front of her and stuck a microphone over the wall. "Tess, is it true you're thinking about coming back on tour? Are you going to pull a Martina Navratilova and play doubles with a younger, fresher player like Gabrielle?"

  Tess watched the mousy reporter sigh a little, but give up her ground. That one was going to have to get a lot tougher if she was going to last out here. "So, is that the rumor already?" Tess asked, shooting the more aggressive reporter a cocky smile.

  "Is it just a rumor?"

  Tess debated briefly the merits of dodging that question and letting the speculation build for a bit, but ultimately decided against it. "Apparently, since I hadn't even heard that one."

  "No plans for a comeback, then?"

  Tess continued to sign autographs for fans, pausing here and there for a photograph. "Hi, Antoinette," she said, greeting the reporter by name. "You know me, I'd be playing right now if I thought my shoulder could keep me in the top ten." She grinned, posed for another picture. "So no, I won't be returning, doubles or singles. Thanks," she said to another young fan as she handed back her autograph.

  "So you're taking up coaching instead?" This came from the young reporter, asked so softly Tess almost didn't hear her.

  Tess paused, didn't take the next piece of paper, and looked directly at her. "Margaret, did you say? New out here, huh?" The woman blushed a little as she nodded. Boy, completely green. "Nice to meet you, Margaret. Don't let these guys push you around," she added with an admonishing little smile in Antoinette's direction.

  Tess had learned early on the best way to beat them at their own game. They treated her like a piece of meat; would chew her up and spit her out without a second thought to her welfare as long as it got them an extra inch of column space. She, on the other hand, treated them like family. A highly dysfunctional one, but family nonetheless. A case of the victim humanizing herself to her attacker. Didn't stop them, but it made them think a bit more about what they were saying in print.

  "No, I'm not coaching," Tess went on. "I'm just helping out a friend who happens to be in between coaches at the moment."

  "Some friend to have, eh?" Antoinette shot back, eliciting a few laughs from the crowd.

  "How long have you known Gabrielle?" another familiar voice asked, echoing the shy reporter's initial question, only with a sly, underlying curiosity that Tess knew she'd be wise to exploit to her advantage.

  She searched the throng until she spotted her. "Hello, Fionula."

  Tess had learned long ago no amount of humanizing would work with Fionula.

  "Tell us how you and Gabrielle came to be such great friends," she asked, her expression bright and perky, which fooled so many. It was all in the eye
s, Tess knew. Close set and snakelike.

  "Didn't Gaby tell you during your interview? Oh, that's right, you were in too much of a hurry to file your story and beat out all these other hardworking souls." She shot a cheeky grin to the rest of the group, who shared a brief moment of collective angst over Fionula's consistent ability to grab the hot headline. "To answer your question, we have mutual friends here in London."

  Fionula was clearly looking for the dirt angle to this particular breaking news story. She'd trumped everyone being the first to announce their partnership, but typical of her, she wasn't satisfied with that. Dirt angles could bite you in the ass if caught unaware. But if you were sharp enough to catch on early, you could use the reporter's less-than-lovely agenda to your own advantage. Tess had every intention of doing just that. The fact that Fionula was going to unwittingly be the one to help her achieve her goal was just icing on the cake.

  "As you probably know, I got into town early to be here for my brother Bobby's wedding. Now I'm just looking forward to watching a couple of weeks of good tennis."

  "Just 'good'?" a male reporter called out. "Not great?"

  She found his face in the crowd and grinned. "Hey, Ethan. How is Mary doing?" she asked, referring to his wife, who had been a reporter before marrying him and starting their family. "You know, with me no longer on tour, pissing players off and bringing out their best game in order to beat me…" She shrugged. " 'Good' is as good as it gets."

  Everyone laughed.

  "Don't let Serena or Justine hear you say that," he tossed back.

  "My record against them speaks for itself. You guys would love nothing more than for another rivalry like ours to spring up, and you know it." She took another piece of paper, signed another autograph. "You know, Ethan, you're getting a little soft. You should give Mary a break with the kids, let her come out here and badger me a little. She knew how to play hardball." Exactly as expected, Fionula took up that little gauntlet.

  "Is it hard being here as spectator instead of player? You owned this tournament two years ago. How does it feel being on the court as coach, not player?"

  It sucks ass, how do you think it feels? Tess wanted to shoot back. Bitch. She'd known the question would come, of course, but she thought she'd handle it better. Coming from Fionula, the question hit her like an arrow to the chest. It took everything she had to maintain even a semblance of a cheery facade and pretend all was well and good in Tess Hamilton Land. Like she wasn't still in mourning over the death of her career, like her world hadn't come crashing down the moment she'd landed on her shoulder, like she wasn't still trying to glue that world back together again and having about as much luck as she would reassembling shattered Humpty Dumpty pieces.

  Had it not sucker punched her to such a degree, she might have had the moxie to use the visceral intensity of her reaction to her favor, let them inside, let them see her pain, work that angle, gain sympathy. It might have won her a few marketability points. But it was all she could do to maintain an even smile, Besides, no way in hell was she going to give Fionula the satisfaction of seeing the truth.

  "I'm not coaching Gaby," she said tightly, opting to sidestep the issue altogether. It would come back to haunt her again, and again, but next time she'd be better prepared. "I'm just playing mentor a little. Mostly I'm here to enjoy myself. Watch my brother play." She smiled directly at Fionula, as much a test of her own fortitude as anything else. "There's nothing more to it, really."

  A statement she well knew was like waving a red flag at a bull. Dirt diggers like Fionula knew that anytime a player, or any celebrity, said there was nothing more to the story, there was definitely more to the story… usually all juicy.

  It was a risky angle to play, but what choice did she have? Tess had to make her and the other diggers suspect there was more to this arrangement with Gaby than met the eye, enough to keep the speculation very visible in the press… without actually encouraging them to dig in the direction that would uncover the real truth. That multimillionaire player Tess Hamilton, former number-one player Tess Hamilton, ten-time grand-slam winner Tess Hamilton… was now flat-busted, broke Tess Hamilton. The same Tess Hamilton who could swing a dead cat in the middle of a corporate party and not hit anyone interested in signing her to a deal.

  At the moment, it was advantage Tess, and she damn well planned to keep it that way. Before Fionula or anyone else could follow up, she looked over her shoulder and called out, "Gaby?" She waved at her. "Come on over and say hi."

  The reporters all pressed closer, the fans did, too, as did the photographers and cameramen, who all resumed their jockeying for position.

  Tess climbed down off the chair. "You're going to want her autograph," she told the fans when they sighed in disappointment, "Trust me. You can all say you got Gabrielle Fontaine's autograph the year she made her Wimbledon debut… the very tournament she will go on to dominate over the next ten years."

  The reporters almost wet their collective pants getting down that sound bite. "Are you predicting her success because you'll be coaching her?" Antoinette asked.

  They were like bulldogs. But she was counting on that. She knew they wouldn't give up on that angle… and hoped they wouldn't. As long as she was connected to Gaby, she was news.

  "I'm not her coach. Her record in the juniors speaks for itself. She's only been out here a few months and she's already making her mark on the tour. You watched how she handled Serena in Paris, then took Venus to two tiebreakers in Birmingham. Give her time—and not much of it. You're looking at the next American champion." She grinned again. "Number one on the charts, number one in our hearts."

  Gaby shot her a smile, and started signing a sudden flurry of autograph requests.

  "Gabrielle," several reporters called out. "What do you think of Tess's prediction?"

  She glanced at Tess, who gave her an almost imperceptible nod, then grinned up at the crowd. "I'm hoping she's wrong."

  "What?" There was a collective gasp. Pencils poised over paper.

  Gaby's grin spread wider. "I'm hoping I dominate this event for the next twenty years.''

  Everyone laughed. Tess beamed. God, she was a natural at this. Why in hell Max wanted to subdue any part of her natural charm and energy was beyond Tess.

  "Okay, guys," she said, raising her voice to be heard above the sudden cacophony of shutters whirring and questions being tossed at Gaby. "Our superstar here needs to get inside and get rubbed down."

  "Gabrielle, just one more!"

  "Look this way, Gaby!"

  "Come on, Tess, just a few more!"

  "Hey now," she admonished with a sassy wink, "you got more than your ten minutes. We'll see you all after round one."

  "You predicting an upset, Tess?"

  "Think she'll beat Davina?"

  Tess merely responded with a knowing smile as she quickly ushered Gaby off the chair.

  "Come on, Tess," she whispered, "let me stay out here. This is great press."

  "First rule of good press: Make 'em want, then make 'em wait. Wave, smile, and follow me."

  Gaby looked like she was going to rebel, but at Tess's steady stare, she did as asked, and quite brilliantly. "Thanks for waiting, everyone!"

  As they crossed the court, Tess told her, "There will be plenty more where this is coming from."

  The crowd had migrated and were trying to come into the alley that ran between the practice courts and the main building, but fortunately security was waiting for them. She ushered Gaby and Petra ahead of her. "Just keep moving," she told them, "no stopping, no talking until you're inside." Tess moved more slowly, let the girls disappear inside. She smiled easily and waved as she passed by, but didn't answer any of the additional questions shouted to her, or pause long enough for another photo opportunity. Make 'em want, then make 'em wait. Not a bad first day as the coach who really wasn't.

  Until she saw who was waiting for her at the players' entrance.

  She forced a bright smile. "Hello, Max. We re
ally have to stop meeting like this. So… now what did I do wrong?"

  Chapter 15

  "We need to talk." Max turned, but Tess stayed where she was.

  "We always need to talk. It never seems to get us anywhere, though. Did Gaby and Petra get inside okay?"

  "They should be in the training room." Max looked past her at the crowd still hanging over the wall. He didn't need to give them any more fodder. Tess had already seen to that little bit of business. "Let's go to the players' lounge." He bit back a sigh when Petra stepped back outside. "Your mom is waiting in the training room," he told Petra, trying to stem the impatience in his voice. And failing, if the expression on Tess's face was any indication.

  "Thank you, Max." Petra put her hand on Tess's arm. "Will you come back with me and talk to my mother? She watched me on court with you and she'd like to talk to you about maybe helping me with my game, too."

  Tess looked from Petra to Max, then back to Petra. "I have to talk to Max now, but maybe later, okay?"

  Petra's expression went straight to sulk mode, but she didn't argue further. "Okay. I will tell her you said you'd talk to her." Max didn't think Petra meant that to sound like a threat. But then, with her, everything sounded petulant.

  "No problem," Tess assured her, sounding far more cheerful about the prospect than Max would have.

  Maybe Tess had never met Petra's mother. He should probably warn her. Then again…

  "Thank you so much," Petra said, perky once more as she gave Tess a quick hug. Adversaries one moment, old friends the next. Whatever got Petra what she wanted, he supposed.

  They both waved halfheartedly as Petra flounced through the door toward the players' locker rooms.

  Max looked back to Tess. "So, what, now you're the patron saint for teenage tennis players?"

  Tess laughed. "Hardly."