Copyright © 2021 by Sodasac Press All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Publisher: Sodasac Press Cover design: Once Upon a Cover Custom Artwork: Megan Shaffer Editing: SJS Editorial Services Formatting: Christina Butrum Dedication To my children for whose weirdness I take full responsibility. It couldn't be helped. Contents LOVE AND LOATHING 1. The Stanley Sisters 2. Loathe Pie 3. Fine Eyes 4. Spiders, Sharks, and Barnacles, Oh My! 5. It's Hard to Be the Bard (or MacGyver) 6. Good Opinion Once Lost 7. Quetzalcoatl’s Hot Chocolate 8. How Pitiful His Tale (How Rare His Beauty) 9. Eggs, Pie, and Cheese Wiz 10. Any Savage Can Dance 11. Red and Black 12. The Yam Incident 13. Telenovelas and Cap’n Crunch 14. What Is This Feeling? 15. He Ran Into My Knife Ten Times 16. At Common Sense She Gaily Mocks 17. Twitterpated 18. Taco Wednesday 19. Some Disenchanted Evening 20. Cold Civility 21. Will with A Quill 22. The Winter of Our Discontent 23. The Girl with The Lanyard 24. The Woman Who Stole My Heart and My Dog 25. First-Rate Opportunity 26. Stay 27. Lights, Cookies, Snoopy 28. Hold, Monsters! 29. T Minus One Day 30. Something Else 31. Take Heart, Take Mine 32. Pour, Oh Pour, the Pirate Sherry Epilogue SECRETS OF A HOLLYWOOD MATCHMAKER 1. Talk Like A Pirate Day 2. The Game Is Afoot With Fabulous Shoes 3. Dog People 4. Beso De Angel 5. Extravagant Purchase 6. Gal Pals 7. Perpetual State Of Symmetry 8. Emoji Dating 9. Spaghetti Face 10. Monarch Of The Sea 11. A Disturbance In The Force 12. Road Trip 13. All About Tan Lines 14. Frankfurter Parties 15. Be More Chill 16. Don’t Blink 17. Elephant In The Room 18. Coffee In Bed 19. Jazzercize, Don’t Eat Those Fries 20. Strictly Professional 21. Shipping 22. Simple-Minded Creatures 23. Hurry Up And Wait 24. Seeing Red On The Red Carpet 25. Goodbye, Hello 26. S’more Bad Jokes 27. Badly Done 28. We’ll Always Have Paris 29. Mad World 30. Lessons From Uncle Hershel 31. Zip It 32. Whatever Is True Epilogue DRIVING MISS DARCY 1. Georgia 2. Georgia 3. Georgia 4. Wyatt 5. Georgia 6. Wyatt 7. Wyatt 8. Georgia 9. Georgia 10. Georgia 11. Wyatt 12. Georgia 13. Georgia 14. Wyatt 15. Wyatt 16. Wyatt 17. Georgia 18. Georgia 19. Georgia 20. Wyatt 21. Georgia 22. Georgia Epilogue PITA MY HEART 1. ROSEMARY 2. INGRAM 3. ROSEMARY 4. INGRAM 5. ROSEMARY 6. INGRAM 7. ROSEMARY Epilogue Dancing with the Cowboy A Note From Gigi About the Author BOOKS BY GIGI BLUME 1 The Stanley Sisters Beth It is a truth universally acknowledged that a hotshot movie star must be magnanimously bonkers to do regional theatre. Like, crazy of epic proportions. Schizo. Cracked. So what the blazes was he doing here? There were more than enough egomaniacs in my life and I could have done without Mr. Action Flick, thanks. Unfortunately, nobody asked my opinion. But I’m getting ahead of myself. There was, in fact, some sauce that was fantastically awesome: I landed my first professional gig as a principal cast member in Pirates of Penzance at the Stella Gardiner Theatre. The Stella Freaking Gardiner Theatre, people! Everybody knows The Gardiner’s THE prime regional playhouse in Los Angeles. And after an eternity of paying my dues performing in weird obscure shows in shoddy warehouses, I was finally getting paid. I know, right? Sauce. Awesome. For about a half-second, I bid a tearful adieu to memories of tap shoes sticking to stage paint still wet on opening night and also the stinky dressing rooms with mysterious carpet stains. Or not. Really, there were no tears at all unless you count my stinging, watering eyes from the residual paint thinner lingering on my nose hairs from that time I did Little Women at a condemned train station. Ah, what I did for my art. It was actually a mystery how I managed to get the part of Edith in Pirates of Penzance, but there I was on the first day of rehearsal, hoping nobody would notice the fresh meat that I was. I was certain it was some sort of mistake and half-expected the director to kick me out as soon as he noticed me. Can I be honest here? I was mildly disappointed he didn’t. Professional theatre meant they expected professional-level work. And that terrified me. No more performing next to livestock with the errant chicken crossing the stage. Or that one black box theatre where the owner’s dog would wander into the audience and randomly sit on someone’s lap. I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. And by Kansas, I mean community theatre. (I’m not from Kansas. I’m from Long Beach.) And can we talk about the complete dork I was compared to all the other actors in the rehearsal studio? Everyone was in dancewear, stretching and warming up like a scene out of A Chorus Line. I was in threadbare yoga pants and a Guardians of the Galaxy t-shirt. Way to make an impression on your first day, Beth. So, instead of hyperventilating while waiting for rehearsal to start, I decided to sneak to the green room to text my friend Jane who was supposed to be there already. Me: ETA? I feel like a Hobbit in a room full of Rivendell Elves. Hurry up. No response. Honestly, where was she? I marched into the kitchenette for a bottle of water and that’s when I came upon a stunning specimen of a man finishing a phone call. I couldn’t help it. Something about this person stopped me in my tracks. Why though? It’s not like I was boy crazy or anything. He wore a crisp pair of jeans that looked like they were tailored for his tall form, and tucked into those jeans was a black button-down shirt, which reminded me of something Gene Kelly would wear. The short sleeves were cuffed just enough to showcase the long line of muscles and sinews on his arms. Action hero arms—but not too bulky. His hair, a sandy light brown, fell in careless, tousled waves and framed his aristocratic features, dotted with a two-day stubble. But his eyes. That’s probably where I lost my faculties. They were a piercing blue, rimmed with speckles of dark grey. Like the Pacific on a sunny day when there’s a single cloud over the horizon, promising an oncoming storm. And when those eyes fell over me, I suddenly felt freakishly tiny. “Hhh-hi,” I
