Cami stared at the news article Lana had brought up on her laptop.
Life of crime: Did Daddy DiCarlo make a big mistake?
As if the pictures of debauchery from a few days ago weren’t enough, stories are flooding in about the other sisters in the DiCarlo debacle. Reports that Jonquil Chestnut has a history of theft and criminal behavior have been confirmed. Rosemary Keogh was expelled from more than one school for refusing to follow the rules, and actually held internships under two different chefs in Europe—which begs the question, did Daddy have to pay someone off so she could finish her training—training she apparently couldn’t get anyone in the U.S. to give her?
The world waits to see if the daughters of hotel magnate George DiCarlo can pull off the launch of his newest resort.
Cami gnashed her teeth. “All right, I already know this is a load of crap, so tell me what really happened. If we’re going to twist it back our way, I need all the facts.” She looked at Jonquil.
Jonquil spread her hands. “The best I can think of is that I stole a candy bar when I was nine. My mom found it, took me back to the store, and arranged with the store owner for me to go in every afternoon for a week to sweep the floors. I didn’t even get to keep the candy bar.”
“And you’re supposed criminal record?” Cami asked.
Jonquil’s lips twisted and she avoided eye contact. “I had too many parking tickets— give a girl a break; do you have any idea how hard it is to find a parking spot in Philly? Anyway, I didn’t get them paid in a timely manner, and I ended up with a warrant for my arrest. A friend of mine worked on the force, mentioned it to me and I went in the next day and took care of it. I wasn’t ever booked.”
“All right. I’m surprised there was still a note anywhere about the warrant.” Cami rubbed her temples. “Those should be easy to prove, but I want you to call your friend and find out why the warrant is still popping up under your name, and get it cleared out. If they’re finding it, the warrant may still show it’s valid.”
Jonquil covered her mouth. “I didn’t think of that.”
Already feeling a little better, Cami turned to Rosemary. “Okay, spill, you rule breaker. What happened? Were you actually kicked out of your schools?”
Rosemary smirked. “Okay, I can’t help it; I was a bit of a rebel. Dad always said I should’ve grown up in the sixties.”
Not amused, Cami pinned her with a hard glare.
“Fine. You need to lighten up! I wasn’t actually kicked out. We had an administrator at the school who was giving a teacher problems. She was a great teacher, totally dedicated, and didn’t even have to work. She had plenty of money.” She lounged back on the sofa.
When Cami kept staring at her, Rosemary shrugged and continued on. “Anyway, I was on the student council when she tendered her resignation in the middle of the year because the dude was picking at her so much. We talked about it and decided to stage a walkout. I headed the whole thing. The administrator quit that day and left town, and the teacher stayed. If I served a week’s after-school detention, it was well worth the price.”
“And what else? I understand you actually completed two full internships in Europe with chefs who focused on different things. The second one was a pastry chef, right?” Cami leaned back in the chair, not quite ready to relax, but feeling a little better about things.
“Exactly. So it’s total crap.” “And before that?”
Rosemary’s lips pursed. “Okay, there was one more situation, but I was framed.” Framed? Really? Cami wanted to reach out and smack Rosemary for not getting to the point. She’d been in such a great mood ten minutes earlier. “Details. Now.”
“Keep your shirt on, or should I say, your dress, and did I mention how much I love those sandals? Wow!” She shifted further into the cushions and took a sip of her Diet Mt. Dew—the only thing Cami had ever seen her drink besides espresso. “Anyway, I was going to a private school, and the cheer queen was upset the football captain liked me. We had words, which a teacher stopped—words, no physical fighting involved. Of course, there may have been slapping and scratching in the future if the teacher hadn’t stepped in, but that’s beside the point.”
Rosemary waved the comment away. “Okay, so I probably would’ve used my fist, but it never got that far. Anyway, we had a report due for history class, and she copied a paper from the Internet, put my name on it and somehow swapped my actual report. No, I can’t prove she was responsible, but,” she shrugged, “who else? Then she went to the teacher and said she’d overheard me talking about how I didn’t care about the class anyway, and so I’d totally poached a report from online. Of course the teacher did a couple of searches and proved it was stolen. It didn’t matter that I had a copy of the report I’d written, the school put me out to dry as an example.”
Cami was sure dealing with Rosemary was going to give her ulcers. “You were how old?”
“Seventeen. And I had great self-control. I only keyed her car in response, but I made sure it couldn’t be pinned on me, so it’s fine.” She folded her arms over her chest.
Cami swore. She stood and walked over to the window, fisting her hands to keep from hitting something. Why was she having to deal with this woman? What had her dad been thinking putting Rosemary to work in his hotel?
“Chill, kidding, I didn’t key her car. It crossed my mind when I saw it sitting in a parking lot one night, but I held myself back. There is a line.”
Cami felt some of the tension eased from her back and shoulders, but kept her hands fisted at her sides as she turned to everyone.
Rosemary rolled her eyes. “Get this woman a shot of something to calm her down before she has a come-apart.”
“You know,” Cami said evenly, “For someone who lived in Europe for two years, you sure come across as an inner-city delinquent.”
Rosemary grinned. “I grew up in D.C. I can be as smooth and cultured as the next person. I just prefer to be myself most of the time.”
“Wonderful. Well, we can’t do anything about the school expulsion except say it was a misunderstanding, but no one’s going to buy it, so let’s avoid discussing it at all if possible.”
“What do you mean they won’t buy it?” Rosemary asked. “It’s the truth.”
“Doesn’t matter. You think people who read these rags care about truth? No, they don’t. They care about sensationalism.” Seeing Rosemary accept the declaration with bad grace, Cami pushed forward. “Mentioning you completed two full internships in different specialties should go over better. In fact, I think it would be good if we all— including Delphi—wrote up a paragraph or two detailing our professional histories and accomplishments as far as how they prepared us for our roles here. We’ll post them up on the website, and create a press release. I’ll work with the corporate media specialists and contact Alex to firm things up.” They had to do something before this totally got out of control.
The first article had been an irritation; this one took things to a new level.
She stood and moved to the stairs. “Lana, can you contact the others? I’ll tweak my own bio. If the past week or two is anything to go by, we need to anticipate more media attacks coming up. If there’s anything in any of our pasts that can be dug up or twisted to suit the papers, they’ll find it.” She glanced back over her shoulders to see Lana’s face was white, and Sage’s eyes were as big as bagels. Though Cami considered asking what they could possibly be hiding, she didn’t have the energy for it.
The night had gone from fabulous to fraught, and Cami felt wrung out. When she shut the bedroom door, she went through the motions of changing out of her eveningwear into pajamas, doing her facial cleansing and moisturizing routine and sat at the computer. It was too late to call Alex, though she desperately wanted to. He would soothe her and help solve the problem—two things she could use now. She pulled up her bio and made some tweaks to it.
She emailed the PR people at corporate headquarters, directed them to the articles in question—on the off chance they hadn’t seen them yet—and copied Alex. Cami mentioned the women would all come up with something to post on the website, and could they please call her at their earliest convenience to discuss strategy.
Though Lana would be the hotel’s general manager, it was clear she wanted Cami to deal with the debacle. It was Cami’s forte, so she would handle it. It was one more thing to squeeze into her time as she prepared for the hotel opening in seven weeks.
She was already tired.