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Authors: Susan Elizabeth Phillips

It Had to Be You

BOOK: It Had to Be You
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Dear Readers,

 

This is the book that started it all. For years I’d amused myself wondering what would happen if a woman who knew nothing about sports inherited a professional football team. When I finally started writing
It Had to Be You,
I had no idea it would be the first in a series of books. (Please keep this to yourself, but I’m not crazy about sports.) The series begins with
It Had to Be You
and ends with
This Heart of Mine
, which tells the story of Molly Somerville, whom you’ll meet for the first time here.

 

I hope you enjoy this introduction to the Chicago Stars family. Although each of these books stands on its own, some prefer to read them in order. If you’d like to learn more about this series and all of my books, visit my web site at
www.susanphillips.com
or send me a self-addressed stamped business-sized envelope.

 
Happy Reading,
Susan Elizabeth Phillips
c/o Avon Books
10 East 53rd Street
New York, New York 10022
Susan
Elizabeth
Phillips
 
It Had to Be You
 
 
To Steven Axelrod, who’s been around from the
beginning with a good head, a strong shoulder,
and a high tolerance for crazy authors.
This one had to be yours.
 
Contents
 
1
 Phoebe Somerville outraged everyoneby bringing a French poodle and a . . .
 
2
 Brian Hibbard shuffled the papers in his  lap. “I apologize for barging in on . . .
 
3
 “There’s no other way to look at it, Ice,”  Tully Archer said, speaking to Dan . . .
 
4
 Dan opened the refrigerator door, pulled  out a quart of milk, and unscrewed . . .
 
5
 Pooh got distracted by a Dalmatian asthey were crossing Fifth Avenue just . . .
 
6
 “Here we are, Miss Somerville.” TheBuick Park Avenue left the highway . . .
 
7
 The humid night breeze blew the cur-  tains and ruffled Molly’s dark . . .
 
8
 A vein bulged at Dan’s temples as hescreamed. “Fenster! On thirty-two . . .
 
9
 Phoebe stood in the flickering shadowsof the torches that had been placed . . .
 
10
 As Phoebe looked down at the video   tape that lay on ohthe passenger seat . . .
 
11
 Phoebe felt muzzy and depressed as she  sipped her first cup of morning coffee.
 
12
 Phoebe ran into Bobby Tom Denton inthe hotel lobby at eight-thirty on . . .
 
13
 Phoebe’s cheek was stuck to Dan’s chest  and her leg was twisted at an . . .
 
14
 Ron cleared his throat “Ms. Somervilleposed for the
Beau Monde
. . .
 
15
 Phoebe slid back the curtain she had been peering through as Dan pulled . . .
 
16
 Ron stared down at the field from theskybox window. “I knew what . . .
 
17
 The Giants’ defensive line was stunnedthe first time they took their . . .
 
18
 Molly had just walked in the door fromschool the next afternoon when the . . .
 
19
 Phoebe studied her reflection in the long, narrow mirror that occupied . . .
 
20
 “Are you sure you’ve told me every-   thing that happened after I left?”
 
21
 Dan walked across the bedroom, unselfconscious about his nudity.
 
22
 “Stop scowling, Darnell. You’re scaringthe photographers.” Phoebe . . .
 
23
 The pep band struck up “Ain’t She Sweet?” and the Star Girl . . .
 
24
 On the sideline Dan called Jim Biederot  over. He hoped the quarterback . . .
 
25
 Ron met Phoebe just inside the door ofthe locker room, and after assuring . . .
 

Epilogue

 

Acknowledgments

 

About the Author

 

About the Publisher

 

Copyright

 
1
 
P
hoebe Somerville outraged everyone by bringing a French poodle and a Hungarian lover to her father’s funeral. She sat at the gravesite like a fifties movie queen with the small white poodle perched in her lap and a pair of rhinestone-studded cat’s-eye sunglasses shielding her eyes. It was difficult for the mourners to decide who looked more out of place—the perfectly clipped poodle sporting a pair of matching peach satin ear bows, Phoebe’s unbelievably handsome Hungarian with his long, beaded ponytail, or Phoebe herself.

Phoebe’s ash blond hair, artfully streaked with platinum, swooped down over one eye like Marilyn Monroe’s in
The SevenYear Itch.
Her moist, full lips, painted a delicious shade of peony pink, were slightly parted as she gazed toward the shiny black casket that held what was left of Bert Somerville. She wore an ivory suit with a silky, quilted jacket, but the outrageous gold metallic
bustier
beneath was more appropriate to a rock concert than a funeral. And the slim skirt, belted with loops of gold chain (one of which sported a dangling fig leaf) was slit at the side to the middle of her shapely thigh.

This was the first time Phoebe had been back in Chicago since she’d run away when she was eighteen, so only a few of the mourners present had ever met Bert Somerville’s prodigal daughter. From the stories they’d heard, however, none of them were surprised that Bert had disinherited her. What father would want to pass on his estate to a daughter who’d been the mistress of a man more than forty years her senior, even if that man had been the noted Spanish painter, Arturo Flores? And then there was the embarrassment of the paintings. To someone like Bert Somerville, naked pictures were naked pictures, and the fact that the dozens of abstract nudes Flores had executed of Phoebe now graced the walls of museums all over the world hadn’t softened his judgment.

Phoebe had a slender waist and slim, shapely legs, but her breasts and hips were plump and womanly, a throw-back to an almost forgotten time when women had looked like women. She had a bad girl’s body, the sort of body that, even at thirty-three, could just as well have been displayed with a staple through the navel as hanging on a museum wall. It was a bimbo’s body—never mind that the brain inside was highly intelligent, since Phoebe was the sort of woman who was seldom judged by anything except appearances.

Her face wasn’t any more conventional than her body. There was something off-kilter about the arrangement of her features, although it was difficult to say exactly what since her nose was straight, her mouth well formed, and her jaw strong. Perhaps it was the outrageously sexy tiny black mole that sat high on her cheekbone. Or maybe it was her eyes. Those who had seen them before she’d slipped on her rhinestone sunglasses had noted the way they tilted upward at the corners, too exotic, somehow, to fit with the rest of her face. Arturo Flores had frequently exaggerated those amber eyes, sometimes painting them larger than her hips, sometimes superimposing them over her wonderful breasts.

Throughout the funeral, Phoebe seemed cool and composed, despite the fact that the July air was heavy with humidity. Even the rushing waters of the nearby DuPage River, which ran through several of Chicago’s western suburbs, didn’t provide any relief from the heat. A dark green canopy shaded both the gravesite and the rows of chairs set up for the dignitaries in a semicircle around the black ebony casket, but the canopy wasn’t large enough to shelter everyone attending, and much of the well-dressed crowd was standing in the sun, where they’d begun to wilt, not only from the humidity but also from the overpowering scent of nearly a hundred floral arrangements. Luckily, the ceremony had been short, and since there was no reception afterward, they could soon head for their favorite watering holes to cool off and secretly rejoice in the fact that Bert Somerville’s number had come up instead of their own.

The shiny black casket rested above the ground on a green carpet that had been laid directly in front of the place where Phoebe was sitting between her fifteen-year-old half sister, Molly, and her cousin Reed Chandler. The polished lid held a star-shaped floral spray of white roses embellished with sky blue and gold ribbons, the colors of the Chicago Stars, the National Football League franchise Bert had bought ten years earlier.

When the ceremony ended, Phoebe cradled the white poodle in her arms and rose to her feet, stepping into a shaft of sunlight that sparked the gold metallic threads of her
bustier
and set the rhinestone frames of her cat’s-eye sunglasses afire. The effect was unnecessarily dramatic for a woman who was already quite dramatic enough.

Reed Chandler, Bert’s thirty-five-year-old nephew, got up from his chair next to her and walked over to place a flower on the casket. Phoebe’s half sister Molly followed self-consciously. Reed gave every appearance of being grief-stricken, although it was an open secret that he would inherit his uncle’s football team. Phoebe dutifully placed her own flower on her father’s coffin and refused to let the old bitterness return. What was the use? She hadn’t been able to win her father’s love while he was alive, and now she could finally give up the effort. She reached out to give a comforting touch to the young half sister who was such a stranger to her, but Molly pulled away, just as she always did whenever Phoebe tried to get close to her.

BOOK: It Had to Be You
11.74Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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