A Guy's Worst Nightmare

By Shawna Hansen

One daughter, one soul. Two by two Squaw Sachem’s spirit opened her arms and accepted an old soul released from the ground into the serenity of the new moon’s darkness. Chelsea and Haley Maverick are sisters who live on opposites sides of the country and are in love with the same guy, Ethan Jordane, one of Hollywood's most eligible bachelors. As the Maverick sisters' destinies draw Ethan into the family curse, Ethan's life is torn apart and he discovers being in love with a Maverick is a A Guy's Worst Nightmare.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shawna Hansen
• Release date: Oct 10, 2011
• ISBN: 9781466120747

Shawna Hansen

Author of 3 romance/new adult novels: A Guy's Best Friend, A Guy's Worst Nightmare and A Guy's Dream Come True. Shawna also is working on a series of Young Adult Science Fiction books starting with City of Fury. Shawna HANSEN lives in Massachusetts and loves Revere Beach.

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A GUY’S WORST NIGHTMARE, Copyright © 2011 by Shawna Hansen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented without the express written permission of the author.

FIRST EDITION

EPub Edition October 2011

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Cover graphic art © Olena Chyrko, 2011. Reflexion of a lunar path in water. Night, a ray of light. © http://www.dreamstime.com/free-stock-image-reflexion-of-a-lunar-path-in-water--rimagefree7037542-resi3313569

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A Guy’s Worst Nightmare

Shawna Hansen

Copyright © 2011 by Shawna Hansen

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Cover

Winnisimmett (Modern Day Chelsea), Massachusetts, 1600s

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Nahanten, Two Things United or Twins,(Modern Day, Nahant, Massachusetts), 2010s

Preview A Guy’s Dream Come True (Available Fall 2011)

Lyrics to A Guy’s Worst Nightmare by Haley Maverick from her latest CD as performed at the Oscars

Dedication

About the Author

Books by Shawna Hansen

Winnisimmett (Modern Day Chelsea), Massachusetts, 1600s

Samuel Maverick, Elias Maverick, and John Blackbach had worn out their welcome in London. King Charles tired of the endless gossip surrounding the young Maverick brothers and had grown weary of the entertainment the pair had provided at court and sent the three far away with the lord of the manor of Groton in Suffolk, John Winthrop, and specifically titled the three blackhearts with a thousand acres in the heavily inhabited native lands of the Winnisimmett. The most recent news he’d been forced to hear about the Maverick brothers was that they had accompanied Winthrop’s party of exploration from Salem to Boston Bay on June 17th, 1630 and with that news, the king left the lives of the Maverick brothers and Blackbach to fate.

Winthrop had his hands full with the Maverick brothers. Luckily, Samuel had met the influential widow of David Thompson and in turn, had his hands full managing his wife’s large possessions, including Noddle’s Island. He built a house for them in 1633 and tried to keep his brother, Elias, out of trouble. Elias had spent his early years in the New World at his brother’s side and learning the ways of the Sagamores, Sachem and Aberginians, the people who lived along the Charles, Merrimack and Mystic Rivers.

Elias was welcomed by the Sagamores and was married to the great chief, the New Moon’s, daughter, Abigail. He tried to explain the ways of the English settlers to the three sons of the chief Nanepashemet (called the New Moon): Wonohaquaham (called John Sagamore of Winnisimmett) and Montowampate (James Sagamore of Lynn) and Winnepurkitt (called the last of the Sagamores), but even after the English fairly traded and paid for the land, the Sagamores felt it unjust that they were not allowed to hunt and fish on their lands.

Elias soon found that that the Indians were savages and were neither useful to the English or respectable. Elias reported to the Governor that it was necessary to abandon efforts to provide the natives with equal protection with the whites and they could not bring the savages into the Christian habits. Quiet efforts were taken by individuals to keep the natives in the area through the winter to continue the proper and just sale of the native lands.

At the end of the summer in 1633, Abigail was pregnant with Elias child and was eager to leave the summer hunting grounds and asked Elias if he would come with her and her mother’s people to the winter lands. Elias begged her to stay in the Winnisimmet and said he was her family now and she should stay. Abigail’s mother, called Squaw Sachem, had taken over governorship of her sons’ tribes when New Moon died. She packed up her followers and dragged her daughter away from the Winnisimmet, saying she’d had a vision that the barren English would scorch lands and steal their children.

Angry with Abigail’s abandoning him and furious with Squaw Sachem’s forceful removal of Abigail from his life, Elias Maverick volunteered his own brother’s ferry in the dead of the night to transport disease-ridden blankets and food to the Sagamore people. He took the ferry back to Boston and booked passage back to England and left his brother, Abigail and the savage New England life he now despised behind forever. He left the blankets and food to be distributed by his brother to the chiefs as the cold weather brought hardship and starvation to the Sagamores.

In December 1633, John Sagamore died of smallpox and almost all of his people were buried by Elias’ brother, Samuel Maverick who was heartbroken and consumed with guilt that his brother had involved himself in this massacre out of revenge against Squaw Sachem. Samuel could never forgive himself for his own part in the Sagamores’ betrayal by personally supplying the starving and cold peoples of John and James Sagamore who had willingly stayed behind to build a community and enjoy the security of the Boston English and avoid war with the Narragansetts, who still remembered John Sagamore’s betrayal of the Narragansetts in 1629 when John warned the Maverick brothers of the massacre planned by the Narragansetts.

Samuel had personally delivered food and smallpox infested blankets to John and James Sagamore. More than thirty adults died, including Elias’ brothers-in-law, John and James Sagamore. Winnepurkitt, John and James, thirteen year old brother was the remaining chief of the tribes and was completely under the thumb of the Boston English. The surviving children were taken by settler families in the bay, many unable to conceive or keep the children alive in the harsh New England winters. John Sagamore’s only son, called George Rumney, was taken to live with Mr. Wilson, the pastor of Boston and brought up by him.

With James and John dead, Winnepurkitt, their thirteen year old younger brother was moved out to Deer Island where he and his wife, who was originally from the island of Nahant, north of Crescent Beach, raised their three daughters. Winnepurkitt ruled and lived year-round as his people became English.

The last of the Sagamores, Winnepurkitt was mistakenly captured and carried away with other prisoners and sold for slaves at the end of King Phillip’s war. Upon his return from Barbados, years later, he returned to an English world where his mother, father, brothers and sisters were mere ghost stories whispered by English children around fires. The souls of those betrayed by Elias and Samuel Maverick remained buried deep in the dark soil.

Squaw Sachem returned to the summer hunting grounds with vengeance in her heart. She’d learned of her sons’ deaths by disease. Her daughter had died in childbirth. She’d raised the child as her own as she mourned her three children’s deaths. Squaw Sachem had taken a new husband and assumed New Moon’s rule over the Massachusetts tribes. She had returned to Winnisimmet to search for Elias Maverick and negotiate payment to keep Elias’ son with her.

Upon visiting Samuel Maverick and learning of Elias and Samuel’s betrayal, she told him that he would carry the blood of her people even as his hands had buried her people in the darkness of the soil in the English tradition instead of releasing them to the sky. Squaw Sachem handed Samuel Maverick, Elias’ son and said that until Elias returned her daughter’s heart to Crescent Beach, the souls Samuel Maverick had savagely buried in Montowampate’s woods in the barbaric English tradition far from their families would feed upon Elias and Samuel’s children.

One daughter would bear the stain in payment for her own daughter, Abigail’s life and one daughter would be the vessel for the tormented souls. Squaw Sachem turned her back on Abigail’s baby and John’s son who was now living with Pastor Brown in Boston.

Visiting the summer hunting grounds, she stayed away from Winnisimmet and away from her son, George Rumney on Deer Island and lived her summers on the island of Nahant with George’s wife’s family. She took comfort in the beauty of the moon’s reflection as she gazed over the waters between Nahant and Crescent Beach. She thought about the new moon and how the moon is dark between the Earth and the sun. When the new moon rose at the same time as the sun, she thought about the souls of her people trapped beneath the dark woods in Lynn and prayed that they find their way out of the Earth’s silent darkness and someday take their place in the new moon’s darkness. She prayed for their souls and for the souls of her lost children and first husband.

Samuel Maverick was twenty-two years old when he came to America and built the first permanent English residence in Winnisimmet. At the age of thirty-one, he fortified his home against the natives. He shut his heart to their misery and spent the rest of his life raising Elias’ son, whom he named Matthew and raised as his own. He suffered with memories of the Sagamores he’d buried with his own hands. Samuel died a little the four times his wife bore him a healthy son and each of his sons died before the next brother was born. Finally, his wife died one evening under the dark New Moon as she delivered their healthy twin daughters, Experience and Hazdiah.

Samuel threw himself into running the ferry that ran from Winnisimmet to Boston and shortly after his daughters were born, was granted a second ferry which ran from Windmill Hill (Copps Hill) Boston to Winnisimmet.

Squaw Sachem watched from her summer island in Nahant as Elias’ treachery solidified the Maverick family’s wealth and Samuel’s mansion became a fortified prison that neither she nor her people were powerful enough to tear down. Squaw Sachem delighted in watching her daughter’s son, Matthew Maverick, grow in power within the English world. She wondered if her daughter’s son remembered his grandmother and the truths she’d whispered into his heart before handing him over to Samuel Maverick.

Before her own death, Squaw Sachem waited for Elias Maverick to return her daughter’s heart to her, but he sealed the fate of his son’s daughters and his brother’s daughters by dying in agony far away in England, poisoned by his dark-haired mistress he often called Abigail as he made love to her. She’d poisoned him after he beat her nearly to death and caused her unborn child to hemorrhage from her body. She drank the poison herself to avoid the gallows.

Squaw Sachem watched as Samuel’s daughters, Experience and Hazdiah, and Elias and Abigail’s son, Matthew’s daughters paid the price of the stain and provided a vessel for the tormented souls buried deep within James Sagamore’s Lynn woods. Squaw Sachem’s spirit passed into the sky and continued to wait for the return of Abigail’s heart. The stain of Abigail’s death continued its ebb and flow as the Maverick brothers’ daughters paid for the passage of each of the thirty souls buried in the ground. One daughter, one soul. Two by two Squaw Sachem’s spirit opened her arms and accepted an old soul released from the ground into the serenity of the new moon’s darkness.

1

The Bass Point Café emptied out as the reporters and cameramen lurking in hopes of an early appearance by Chelsea’s older sister, Haley Maverick, the children’s channel movie star, were rewarded as cell phones all rang simultaneously with the news that Haley’s limo had just left Logan airport. Haley Maverick would arrive in Nahant in 20-30 minutes depending on traffic up Route 1A.

Smiling, Chelsea picked up two $20 bills a reporter had left on the table for a cup of coffee, two eggs, bacon and toast. Wicked big tip. Reporters and cameramen jumped up, abandoning half-eaten breakfasts and taking last sips of coffee before heading outside to line up to capture the best camera angles to get the money shot when Haley stepped out of the limo.

Completely alone inside the café, Chelsea flipped the pancakes she’d been cooking for a Boston Globe reporter. She put them in a doggie bag to give them to her little brother, Jasper, when she picked him up from daycare later. It would take about 20-30 minutes to clean up the cafe from the morning rush.

Chelsea loved working at her grandmother’s café. She loved watching customers’ faces when they took their first bite of her food and felt food ecstasy. The Bass Point Café was remote and out of the way unless you were a Nahant local. An Improper Bostonian reporter told Chelsea that not only was the food excellent, but the view of the Boston skyline from the café was worth the drive.

Caught off guard when Haley’s personal assistant, Leslie, called late last night to say Haley was arriving early, Chelsea hadn’t scheduled any backup this morning and was working alone in the café, but everything had gone all right. No burnt toast or smushed omelettes.

Chelsea had been in bed since around 10 pm after she’d finished hanging up some photographs in her new apartment above the café. Chelsea was having a hard time staying awake focused on everything Leslie was saying. She needed to catch all the info Leslie was rushing through. The clock next to Chelsea’s bed read 2 am east coast time.

Leslie slammed Chelsea with the news that Haley had broken up with Diego for good. Again. Estelle was flying with Haley to meet with Sam Jordane on the Vineyard this weekend about the new movie. Leslie took a breath and gushed that everyone thought the new shark movie was just fabu.

Breathing for a second between words, Leslie took in a few breaths, but before she could start up again, Chelsea cleared her throat and said thanks for the call and asked why Leslie wasn’t coming. Leslie laughed nervously and said she was too, too, too busy. Haley needed her in the office in L.A. to handle PR prior to the movie shoot.

Getting this call so late and from Leslie confused Chelsea. Haley always called or texted Chelsea from her cell when she wanted to tell Chelsea something personal. Haley had been a working actor and movie star since before Chelsea was born, but sometimes Haley’s personal life never seemed as real as the emotions she portrayed in front of the camera.

It was exasperating for Chelsea to try to figure out at 2 a.m. in the middle of the night whether Haley was really in trouble. Or not. Chelsea had a strong feeling this final, final breakup was staged for the public and the cameras since Leslie was calling.

Groaning, Chelsea had expected Haley to arrive on Friday. Grandma Mav had gone up to Maine to visit her sister for a few days taking Kevin with her. Chelsea had planned to clean up the restaurant all day Thursday, but now she’d just have to close it up the best she could before Haley arrived in all her glory. Chelsea hated dumping the cleanup on Grandma Mav.

Coming to the café early this morning, Chelsea had hoped to get a head start on the breakfast prep. She’d baked a couple dozen in anticipation of the news crowd hoping to get a bite to eat before interviewing her famous sister. The more she could get done before Grandma Mav came home from Maine, the better Chelsea would feel about leaving the café for the summer to join Haley’s summer vacation entourage.

Behind the shiny, chrome deli counter, Chelsea emptied cup after cup of still-warm coffee into the kitchen sink. She wished she could empty all the thoughts twisting and pounding inside her head along with the wasted coffee. Things she’d done. Things she had to do. Things she couldn’t do until she came home to Nahant in September. She was exhausted from thinking and re-thinking everything.

Wondering if everyone’s family was as crazy as hers, Chelsea felt like her mind had been going over the family history and weighing her down with all the screwups, successes and just plain weirdness that came with being a member of the Maverick family.

Slowly wiping her hands on a towel, Chelsea tried not to stress about seeing Estelle. Chelsea told herself Estelle would just do her Haley’s Mom routine in front of the cameras here in the café. Then, when the cameras clicked off, Estelle would spend a minute or two ripping Chelsea’s self-confidence to shreds.

As much as Chelsea wanted to go along with Haley’s happy little family reunion, having Estelle in her café, her home-away-from-home, felt wrong. Estelle had no right to be here.

Chelsea cleaned up a ketchup spill near the cash register. Victor Maverick, Chelsea’s dad, rarely said Estelle’s name, but he loved to tell his story about how Haley got her name. Victor was kind of a space nerd. He and Haley’s mother, Estelle, drove to Revere Beach in 1986 to see Halley’s Comet, but they were so busy talking with each other that they steamed up the car windows and missed the comet.

While in school, Chelsea had read that the 1986 sighting of Halley’s Comet was disappointing. Victor always ended his story by saying he had to name his daughter, Haley, because he wasn’t sure he’d still be around to see Halley’s Comet again in 75 years with the way his kids were making his hair turn prematurely grey.

Although Victor never told the whole story about how Haley got her name, Chelsea had put enough pieces of malicious gossip together to figure it all out.

Estelle’s visit to see Victor in Nahant 1986 was her first and last trip to Massachusetts while with Victor. Estelle and Victor had rendezvoused in hotels all across Italy over the winter while Victor shot his hit movie, The Amero-Italiano, a romantic comedy written and co-produced by Victor’s then second wife, Janice Kensley Maverick, daughter of Jackson Kensley, New York City media mogul.

Featuring an adorable Italian princess who fell in love with an Italian-American oaf visiting his family’s homeland, Janice had not been happy with the casting of her lovely, aristocratic heroine. The movie was modified so a French bikini model, Estelle Bonet, could play the lead role of an Italian socialite/ski bunny who fell in love with an American womanizer and had lots of fun chasing each other around the Alps.

Estelle, the French bikini model, hated American movies and Americans - all Americans except Victor Maverick. That summer, Estelle took her acting seriously and spent a lot of time researching her role by letting Victor pursue her in luxury ski chalet suites around the Alps.

Once shooting wrapped up, Victor called off his interlude with Estelle, but it was too late. Janice, his wife #2 of less than a year, had found out about the affair. Wife #2 informed Victor the locks on all the doors had been changed. His name was removed from their Beverly Hills mansion’s security gate’s list.

All the money from their joint bank account had been withdrawn. Victor called his mom, Anne Maverick in Nahant, and she wired him the funds to get back to the states. He slunk back to Nahant hoping to convince Janice over the phone he missed her and to let him come home and at least see baby Matthew.

Divorced once before when Wife #1, Marie Costa Maverick, Victor’s wife of almost ten years discovered Victor had a pregnant mistress expecting her child the same month Kendall was due, Victor had found himself not yet 30 years old, heartbroken and miserable, divorced from his high school sweetheart and separated from his oldest son, Chase, and his son-on-the-way, Kendall.

When his first divorce was final, Victor moved in with Janice and married her just days after his son, Kendall, with his first wife was born. Janice and Victor’s son, Matthew, was born a week later.

Less than a year later, Victor had found himself heartbroken and divorced from Wife #2 and separated from his third son, Matthew. He married Estelle as soon as his second divorce was final. His baby girl, Haley Josette, with wife #3, Estelle, the French bikini model, was born shortly before Christmas.

Chelsea knew that Grandma Mav and Estelle had not clicked. Grandma Mav stayed in touch with Victor’s first two wives, Marie and Janice, but she stayed far away from that crazy woman, Estelle. Grandma Mav had told Chelsea that Estelle wasn’t happy being pregnant and losing her bikini model body.

Constantly accusing Victor of cheating on her while she was pregnant, Estelle was right that he was cheating on her. Victor was actually back with Wife #2 on the side. Janice felt turnabout was fair play and since Estelle had slept with Victor while Janice was pregnant with Matthew, Janice had the right to sleep with Victor while Estelle was pregnant.

In way over his head and started staying with his mother at the new mansion he’d built for her in Nahant, Victor needed to get out of Hollywood and cool things down between Janice and Estelle. His worst nightmare was that Janice would hold a press conference and announce their affair. His second worst nightmare was that Estelle would hold a press conference and announce his affair with Janice.

Grandma Mav had only one rule: no hanky panky in Nahant. What Victor did in L.A. and New York and anywhere else on the planet was his business, but at her house in Nahant, Victor was a married man. She didn’t want to hear about him being seen with any women other than that French wife of his. Janice followed Victor back east and moved into an apartment in Central Park east to be closer to Victor. Victor bought a private plane to use to shuttle between his families on both coasts.

Over time, Victor’s visits to California revolved more and more around Haley’s acting work and his sons’ school schedules. Victor visited his children on the west coast as often as possible. Estelle and Victor went months without speaking to each other about anything except Haley’s work schedule. They remained married and happily estranged for over five years.

Every time one of his affairs was revealed in a celebrity magazine, Victor fully expected Estelle to demand a divorce, but for better or worse, Estelle was happy being Mrs. Victor Maverick.

As Mrs. Victor Maverick, Estelle had carte blanche to the highest social tiers of the Hollywood elite. Publicly, she reveled in her role as the rejected wife. She won the hearts of the world’s celebrity magazine readers with her loneliest Hollywood wife and mother persona. She discreetly warmed her own bed with a string of affairs with younger men seeking fame and fortune and a part in one of Victor’s movies in Hollywood.

With unlimited access to Victor Maverick through their beautiful daughter, Haley, Estelle became one of the most powerful agents in Hollywood. Her #1 client was Haley Maverick, child star.

Whether Haley even knew she had three older brothers when she was little was something Chelsea always wondered about. Chelsea doubted Estelle would allow Victor’s boys to visit or Chelsea to visit her brothers at their mother’s mansions. Victor visited all of his children, but he although he officially lived with Estelle in Beverly Hills, he often stayed with Sam and Lydie Jordane whose oldest son, Ethan was best friends with Victor’s oldest son, Chase.

Checking the clock, Chelsea saw there were another ten to fifteen minutes left before the limo would get to Nahant. This would be the first time that Chelsea would be alone with Estelle in her entire life without Victor or Grandma Mav nearby. Estelle was nasty enough to Chelsea with Victor and Grandma Mav around. How low would Estelle go this time once the cameras clicked off and they were together in private?

Stuck letting Estelle visit the café, Chelsea knew Haley needed Estelle here with her in Massachusetts to finish the movie contract. Chelsea was going to party with Haley for a couple weeks then go to Martha’s Vineyard with Haley for the rest of the summer. Haley had convinced Chelsea to work as her body double on the movie.

Being around Estelle for the ten minutes it would take for the photographers to get the photo of Chelsea and Haley, two loving sisters reunited, with Estelle, Haley’s loving mom, looking on in tender support was going to be hellish for Chelsea.

Haley would be there. That’s all that mattered to Chelsea.

Chelsea knew the rest of the story about Estelle and Victor, because it was her story, too. When Haley was five years old and already a veteran movie star, Estelle became insanely furious with Victor when she was told by a friend who wanted Estelle to be aware before everyone knew that Victor’s production studio was moving to New York City. Victor was leaving Hollywood to focus on made-for-cable movies and cable TV programming in New York.

Estelle knew Janice was behind this move. Janice’s father ran the movie business in New York. Estelle was going to make Victor very sorry if he tried to divorce her and go back to Janice.

Hollywood was fickle. Victor’s name wasn’t opening up doors in L.A. with rumors that all his future productions would take place in New York. Estelle’s calls stopped being returned. Friends she’d known for years stopped initiating a hello in public.

Estelle knew everyone who was anyone, but she was suddenly invisible to the Hollywood elite. Haley’s acting career was already rock solid, but she was only five years old. Everyone expected Estelle to move Haley to New York.

All Estelle’s power clients had jumped ship, except Haley. Estelle decided to take quick action and seduced Victor to return to her bed by offering Victor the one thing he couldn’t resist: time with his daughter. Victor had bought a Central Park West apartment for himself and a Central Park East apartment for Janet. He didn’t see a problem with Estelle and Haley moving home with him in New York City. Victor liked having his families around him. Victor knew his first ex, Maria, was never leaving Hollywood. The Revere Girl in Maria loved the big hair Hollywood glam. Victor made a point to be in Nahant whenever Maria came out east to bring the boys, Chase and Kendall, to visit her parents in Revere and their Grandma Mav in Nahant.

Convinced he’d been wrong about Estelle being cold-hearted, Victor regretted living apart from his luscious French wife for so long. Victor lovingly told Estelle his plans to move both Estelle and Haley out east with him. Estelle wanted him to stay in California; not move them all to New York. Victor wasn’t getting the message.

It was time for Estelle to get pregnant fast to keep Victor in California. Estelle knew Victor wouldn’t risk her pregnancy by asking her to be miserable and move away from the sunshine to cold, grey New York City.

Less than a month after Victor had moved back in with her, Estelle got the news she was waiting. She was pregnant. She immediately demanded that Victor stay in Hollywood to be with her during her pregnancy and help her with Haley.

Having already inked a new contract with a major cable TV channel to run a show based on an Italian hitman in East Boston, Victor staying in L.A. was a no-go. Even with Estelle’s pregnancy.

Victor was ready to settle down with Estelle. He knew Estelle would love New York if she gave it a chance. He wasn’t asking her to live in a small New England town like Nahant.

Estelle would have to understand how much Victor had invested in this production. She’d give in and move out east with him. Estelle wanted him back. She was having another baby to show him how much she wanted him.

Even reminding Estelle she be a part of the European movie scene from New York, wasn’t enough. Estelle couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She threw Victor out.

Telling the world that as much as she loved Victor Maverick and fully supported his new work in New York, Estelle held a press conference to announce that she and Haley were staying in L.A. Estelle was extremely vicious about her relationship with Victor in front of the reporters.

Privately, Estelle was insanely unhappy that she’d ended up pregnant for nothing. Victor wouldn’t stay in Hollywood even for his own brat. Estelle played her final card to get him to move back to Hollywood. She produced photos and a spreadsheet logging all of his affairs during their marriage.

Stunned that Estelle had thrown him out, Victor escaped to New York. Victor felt like an idiot. Estelle held a second press conference to announce that her reconciliation with Victor had ended because she’d found out he was having an affair with his ex-wife, Janice, whose father was running Victor’s new business and life.

Estelle threatened to take away all of his rights to visit Haley and the future baby. Estelle had her lawyer serve Victor with papers to immediately deny Victor access to Haley unless he could prove California residency.

To appease Estelle and her attorneys, Victor quickly bought a beach house in Malibu. He desperately wanted to keep his right to see Haley. Victor funded a new Hollywood movie studio to be run by his best friend from Emerson College, Sam Jordane, an award-winning young director.

With Sam as his star director, Victor’s movie studio produced blockbuster after blockbuster. Estelle’s connection to both Victor Maverick and Sam Jordane re-opened the doors that had slammed in her face when Victor moved to New York.

Victor’s venture with Sam saved Estelle’s career, but their marriage was a sham and a battlefield. Victor wasn’t going to give up Haley, but he couldn’t risk losing everything he was building in New York City.

Hating being pregnant, Estelle took out her anger on Haley by telling her she was never good enough, didn’t work hard enough and she wasn’t going to make it in the acting business.

Even at age six, Haley was her father’s daughter. She had the Maverick work ethic and professional dedication. Haley made sure that her performances were perfect enough to make Mommy Estelle happy.

Nine months later, Estelle called Victor in New York and told him his baby was being removed from her body by C section. She expected Victor to come collect his infant. Estelle had no intention of taking the baby home from the hospital. Victor and his mother flew out to L.A. to collect the baby.

Grandma Mav told Chelsea that Estelle had been very unhappy and unable to be a mom any more. Chelsea always wondered why they left Haley with her if Estelle couldn’t be a mom.

At the hospital, Grandma Mav and Victor were greeted by Estelle’s attorney who demanded that Victor sign a form stating that Estelle had sole guardianship of Haley Josette Maverick. Victor would have sole guardianship of Baby Girl Maverick. Victor quickly called his attorney who negotiated new terms on Victor’s behalf.

After the baby was delivered, Victor handed Estelle a check for $1 million dollars. In return, he received signed paperwork for a no-cause divorce. Victor’s attorney demanded that Baby Girl Maverick have visitation rights to get to know her sister and spend time with her.

Tired of listening to Victor whine about not seeing Haley enough and sick of seeing Victor’s golden good looks and perfectly toned body, Estelle was so sick of looking at his perfect body and hearing about his wants and needs as a father that she wanted to throw something at him. She knew she’d spend the next six months exercising to work off the fifteen pounds she’d gained during this useless pregnancy.

Estelle especially hated seeing Victor’s smug mother holding the disgusting infant. She told her attorney to make Victor stop whining and just get him away from her.

Haley was not allowed to come to the hospital to see her baby sister or her father. Estelle finally broke down and said yes to future visitations by the baby to Haley upon mutual convenience. Estelle planned to make seeing Haley extremely inconvenient for Victor’s youngest daughter.

Estelle refused to name the baby, so Victor named her after the town the Maverick family had settled in the 1600s, Chelsea, Massachusetts. He gave Chelsea his mother’s name for her middle name, Ann.

Years of hard work had been invested in Haley’s acting career by the time the new baby arrived, so giving up Haley and keeping the new baby had not been an option. Estelle had also determined that splitting her time between two child stars would leave her no time to herself.

Thrusting a newborn into Victor’s playboy life seemed like the best punishment for nine months of Estelle having to be fat. Estelle had practically starved herself during her pregnancy, but she had still gained fifteen pounds. Losing fifteen pounds at age 25 was going to take strict discipline and possibly plastic surgery to get her body back.

Hoping having a newborn cramped Victor’s lifestyle, it made Estelle happy to think Victor would be tied down with a kid for the next eighteen years.

Thanking her lucky stars that Estelle’s fury with Victor not coming back to live with her in Hollywood resulted in her refusal to be a mother to Chelsea, Chelsea knew if Estelle had kept her both girls would have been raised in Beverly Hills as child stars.

Chelsea would never have lived her somewhat normal life in Nahant as the girl-in-the-mansion-next-door.

Sure, it hurt to know her own mother had rejected her before she was even born, but Chelsea had never thought of Estelle as anyone other than Haley’s mom.

2

Looking forward to watching Haley preen like a peacock for the cameras, Chelsea walked across the café and opened the window blinds so she could see her sister’s limo pull up. The narrow road was already crammed with cars parked on both sides of the road.

Haley loved telling her story about much she adored the east coast and reconnecting with her dad, Victor Maverick, the ultra-famous TV and movie producer, her Grandma Maverick, her little sister, Chelsea, and her two youngest brothers in their hometown, Nahant, Massachusetts.

The fact that Haley had spent a grand total of five days in Nahant over the last twenty-five years of her life didn’t matter to the reporters. Haley wasn’t a local girl done good but she played one in front of the paparazzi.

As much as Haley drove Chelsea crazy, Chelsea missed Haley and all her little games. She hadn’t seen her since just after spring break when Chelsea had gone to Florida with Grandma Mav and her younger brothers, Kevin and Jasper, for her final spring break as a senior in high school.

Haley had met them in Orlando. They’d been VIPs at Disney World when Haley and the other teen stars from her TV show led the parade down Main Street Disney.

If Haley knew the directions from Logan airport to Nahant, Chelsea would be totally shocked. Chelsea was a local Nahant girl, but she’d been born in L.A. - just like Haley. Unlike her famous TV star sister, Chelsea felt like she hadn’t done anything noteworthy except graduate from high school.

Nahant did not have its own middle school or high school. Historically, Nahant had been a part of Lynn, Massachusetts, but nowadays the kids from Nahant were bused from Nahant’s two islands, Nahant and Little Nahant, over the causeway access road, through the rotary and driven up Lynn Shore Drive past the seaside mansions in Lynn’s Diamond District to attend school in the more prestigious Swampscott schools.

Chelsea’s dad called their family bi-coastal. Up until this summer, Chelsea, her dad and Kevin had relocated to their beach house in Malibu. Her older brothers, Chase, Kendall and older sister, Haley, lived in Beverly Hills with their moms. Matthew lived with his mom in New York City.

Jasper, Chelsea’s youngest brother, was still too young to come out to Malibu with them. Chelsea wasn’t sure if her dad, Kevin and Jasper would continue the tradition of staying in Malibu now that Chelsea had graduated from school. The main reason they’d been living bi-coastal was for Chelsea and Haley to be able to spend time together.

At the end of each summer, Victor, Chelsea and Kevin returned home to Nahant. Chelsea lived with their dad and Grandma Mav in her renovated Bass Point mansion.

Kevin lived with his mom in Nahant over by the marine center. After breaking up a few months after Kevin was born, Victor had bought Kevin’s mom a beautiful home minutes from Grandma Mav’s house.

Victor had also bought his youngest son, Jasper’s, mother a home in Nahant near Grandma Mav’s but in the other direction from Kevin’s mom’s place after they broke up a year ago.

Over the years, Victor had bought eight residences for his families. Three Beverly Hills mansions for his ex-wives in California, his ex-girlfriends in Nahant, the beach house in Malibu for himself and Chelsea, a Central Park West apartment for himself in New York City, a Central Park East apartment for his second ex-wife and his son, Matthew, two, the building with his mother’s café and Chelsea’s new apartment. He’d completely renovated his mother’s old saltbox house in Nahant where he’d grown up. He also owned two yachts and the private plane, but the only place Victor felt at home was his mother’s house.

Up until two weeks ago, Chelsea had lived with Grandma Mav and Victor when she’d moved into her own apartment above the café. She loved the feeling of having her own place, but it was still nice to do her laundry at Grandma Mav’s and swim in the pool with Kevin and Jazz.

When she was in California, Chelsea felt like a different person. As much as Chelsea loved spending her summers in Malibu, she couldn’t wait to shed her Hollywood skin and return home to Nahant.

In L.A., she dressed in designer clothes from Rodeo Drive picked out for her by Haley and went to Hollywood parties as Haley’s shadow. She only felt like herself when she was surfing and swimming in the Pacific Ocean or just hanging out on the beach with her brothers, Haley and her oldest brother’s best friend, Ethan..

No matter how much of a California party girl she looked like on the outside, Chelsea always felt like the same practically invisible girl from Nahant who bought her clothes at Gap and Marshalls in Vinnin Square in Swampscott. She never got asked out on a single date by any guy at Swampscott High School. Haley said Chelsea scared them off with her Goth eye liner and midnight black hair.

During the school year in Nahant, Chelsea worked at the café with Grandma Mav after school, assisted her father with his office scheduling and paperwork, and loved being Big Sister to Kevin and Jasper. She volunteered for her father’s foundation to help homeless kids and at the New England Aquarium and Nahant Marine Center.

This summer after graduation was going to be completely different. Chelsea wasn’t going to California with her dad. That meant Kevin wasn’t going either. Kevin wasn’t happy to be spending his summer away from Malibu. The Marblehead YMCA’s camp on Children’s Island just wasn’t cool compared to being in Malibu. Kevin blamed Chelsea for completely screwing up his entire summer.

Chelsea’s older brothers were all out of college and working full time. They didn’t have time to spend hanging out on the beach with Chelsea and Kevin. Her brother, Kendall, had been married for several years and had kids of his own. Kendall’s youngest child was older than the littlest Maverick brother, Jasper. Chase and Matthew were both married with no kids.

Relieved when Chelsea asked if she could skip Malibu and do the movie with Haley on the Vineyard, Victor looked forward to spending the summer on his yacht in the Med with his girlfriend, Vanessa. The summers in Malibu had been Victor’s way of keeping Estelle from revoking his and Chelsea’s rights to see Haley. He’d never planned to spend almost half of every year in California.

Kevin had been hoping to spend his summer surfing and auditioning for parts in L.A. Now that Chelsea and Haley had decided to go on vacation together this summer, he thought they should at least take him to the Vineyard with them. Kevin wanted to work on the movie, too, but Haley said they’d already casted all the shark bait extras.

Bringing Kevin didn’t seem like a bad idea to Chelsea, but Haley didn’t want a twelve year old boy hanging around. Chelsea was secretly planning to call Grandma Mav and have Kevin come out to the Vineyard for the 4th of July. His mom had signed him up for the first half of summer at the YMCA camp, but Kevin had he’d had such a bad attitude about it that she’d held off putting the money down for the second half of summer.

Chelsea loved hanging with Kevin. By July