One Fine Day Read online

  Table of Contents

  About the Author

  Also by Erica Abbott

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Epilogue

  Copyright © 2013 by Erica Abbott

  Bella Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 10543

  Tallahassee, FL 32302

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  First Bella Books edition 2013

  eBook released 2013

  Editor: Katherine V. Forrest

  Cover Designer: Kiaro Creative Ltd

  ISBN: 978-1-59493-315-8

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  About the Author

  Erica Abbott was born and raised in the Midwest, and is a graduate of the University of Denver. She has been a government lawyer and prosecutor, a college professor, sung mezzo-soprano on stage, and played first base on the diamond. She likes dogs, cats, music of all kinds, and playing bridge. She also has a love/hate relationship with golf. She lives near Denver, Colorado.

  Also by Erica Abbott

  Certain Dark Things

  Fragmentary Blue

  Acknowledgments

  While the Rocky Mountain Opera and the characters in this book are fictional, all of the operas, arias, and other music discussed are real. In addition, most of the opera singers mentioned are also real (including the story in Chapter Nine—I couldn’t make something like that up!). I encourage you to sample the works of the talented composers and musicians mentioned. I listened to at least part of every composition I referred to in this book and enjoyed them all.

  My deepest thanks to my wonderful family for their continued love and support. A special word of thanks to the many friends who supported and cared for me during a difficult year.

  I continue to be grateful to my readers for their words of encouragement. Authors do indeed write for their readers, and to be appreciated is humbling and gratifying.

  To everyone at Bella Publishing, you have made the process as painless as possible. My thanks especially to Karin Kallmaker at Bella for her friendship and her advice. My fellow Bella authors have been a special support group for me as well.

  To my editor Katherine V. Forrest, my continued thanks for her guidance, advice, constructive criticism, and the discussions concerning the proper use of the comma.

  Finally, to Kathryn, who saved my life in a literal and figurative way, I am forever grateful.

  Dedication

  To my love, always and forever.

  Prologue

  Terry Royce checked the batteries in her digital voice recorder for the third time in ten minutes, then rifled through her briefcase. Pad of paper, check. Pen, check. Back-up pen, check. Emergency back-up pen, check. List of questions, checked and double-checked.

  The assistant at the desk across from her in the waiting room gave her a friendly little smile, but Terry could see that he was a little puzzled at all the activity. He seemed like a nice guy, so stylishly dressed and well-groomed that Terry assumed he was gay. Of course, it was hard to tell these days with all the metrosexuals around.

  Terry had been twenty-two minutes early for her interview with the new artistic director of the Rocky Mountain Opera Company. That gave her plenty of time to make sure all of her equipment was ready.

  This interview was a coup, no doubt about it. The new director had only been on the job a week, and hadn’t given anyone else an interview. Well, there was that twenty-second sound bite on the local public broadcasting station, but there hadn’t been any print interviews. Terry was going to get the article published in next Sunday’s Denver Post magazine, with her by-line helping to establish her as the go-to writer for all things musical. Opera, the symphony, the ballet—she intended to cover them all.

  She mentally thanked her ex-girlfriend, again, for what had been at the time an annoying preoccupation with opera. Terry located the CD in her briefcase and smiled. Jill was going to get a real surprise when they had dinner tomorrow.

  As she was checking the recorder for the fourth time, the phone on the assistant’s desk buzzed. “Ms. Prince will see you now,” the man announced.

  Terry stood, fumbling with her briefcase and purse, shrugging into her blazer. Then she was in the inner sanctum.

  The opera company had offices in a converted warehouse space in lower downtown, and Terry knew they were doing well financially because warehouse space in LoDo was being snapped up at a record pace for multi-million dollar condominiums with views of Coors Field. The exposed brick and metal conduits were all the rage with downtown bankers and well-off Seventeenth Street lawyers. This office had a terrific view of the Rockies to the west, in all their purple mountain majesty. The original brick walls were filled with nicely framed prints from past RMO productions: Aida to Thaïs.

  When Caroline Prince rose from behind her desk to greet her, holding out her hand, Terry couldn’t look at anything else in the room. “Ms. Royce?” Caroline said. “It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you for coming down to see me.”

  Breathe, Terry reminded herself. It wasn’t the fact that Caroline Prince was the foremost soprano of her generation that robbed Terry of her composure, though that was certainly intimidating enough. Despite extensive research, including watching several performances on YouTube, nothing had prepared her for being in Caroline Prince’s presence.

  She wasn’t that tall, really, and she was average-sized, built like neither Madama Butterfly nor Brünhilde. She was dressed simply enough in a shirtdress, with a single gold necklace. But the dress looked like silk, and the color was a deep blue that made her eyes—cerulean? azure? cobalt?—look stunning.

  Terry would have to think of the right adjective later. At this moment, she was busy trying not to drool.

  She dumped her briefcase on the small coffee table in the sitting area of the office, and shook this amazing creature’s hand, nervously tucking a strand of hair behind one ear. From her short haircut to her black frame glasses to her sensible shoes, Terry always thought she looked like a stereotypical lesbian, and if she had believed there was a chance in hell that this stunning woman would be interested, she would have been happy to kiss her feet. And anything else she wanted kissed.

  But her research hadn’t turned up any romantic liaisons at all, apart from a rumor in Europe a few years back, so she resigned herself to the reality that Caroline Prince was probably not only straight, but also one of those women dedicated only to her career. Opera singers were like all performers, she figured, cutthroat and driven beyond all reason to succeed.

  “Thank you for seeing me,” Terry managed, trying to sound like a professional writer instead of a lust-infused teenager.

  “Please do sit down,” Caroline said, and even in her speaking voice Terry could hear melody. “I got some tea for us, is that all right?”

  “Tea is great.” Or coffee, fruit juice, motor oil, whatever.

  Terry got through
the preliminaries, recorder on, list of questions in her lap, by not actually looking directly at Caroline, but when the interview finally started, she had no choice but to look at her. Those eyes.

  “The question I think most people would want to know the answer to is: why give up performing for a job as an artistic director?” Terry managed.

  Caroline laughed lightly. “No performing career lasts forever, and I’m excited to take my calling in a new direction. Opera is my life, my love, and I’m thrilled to be able to continue to contribute in this new position.”

  Sounded like a publicity release, Terry thought. She pressed on with, “But you’re so young to give up your career on stage. Many operatic artists reach their greatest success after forty.”

  Caroline leaned back easily and said, “The truth is that the amount of traveling does get wearing after a time. It’s just wonderful that this opportunity arose at a time when I was considering the advantages of settling in one place. I’ve been all over the world for the last eighteen years, and it just felt like the right time to come home.”

  “Home,” Terry repeated. “You were born in Fort Collins and you studied here, at the Denver Conservatory program almost twenty years ago, right?”

  The musical laugh again. “Oh, my, twenty years. It sounds like forever, but it seems like yesterday. Yes, I was a graduate student here when I won the Operalia competition in Paris. After that, of course…”

  She waved a hand airily, but Terry had done her background work. “After that, La Scala, the Royal Opera, the Met…”

  “I’ve been very fortunate.”

  “You’re being modest, Ms. Prince. I could read you quotes from dozens of reviews, which call you everything from ‘the finest lirico-spinto soprano since Leontyne Price’ to ‘the definitive Madama Butterfly of this, or any, generation.’”

  Caroline murmured modestly, “In all art, greatness is a matter of opinion. As I said, I have been very fortunate.”

  She sipped her tea delicately, and Terry tried again to decide why the woman was so unreasonably beautiful. Auburn hair, a little wavy, was caught in a simple clip at the nape of her neck. She was pleasantly round and shapely, her features were regular and attractive. In a happy surprise, she was modestly made-up. Terry had interviewed plenty of performers who had lost the delicate ability to wear the right amount of make-up for street wear.

  Caroline smiled at her, and Terry realized her eyes had a slight shade of…violet? No, a deeper color. Indigo, she decided. Indigo eyes. It wasn’t really how she looked. She had that indefinable something, the je ne sais quoi, the force of personality, that made a star.

  Terry found her voice again, and said, “There was a rumor that when you decided to stop traveling that you were offered a position at the Met earlier this year. Is that true? Did you reject New York to come back to Colorado?”

  Lowering her eyes, Caroline answered, “That’s very flattering, but it’s just a rumor, believe me.”

  Terry’s journalistic instincts rarely led her to trust people when they said “believe me,” but it was clear that, whatever had happened, Caroline wasn’t going to discuss it. Terry switched topics. “So tell me about your plans for the Rocky Mountain Opera.”

  Caroline talked easily and at length about how she wanted to introduce more American opera into the RMO schedule, and to mix the classics with lesser-known works.

  “I also developed a show I hope to stage next season, with the board’s approval, of course,” Caroline said. “It’s called Hits You’ve Never Heard, brilliant arias from operas not worthy of a complete staging. I wrote some brief introductions for the arias for the audience, so that non-opera goers can enjoy the music in context.”

  Intrigued, Terry asked, “Can you give me some examples?”

  “Of course. One of the most beautiful duets for tenor and baritone in operatic literature is ‘Au fond du temple saint’ from a Bizet opera, The Pearl Fishers. Sadly, the opera itself is—well, to paraphrase, it was once described as one in which little happens but takes a long time to do so.”

  Terry grinned. “Unlike, say, one of your other signature roles as Tosca.”

  Caroline gifted her with a brilliant smile. “What a wonderful opera. Torture, blackmail, an execution, all pretty much onstage. You have to love a role that lets you commit murder and suicide all in one evening.”

  “Sounds like fun.” Terry returned the smile.

  “Another example from Hits You’ve Never Heard,” Caroline continued, warming to her subject, “would be a fine aria, ‘Ebben! Ne andró lotana.’ It’s not heard as often as it should be, because from it’s from an opera named La Wally.”

  “Is that another opera where nothing much happens?” Terry asked.

  “Oh, quite a bit happens. The problem is that the opera is almost impossible to stage. The heroine rescues the hero by climbing down a mountain ravine, then later kills herself by throwing herself into an avalanche.” Caroline laughed. “That’s really difficult to do onstage.”

  That’s just great. She’s stunning and funny, too. Just take me now. Terry managed to ask, “Was the idea for the show you created inspired by your popular CD, Light as Aria?”

  “Oh,” Caroline said, her indigo eyes shining, “you’ve mentioned one of my favorite projects of all time. Yes, I suppose you could say they’re related. The purpose of Light as Aria was to introduce people who might not ordinarily listen to opera to the beauty and power of the music. I loved selecting and singing the pieces for that.”

  “You obviously did a great job.”

  “Goodness, Ms. Royce, you should interview me every day. You’re so good for my self-esteem.”

  Terry doubted that Caroline Prince needed any help with her self-esteem, but she would gladly have volunteered to show up in her office once a day and murmur sweet nothings in her ear, just for practice.

  Terry had exhausted her questions, and she reluctantly got up to leave. “One more thing,” she said. “I wonder if you’d do a personal favor for me. Would you be willing to give me an autograph?”

  Caroline favored her with another brilliant smile. “My dear, of course. What is your first name?”

  “Ah, it’s not for me, actually.” She dug the CD out of her briefcase and said, “I have to tell you, a few years ago, I was one of those people who never listened to opera.”

  Caroline glanced with a sparkling smile at the copy of Light as Aria. “Are you saying I converted you into an opera lover? How charming.”

  Terry grinned and said, “Well, you had some help. I had a girlfriend who was really into opera. We were living together, actually, and she played this CD night and day. After a while, it sort of started to grow on me. This is for her. She has got to be your biggest fan in the universe. I swear, she couldn’t take a bath without listening to that—what’s the big aria from Madama Butterfly?”

  Still smiling, Caroline said, “Ah, ‘Un bel di.’ It’s actually my favorite aria of all.”

  “That’s the one. After you did Butterfly at the Met, you got your first Opera News cover, didn’t you? Jill said the title meant, ‘one fine day.’ ”

  Caroline froze for an instant, then said smoothly, “Yes. It’s about Butterfly imagining when her lover will return to her, on one fine day.” She took Terry’s pen and said, “To Jill, then?”

  “Yes. Jill Allen.”

  Caroline dropped the pen. “I’m so sorry, how clumsy of me. Jill is your girlfriend?”

  “Former girlfriend. For a couple of years now. We’re still good friends. You know lesbians. We get together and we break up, but we’re never really out of each other’s lives.”

  Caroline stood utterly still. “No, I didn’t know that.”

  Terry, embarrassed, said, “Well, of course not. I mean, you wouldn’t. I mean—never mind what I mean. She’ll be absolutely thrilled, really. I swear the woman must have worn out that CD, playing it all the time. We’re having dinner tomorrow, and I’ll give it to her then, an early birthday pr
esent.”

  Pen poised, Caroline said, “I’ll tell you what. How would you like even more of a surprise?”

  Terry lifted her eyebrows and said, “Like what?”

  “Why don’t you tell me where you’re meeting her and I’ll drop by and say hello.”

  “You’re kidding!” Terry exclaimed. “You would do that?”

  “It would seem to be the least I can do for my biggest fan. Are you agreeable?”

  “That would be fantastic,” Terry exclaimed.

  And that, Terry thought on her drive home, was the best interview ever. She could hardly wait to see Jill’s face tomorrow night.

  She was going to be absolutely blown away.

  Chapter One

  Jill Allen sighed deeply in relief and shut her office door. This was her favorite time of the work day. She’d sent her paralegal home, and most of the other support staff had cleared out, too. They filled the elevators to get to the street twenty-three floors below and catch the bus or light rail, or retrieve their cars from a downtown parking lot to begin the commute home.

  There were still lights on in offices, associate attorneys diligently proving to their partners that they were capable of billing astronomical numbers of hours, and partners who were racking up even more billables for clients who could afford to pay the hourly rate at Worthington & Steele.

  When she’d finally made partner herself six years ago, Jill had mistakenly thought the workload might ease up, just a little. After all, now that she was a shareholder in the firm, her future was assured. Six figure income, job security, BMW in the garage, great condo on Cherry Creek, nice office with a great view of downtown Denver.

  But the pressure never really let up. Partners had to do rainmaking, finding new clients, as well as keeping the old ones happy, and that meant networking, business meals at everything from the South Metro Chamber of Commerce to the Stock Show Association.