We ate, talked, joked around, and laughed when we spotted Drake peeking through the bushes. We couldn't imagine what they thought was going on over here, to see the one who took a swing at somebody to be the one hanging out with my father and me for the evening.
Trevor got a kick out of it. And that's how I wanted to end it, on a good note, with him laughing and smiling instead of sad and angry.
"You know," Trevor whispered as we walked up the path between the houses in the wee hours of the morning, "if you end up alone at the end of all this, you look me up. I'd like to give it a try without all the extra stressors."
I nodded. "Deal. You focus on getting it all together, follow doctor's orders, and we'll see where I stand in a few weeks."
I went upstairs with him, quietly helped him pack, and followed him back down the stairs. I walked him to the waiting car and kissed him goodbye. Then I went back to the cottage and crawled into bed.
Sunday
I skipped my workout the next morning and didn't move until Troy walked in with the makeup artist, carrying my clothes for the day. I got up and drug myself into the shower. Then I sat there in a near stupor as they fussed with the hair and makeup, while Troy went over what little agenda there was for me.
"And the camera crews over there are picking up on some interesting pieces of conversation," he told me.
"I figured," I muttered.
"Just remember the position they're all in. To them, it feels like you may have cheated, but they know they can't label it as cheating because while they're supposed to be dating only you, you're dating all of them. It's a very difficult position to be in."
I nodded. "I get it. I won't take their opinions and griping too close to heart."
I went downstairs and tiptoed my way past the office door, where my Dad was sleeping on the guest bed. Up the path I went, creeping along. I heard voices and got just close enough to make out what they were saying.
"I'm not okay with this," Jared said. He looked around, "Am I the only one who's not okay with this?"
The rest of them shook their heads while still deep in their own thoughts.
"I knocked on his door this morning, just to make sure. Hell, I opened his door and peeked inside. He's not in there," Mike said.
"Was the bed even slept in?" Stephen asked.
Liam shook his head, "You can't tell by that. He's always so clean and neat. No personal effects sitting out, clothes folded along crease lines. His room never looked like anyone stayed there."
"I'm about to go climb up on her balcony and look in the window," Jared said.
"If she slept with him, I'm done. I'll pack my stuff and leave now," Drake said.
"I highly doubt she slept with him," Liam said with a knowing smile.
Phillip had spent the last few weeks playing his hand very close to his vest, but the smile on Liam's face had him speaking up. "What makes you so sure?"
Liam dropped his smile. "Because some things I just know."
"But how do you know?" Phillip pressed.
Liam sat up a bit straighter in his poolside chair. "Because, think about it, why would she pick him to be the one to sleep with, after he took a swing at one of us? No, she wouldn't pick him."
"Bull," Stephen said. "If she's going to pick one of us, why not pick the one on his way out, so the rest of us never find out?"
Liam didn't have anything to say to that.
I'd decided I'd heard enough and cleared my throat before moving from the end of the path and proceeded to go over to the small buffet table that production had set up this morning and got a Danish. I shot them all a look before sitting down in a pool chair.
I pulled a piece of Danish from the rest of the pastry with my fingers and ate it. "Question," I said to all of them. "Have I so much as taken off my bikini top, or in any way bared my breasts for any of you?"
No one said anything.
"Then what makes any of you think I'd take off my bottoms and spread my legs for any of you?" I asked. "I mean, I get that temptation awaits me around every corner, but you think I'm going to pick the one night that my father is staying in the same house with me to have a weak moment that I actually give in to? Really?"
"He never came back last night to get his stuff. And he still hasn't shown up, what do you think we'd be thinking?" Stephen asked.
"That I like him as a person and have enough respect for the cause of his PTSD that instead of tossing him out on his misunderstood rear end, my father and I would sit down and share a meal with him. That we'd spend the evening together, talking. And instead of having security escort him to his room to pack up his stuff like some criminal, I walked him up after all of you went to sleep and helped him pack his belongings before walking him down to the car to say goodbye. He's not a pariah. He's a man with a disorder caused by actions made while defending our freedom. Now, I agree he shouldn't be here. But I'll be damned if I'm going to have any part in doing anything that would have him being tossed out on the street."
Silence reigned as I continued to pick off pieces of my breakfast and eat them.
"You can't really blame us for getting a little jealous," Drake said.
"I don't. I just wanted to be clear in where I was coming from." I pulled off another piece and made eye contact with each of them before getting up to go back over to the cottage.
"Oh, come on," Jared called out. "Don't leave."
I looked back over my shoulder. "I have to. I have a father to entertain. Unless, of course, you all want me to send him back up here."
Some groaned and some chuckled as I turned back around and went down the path.
It had been a long week, and the end of the evening found me standing in front of my group of remaining suitors.
"As most of you have probably noticed, there's nothing color-coded for you tonight," Troy announced. "And as you've probably guessed, it's because with Trevor's leaving, we do not need to have an elimination. But, for the sake of the show, we do need to have a Walk of Shame. It still serves as a chance for everyone to reaffirm that you continue to want to be here." He turned to me, "Emmaline, without further adieu, the floor is yours."
Troy stepped back and I stepped forward. "It's been an eventful week, guys. I'm making progress in figuring out who might still be standing here at the end. Each week there are subtle shifts in who is rising and who's falling on the totem pole. So, just know that as I get to interact with each of you more and more, I am getting closer to a decision."
I stopped to take a breath and dig into my resolve. Dad had prompted me to bite the bullet and go ahead and let go of the one I was going to send home anyway, since I was so certain that he and I would have absolutely nothing in the way of a future between us. I'd explained about the dangers of shortening the season of the show, and he replied that I'd already kept this guy around for an extra week. It was time to cut him loose.
"Liam, would you stay with me?"
"Absolutely," he said and moved to the sideline.
"Jared, please stay another week."
"Of course," he said and walked over.
"Mike, I would love it if you stayed."
"I'm not going anywhere," he said with a smile and took his place in the lineup.
"Stephen, please join me for one more go around."
He raised his eyebrow at me, catching my intentional wording. "I'd be glad to," he said and moved to the side.
"Phillip, I'd like you to stay."
"I have no intentions of leaving," he said with a wink.
I took a breath, turned to Troy, and smiled.
Troy nodded and returned a knowing smile.
"I'm good," I said.
Drake looked stupefied.
Troy stepped forward. "Drake, I'm sorry, but you have not been invited to stay."
"Why?" Drake asked me.
"Come on," I said. "I'll walk you out."
Drake let out a disgusted sigh and shifted his attention to saying goodbye to the others. He looked at me, shook hi
s head, and headed for the door.
I followed behind him, and then waited while he paced and ran his hand over the top and back of his head.
"I can't believe this," Drake said. "I thought we were good."
It was my turn for my mouth to drop open in stupefaction. "Good? Good with what?"
"Good together. You and me, we're good together."
"In what world are we good?"
Drake's face dropped. "You don't feel it."
"No. I tried. I wanted to. But I just didn't."
"You could have just told me that instead of kissing me back."
"I kissed you back to find out if I could feel a spark. I didn't. And I never gave you any indication that I had." I made a face. "You had to know you weren't in the best of positions here."
"So everything I'm feeling is one-sided?"
"I feel a friendship towards you. I've enjoyed spending time with you. But there is no spark for me. There's no heat. It's like we're trying to force-"
Drake held his hand up. "Enough. I've heard enough. I get it. Sorry I wasted your time."
"Oh, God. Don't apologize. I feel like I wasted yours."
"Well then, why didn't you send me home sooner? What happened to your not keeping guys around just for the sake of keeping them around?"
I blew out a frustrated breath. "Because I wanted to feel something. I was trying to force it. You're a good man. Hell, you're a great man. What the hell is wrong with me that I can't feel something for you? You're an awesome guy, you are. I like you. I'm just not falling for you."
He accepted it, but he didn't like it. There was no goodbye, no hug, or even a muttered demand to go to Hell. He just harrumphed and got into the waiting car.
I stared after the car for a moment while I gathered myself to go back inside the room of waiting men. When I did go back inside, I stood in front of them and laid it all out for them. "I'm out of throwaways. This is it, the five of you are the ones left that I have felt, or am feeling, things for. Just so all of you know, there's no one here that I'm waiting to see if there's something there with them, or not. I know there's something there with each of you. And now we begin the portion of the season where I stop trying to figure out who I want to keep, and I start trying to figure out who I can bear to let go of."
"The game just changed," Mike murmured.
I nodded. "The game just changed."
Chapter Twelve
Week Five - Five Guys Left
Monday
"Production wants me to express to you their frustration in your sending so many guys home so fast," Troy said with his voice laced with sarcasm.
"Well, kindly tell production that if they wanted someone who would follow their rules, they barked up the wrong tree by picking me."
Troy shook his head. "They picked you on purpose."
I looked up at him, my eyes crinkled in question.
"The show was getting stale. The faces changed, but the storyline was basically the same. They needed something different. Really different. And then up pops the application of a girl who breaks all the rules by living her life differently than any of the other applicants. They went out and searched for single guys living like you do, for all different sorts of reasons."
I smiled. "Well then, they don't get to be upset when we don't follow the rules, now do they?"
"Still though, once you shorten the season, it does make it harder on them to scramble around, trying to change plans."
"What do you want me to do?"
"Nothing. Just be you."
"They why-"
"Because it's my job to pass along the messages. And it's your job to be you. Finding you a husband is what the viewers want, despite how you get there. Production wants the happy ending above anything else. And the only way for everyone to get what they want out of this show is if you be yourself and let the guys fall in love with you."
Troy looked around. "Where's your Dad?"
"He's up with the guys, talking to them all between their interviews."
"Is he going to be an issue?"
"No. He's just here to make sure I'm not going to make a huge mistake."
"He's not going to think anybody is good enough for you."
"No, but he does want to see me married, or at least with someone, because he doesn't like me gallivanting across the country by myself. So he's not going to come back down here and tell me they all suck. But if he does have a strong aversion to any of them, I'd rather know now."
"So we are valuing Daddy's opinion?"
"Yes."
"Okay," he said with a nod and stood. "I'm done with you for the day."
I spent the afternoon banking more blog entries. Then I had to deal with a phone call from the travel magazine I was working with. They were having issues with the network giving them dates as to when different date destinations would be aired so that they could coordinate the release of the mini-articles I was writing for them about the individual places of interest. The show might not be into cross promoting my work, but they were conscious of the fact that I had work obligations nonetheless, plus the places we visited wanted me to write the travel articles about their establishments. But, production also didn't want my destination articles to provide any spoilers, in any way, by coming out ahead of the show's airings.
I had to woman-up and take some of the responsibility for throwing production for a loop with not letting them have as long of a season as they'd wanted. My editor asked why they didn't just split some of the weeks in two and I had to respond with the whole point of the Walk of Shame show being that each episode had a Walk of Shame scene in it. We didn't really get anywhere with the conversation, but at least now the editor understood why the network couldn't give them a straight answer.
Dad came in and flopped down on the end of the couch with a groan. "Well hell, kid."
I closed the lid on my laptop and put it on the coffee table. "What's up?"
"Phillip is old. He's just old."
I raised an eyebrow. "Okay."
"And do you remember the kid from Charlie Brown that was always so dirty?"
"You mean Pigpen?"
"Yeah, Jared is Pigpen."
I smiled through the creased brow I was giving him. "He's always been bathed and clean when I've seen him."
"Yeah, but you haven't seen him in his, in his, like, natural habitat. You've only seen him away from the smelly swamp and cleaned up pretty for the cameras."
I almost laughed. "Natural habitat?"
"He works with creepy-crawly things. And you're not a creepy-crawly girl."
"Well, I'm not a girly-girl."
"No, but you're more, you're more of a, a- Okay," he sat up a bit, "if you go zip-lining, would you want to do it through a swamp, or over a lake? Through a rain forest, or a swamp? Through a canyon, or over a swamp? You get my point?"
I got the point, but I just sat there staring at him. "Are you drunk?"
He shrugged. "Maybe." He looked around the room and nodded. "Yeah, probably."
I smiled, turned sideways on the cushion, propped my arm on the back of the couch, and leaned my head on my hand. "What about Stephen?"
"He's the photographer one. You'd enjoy zip-lining with him."
"Because his natural habitat changes?"
"Yeah. You can zip-line the world with him."
The wattage of my smile turned up. Drunken Daddy opinions were just as fun as sober Daddy opinions. "And Liam?"
"He's a very. Big. Man."
I tried not to chuckle. "But what about him besides the height and muscle?"
"You like mountains."
"I love mountains," I agreed.
"But," and then he let out a heavy sigh.
"But?"
"He's all mountains and you like more than just mountains."
I nodded as my lips set a grim line. "I do."
He nodded, leaned back into the cushions, closed his eyes, and sighed in contentment.
I started laughing.
&nb
sp; He cracked open an eyelid. "What?"
"You do realize that you have completely reversed your opinions from yesterday."
He scrunched his face at me.
"Yesterday everyone else was okay except for Stephen. Today Stephen is the only one suitable."
He rolled his eyes and closed them again. "The big one was still too mountainy yesterday, too."
"True." I angled my head more. "You never did tell me what you think about Mike."
"Him, I like. He's strong, smart, and capable. He thought he knew what was going on with Trevor and pushed his buttons on purpose, to test his theory, then treated him with nothing other than compassion and caring."
"What do you think about him for me?"
"I'm not here to make your decision for you."
I chuckled. "That means he's your favorite."
"I never said that."
"Then what are you saying?"
"I'm saying he's your decision."
"What?"
"Do you want to live with the reality of that leg? Phantom limbs, chaffed and painful stump ends. Dealing with him, when his lifestyle breaks the artificial leg and he's hobbling around while waiting for an expensive replacement. Tripping over crutches on days he's resting the leg because it's sore. Is that what you want to live with?"
I started to form an answer, but he waved a hand at me.
"Everyone is going to have health problems eventually. But he's going to have this on top of whatever other health problems life throws at him."
I started to talk again, but he sat up with more enthusiasm and waved me off.
"And what about when you get sick, or have a baby to take care of, or you're all old and wrinkly and your Mom and I are gone? Will he be able to give you the same level of care and support that you give him? That one of the others could give you, instead?"
I sat there in silence for a moment, absorbing what he said. "I know what you're doing."
He harrumphed. "What I'm doing is not telling you what to do."
I grinned. "Wow, you must really like him."
Walk of Shame Page 25
