Romancing Miss Right

by Lizzie Shane

  His jaw dropped. “Holy shit. You did it.”

  “I am a woman of my word.”

  This was it. He was going to be a host on national television. Too good to be true. “What’s the catch?”

  “No catch. Though there is one condition.”

  “Of course there is.” Craig glanced around the hotel café, surreptitiously checking for cameras, but they appeared to be alone. Miranda had asked to meet with him over pancakes before the dressers got a hold of him to prep him for his evening meeting Marcy’s family.

  “You’ll have to leave Romancing Miss Right.”

  “I wasn’t planning to stay on the show forever,” he said dryly. Miranda just looked at him. “You mean they want me to start right away? Like now?”

  “No, they want you to start when the episodes begin to air—you’ll provide insider commentary on the show until the end of the season and then you’ll transition to doing more general entertainment stories.”

  “I don’t understand. If I’m not supposed to start for months, why do they need me to leave now?”

  “They don’t. I do.” Miranda shoved aside her half-eaten peach crepe. “Craig, listen. You’re bad for Marcy.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “She likes you, and I think you like her, which is why I’m asking you to leave the show now, before anyone gets hurt.”

  “I’m not following you.”

  “As things stand now, Marcy might actually choose you—and I think we both know how that ends. You screw her over for your career and she winds up heartbroken and alone—America’s most famous dupe. But if you leave now, she chooses someone else. You get your back-up host gig, and we all live happily ever after.”

  He couldn’t argue with anything she was saying. Miranda was just laying out the facts exactly as they were—but he still couldn’t make himself say yes. Leave Marcy. Something in his gut churned painfully. “If I accept, what happens next?”

  “You go on your date tonight as planned. Meet Marcy’s family, if you like. You can tell her whenever you like that you’re taking yourself out of the show. It’s up to you whether you choose to tell her why. If you want to leave it to the last minute to make it particularly dramatic, that’s perfectly fine. Just as long as you remove yourself before the next Elimination Ceremony. The offer expires as soon as Marcy starts handing out favors.”

  “Right.”

  This was it. His big break. All he had to do was break Marcy’s heart. If her heart was even engaged. She knew better than to give him her heart. Didn’t she?

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Marcy gripped the wheel nervously as she crept up the drive toward her family home. The passenger seat beside her was empty—the men wouldn’t start this round of Meet the In-Laws dates until tomorrow, thank God. She couldn’t think about them now. All she could do as they approached the big white farmhouse was wonder if her father would even be there to greet her or if his objections to the show would have sent him to Timbuktu to get away from her.

  The farmhouse sat on a dozen acres that hadn’t been used as a dairy farm since long before her family bought the place. One of the smaller barns still stood and had made an excellent play house when she was little. The house had a wrap-around porch and a sort of hodge-podge look, thanks to the addition jutting off the side—but also thanks to that addition it had fourth and fifth bedrooms and a third and fourth bathroom, which had gone a long way toward keeping the peace when the house was filled with three teenage Henrickson girls hopped up on boys and hormones.

  Marcy pulled around into the side yard, the van filled with the camera crews pulling in behind her as the dash-mounted mini-cam captured her silence and nerves. Her father’s pick-up was parked in the side yard alongside her mother’s sedan and her sister Laurie’s minivan.

  Not in Timbuktu then.

  “Here we are!” She announced the obvious for the dash-cam as she turned off the engine, feigning an enthusiasm she couldn’t muster. “Casa Henrickson.”

  Crew members were already piling out of the van, calling out instructions and getting organized, but the details were lost in the ringing of her ears.

  She’d always been a daddy’s girl. His unspoken but universally known favorite. They thought the same way, attacked problems the same way, and she talked through all of her major life decisions with him first and the rest of the world second.

  Then she’d decided to go on Marrying Mister Perfect without even consulting him and he’d started looking at her like she’d been abducted by aliens and he wasn’t sure who’d been left in her place.

  He hated the shows, hated her part in them, and had barely tolerated Jack’s visit during the last season. At the time she’d thought he was playing up the overprotective papa bit for the cameras, but when she got home and watched the episodes air, it became apparent something had shifted in their relationship. She had no idea what to expect this time around, and the producers had sent along a team of cameras to capture their reunion—however it went.

  The side door swung open, screen door banging, and Dinah burst out, leaping down the porch steps in a single long jump. “Marcy’s here!” she shouted back toward the house, already jogging across the packed-dirt driveway toward the car.

  Dinah’s sporty little coupe wasn’t here—she must have caught a ride out to the house from town in Laurie’s van. Marcy had never been so grateful to see her baby sister. Dinah had been in LA when the whole show started. She might be the closest thing Marcy was going to get to an ally.

  Her sister smacked into her at a run, laughing and rocking side to side as her arms clapped around her in a fierce hug. “God, I missed you,” Marcy groaned, squeezing back tight. She hadn’t realized how badly she’d missed having someone to talk to who didn’t want something from her until she was hanging onto her little sister and trying not to turn into a blubbering mess.

  The screen door smacked against the house again. Marcy looked up and lost the fight against becoming a sappy mess. Her parents stood atop the porch steps, her sister Laurie stepping through the side door behind them.

  Her mother and Laurie looked lovely and put together. Camera ready. But as they all came down the steps and came to join in the hugs, Marcy watched the stiff, slow way her father moved and her heart lurched. He looked older. More grey in his hair. More tension lines on his face.

  Had she done that by making him worry?

  Her mother rushed forward and the second Marcy was enveloped in those warm Downy-scented arms, the tears she’d been fighting began to fall. She wasn’t a crier. She hadn’t cried when she saw her parents during the last season, but here she was sniveling like an idiot.

  It was harder this time. When she was a Suitorette, she was only “on” when she was with Mister Perfect or during certain staged moments with the other Suitorettes. Sure, the production crew had waivers that gave them the right to film her twenty-four/seven, but they didn’t actually care about what she was doing every hour of every day. Not so with Miss Right. She was the star. Which meant someone always wanted something from her. Always.

  It was exhausting—both physically and emotionally. And it wasn’t until she was here, in the one place where she could finally release some of that tension, that she realized exactly how much she’d been carrying. So the tears fell.

  Her father stepped forward, the hug as awkward and gruff as his hugs always were. He was still frowning when he stepped back to let Laurie take her turn.

  “It’s so good to see you,” her married sister gushed. “You have to tell us everything.”

  “The gossiping can wait,” her father grumbled. “Let’s get you inside. It looks like rain. Last thing we need is one of your camera people suing us because he was too stupid to get out of an electrical storm.”

  Her mother grimaced apologetically for her father’s dig against the show and Marcy sighed. And so it begins. But they all obediently trickled toward the house.

  As soon as they got inside, her father muttered someth
ing about checking the scores and retreated to his den, leaving Marcy, her mother and her sisters to congregate where they usually did. In the kitchen.

  Their family wasn’t the traditional the man watches sports while the little woman cooks for him sort—her father actually did most of the cooking, having worked as a line cook during college, but the kitchen had always been a gathering place, ever since she and her sisters were small.

  Laurie would sit at the table—at first doing her homework or some craft project, now presiding over her kids as they did the same, though Marcy’s nieces and nephews were nowhere in sight. “Are the kids coming later?” she asked.

  “If they’re good. They got such big heads about being on the show last season, we’ve been using it as a carrot. It’s better than the Santa Claus knows you’ve been naughty trick. Eat your vegetables or no Romancing Miss Right.” Laurie grimaced, settling herself into her chair. “My children, blackmailed by fame. They have a soccer game today and Rick is being Super Daddy and taking them, but they’ll probably be hamming it up for the cameras tomorrow.”

  Dinah hitched herself up on the counter, thunking her bare heels against the cupboards until their mother shot her a glare. “Tell us about the guys. I’m dying here.”

  “Let her get settled, Dinah,” her mother said, taking her usual position on one of the breakfast bar stools.

  Marcy claimed her post on the window seat where she’d scribbled her first story at the age of ten. Princes and princesses and happily ever afters, even then.

  The camera crews in the kitchen moved stealthily around, trying to get them all in the shot, but mostly stayed out of the way.

  “Which one has the hardest abs?” Dinah demanded when Marcy didn’t immediately volunteer details.

  She snorted, the answer easy. “Darius. He’ll be up first. He’s very… competitive.”

  Dinah made a face. “So he’s in it for the trophy and you’re the trophy. Blech.”

  “Maybe. I’d like all of your opinions on him. I don’t want to sell him short if he’s more than just a super hot athlete.”

  Laurie snorted. “There are worse things than super hot athletes.”

  “The day after Darius is Daniel. He’s… perfect. Seriously, I have yet to find a flaw in this guy. He’s from the Midwest. Teaches school for a living. Wants kids. Loves his parents. Gets along brilliantly with his siblings—his Meet the In-Laws visit was like an episode of some sitcom about the perfect family or something. You guys would love them. He’s blown away by all the adventures we have on the show—not jaded at all—and I always feel like he’s looking out for me. He’s really in it for me.”

  “He sounds amazing.” Laurie grinned, but Dinah was frowning.

  “Yeah…” she muttered.

  “What?” Marcy prodded her little sister impatiently.

  “ It’s just… that’s a great list and all, but you never once mentioned how you feel about him.”

  “Oh, well, you know. He’s so great. How could I not be crazy about him?” She smiled, but Dinah’s frown didn’t dissipate. “Anyway, lastly is Craig. He’s the troublemaker.”

  Laurie’s jaw dropped. “You still have the guy they brought on the show to be the bad guy? Marcy, that’s Romancing Miss Right 101. You don’t keep the villains past week five.”

  “I know, I know, but there’s just something about Craig. You’ll see. It’s hard not to like him, even when he’s being nefarious, because he’s so upfront about it. I mean, is he really the villain if he’s telling you the truth about what he wants from you?”

  “What does he say he wants from you?” Dinah asked.

  “Publicity. He wants to be famous. Which I bet is the reason a bunch of the Suitors really come on the show, but at least Craig is self-aware enough to know that’s why he’s doing it and honest enough to be upfront with me about it.”

  “He told you he’s only after the exposure?” Laurie’s jaw was still hanging low.

  “Ballsy move,” Dinah said, with grudging respect.

  “He’s definitely got balls.” Marcy flicked a glance to where their mother was taking it all in. “Not literally. I mean I’m sure he does, literally, but I don’t have any firsthand knowledge of his balls or lack thereof.”

  Her mother snorted. “You’re a grown woman and a romance novelist, Marcy. I gave up hope of you being a virgin on your wedding night when I read the sex scenes in your first book.”

  “Pure imagination. I make it all up.”

  “Your father is clinging to that belief. I’m a little more practical. I only ask that you make good choices.”

  Marcy grimaced. She wasn’t sure how many of those she’d been making lately. Being Miss Right was nothing but choices, but how did she know if she was making the right ones? She’d been living in a bubble, without the input of those who cared about her, for far too long. “I can’t wait to see what you guys think of them.”

  “Tomorrow will come soon enough,” her mother murmured—one of her favorite clichés. “We’re just glad to have you home today.”

  “Me too. I just wish Daddy wasn’t still pissed at me.”

  Her mother sighed. “You know your father. He’ll get over it. Eventually.”

  “How has he been?” Marcy asked. “He looks tired.”

  “We’ll all be relieved when this is over and you’re home.” A frown rose to her mother’s face. “If you are coming home. Where do these boys live?”

  “Daniel’s from Indiana. It’s a pretty easy drive from here.”

  “Well, isn’t he perfect?” Dinah muttered, though it didn’t sound like a compliment.

  “Darius is from Atlanta and Craig from San Diego, but I haven’t discussed who would live where after the show with any of them. I wouldn’t be able to move in with the guy I choose until after the show airs anyway, so there would be at least a few months when I would come back here and pack up my place.”

  Not that it would take long to pack. The two bedroom apartment she rented above an ice cream shop in town wasn’t big enough to accumulate a lot of stuff.

  “Well, we’ll be glad to have you back for as long as we can get you and we’ll support you, whatever decision you make.”

  “Do you? Does he?”

  Her mother frowned. “You two should talk. You and your father have always been too alike for your own good. Both so convinced you can organize the world to suit you.” Her mother rose, reaching into the fridge for a small platter. “Here. Take him some of that fancy salami he likes. I learned a long time ago how to feed that man into a good mood.”

  Marcy grinned and took the platter. Her mom might be playing up her famous clichés a bit for the cameras, but if that was all the reaction the cameras infiltrating her house caused, Marcy would take that as a win. Everything was much more invasive this time—something her father had feared. And now she had to beard him in his den… with a camera trailing in her wake, recording her every move.

  “Daddy?”

  The den was equal parts library and cinema—all the walls that weren’t covered by the giant fifty inch television were stacked floor-to-ceiling with built-in bookshelves, cluttered until the shelves sagged under the weight of the books. Her mother had always liked to garden and build little projects in her spare time, passing on her love of crafts to Laurie—but her dad had shared his love of books with Marcy. He was the one who’d given her the first David Eddings and Robert Ludlum she’d ever read.

  Growing up, she’d often found him in here—a book open on his lap and a game muted on the television, though the screens had been smaller then.

  He’d been the one she went to when she decided she wanted to try to make it as a writer and even though he’d never read a romance novel before, he’d gone out and bought five of the best sellers as research immediately after telling her he believed she could do it—no matter how steeply the odds were stacked against her.

  She’d like to think she would have been able to make that leap to follow her dreams without hi
s belief in her beneath her as a safety net, but she wasn’t sure she would have. His support was a giant part of the person she’d become—and now he’d taken it away.

  When she hesitated in the doorway, he closed the book on his lap, clearing his throat gruffly. “You know you’re always welcome, Marcy.”

  She came all the way in, and the camera followed before closing the door. “Mom sent you some of that salami.”

  “Trying to butter me up, eh? Not subtle, that woman,” he said affectionately, and swiped a cracker and a slice of the meat off the tray as soon as she set it on the table between the two big arm chairs that dominated the den.

  Marcy sank down into the other chair, sitting sideways to face her father and tucking her legs up underneath her like she did when she was a kid. “How long are you planning to be mad at me about going back on the show?”

  He turned to look at her, glowering. “I’m not mad at you. I’m worried about you. This whole business, advertising yourself on national television, toying with people’s hearts—it doesn’t sit well.”

  “I know you don’t like it, but can you at least support me? Try to take it seriously?”

  “Is that what you’re doing? Taking it seriously?”

  A few weeks ago, he might have been right to question how seriously she was about finding love on national television, but right now it felt all too real. “They aren’t bad guys.”

  “That doesn’t make them good enough for you.” He ran his hands over the book in his lap. One of hers.

  She smiled at his protective grumble. “Just give them a chance, okay? For me?”

  His nod was grudging. “For you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “I hate him.”

  Marcy cringed, but she couldn’t exactly argue with her father’s comment. From the moment he’d stepped out of the SUV, exclaiming “So this is what the flyover states look like,” Craig had been a world class douche today. It was no surprise her father despised him.