by Lizzie Shane
Part of her wanted to feel bad for the crew members having to scramble because of them, but a much bigger part appreciated the reality of a moment that wasn’t planned and scripted. She’d been missing the real.
“Milady.” Craig bowed with a flourish.
“You know they have a whole gourmet meal planned for us somewhere tragically romantic.” Marcy knelt on the improvised picnic blanket, tucking her skirt around her legs. The roof was a just a smidge too hard to be comfortable for long, but the view more than made up for any slight discomfort. Swathes of orange, pink, and gold painted the sky as the sun dipped toward the hills that surrounded the city. Its orangey light gilded the Roman ruins and the rooftops of eighteenth century villas alike.
“We aren’t gourmet people. This is us,” Craig argued, deftly uncorking the wine. He frowned into the bottle. “I seem to have forgotten the glasses. Sit tight and I’ll run down and steal some glasses from the suite.”
Marcy plucked the bottle from his hand and brought it to her lips, taking a long drink of the dry Chianti. She didn’t spare a moment to wince at what her mother would say when she saw that. Marcy extended the bottle back to Craig with a grin. “Glasses are overrated.”
He took it with a grin. “I knew you were my kind of girl.”
She broke off a wedge of bread, passing it to him and grabbing a chunk for herself. “I never pegged you for the rooftop picnic type. I thought you wanted the fame and fortune and everything that went with it. The best things in life.”
“I do want the best things—for my mom. I want her to be able to have caviar for breakfast, escargot for lunch and truffles for dinner if she wants, but I think no matter how rich and famous I become I will always want pretty much the same things. Hard to compete with beer and pizza. Or hanging out with a hot girl on an Italian rooftop with bread and wine.” He took a swig of the wine and passed it back to her. “What about you? You want the truffles?”
She shook her head. “Nah, the truffle life has been fun for a few weeks, but I think I’m a pizza girl at heart.”
He stretched out beside her on the blanket, lolling as if the rooftop wasn’t uncomfortable as hell. “That’s not much description. Paint me a picture, writer girl. Tell me what you want. What’s your perfect life look like?”
The words shuddered through her like an earthquake, leaving a blank confusion in their wake. She didn’t know how he always seemed to know the exact right question to ask when she needed to hear it. Not that she had the first idea how to answer.
“Honestly? I’m not sure I know what I want anymore. I thought I wanted the picket fence life, but do I really?”
“This sounds like a conversation that calls for more wine.” He handed over the bottle and waved for her to take a sip. “So what’s wrong with the picket fence life?”
“It just feels so final. I want kids, yes, but I’ve seen how much they suck up your life and I’m not sure I’m ready for that yet. Someday, absolutely, but within the next couple years? I don’t know. And yeah, I wanted to have a house with a yard in a suburb for my kids to play and ride their bikes in the cul-de-sac, but when I think about the kind of place I might want to move after the show is over, I see a loft in a city.”
“So no mortgage in suburbia.”
“Not right this second. I want that, I do, and I thought I was ready for the happily-ever-after, I really did. But that life, it doesn’t feel like an exciting new adventure, the way it should, it feels like a destination I’ll get to eventually, but right now I want to enjoy the journey. I’m not ready for it to be over.”
“Studies have shown life ends the second you move to the surburbs. It’s science.”
She chucked an olive at his face and he dodged it, laughing. “I just feel like the show is rushing us—me—all of us, I don’t know—toward the happy ending because they need the resolution for their season, but I don’t want it to end. I want a beginning with someone. You know?”
“So make it a beginning. Who says you have to play by their rules?”
Marcy took another swallow straight out of the bottle, sprawled out on the roof with Craig, who always played by his own rules—as evidenced by the non-sanctioned picnic. He made it sound so simple, but for him everything was simple. He put his mom first, his career second, and everything else was a casualty to his ambition. But Marcy couldn’t operate that way.
What if this was her only chance for the mythic Happily Ever After? What if this was the moment she would look back on for the rest of her life and wonder what would have happened if she had just chosen differently?
If there even was a choice to be made…
Craig had said flat out that he would break her heart.
“How am I supposed to break their rules?” she challenged him. “Am I supposed to choose neither of you?”
“Of course not,” he said, all cocky confidence. “You’re supposed to choose me.”
“Oh really? Right before my father got sick, you were ready to walk away. You said you would break my heart if I picked you. You’ve told me you would hurt me if I let myself care for you, so why would I ever want to pick you?”
“Because you might be able to break my heart too.” He said it softly and her heart lurched achingly in her chest—then the words penetrated her hearts-and-flowers moment, cracking it in two.
Might be.
Craig could teach a master class in having walls up around his heart. He made her emotional defenses look downright amateur. This was probably as close as he was ever going to get to admitting he cared for her. That he might even love her.
Unless he was playing another game with her. Semantic back-flips so he could never be accused of lying to her even as he tricked her into thinking he felt more than he did. Marcy sighed, looking away over the Verona skyline. The sky was darkening rapidly now. They wouldn’t be able to see their own picnic in another fifteen minutes and the cameras would be completely blind unless the crew got the night-vision gear up here.
She sighed. “I’m tired of all the games and guesswork.”
“You’re tired?” He laughed. “You’re not the one who nearly had a heart attack waiting to be the last one picked at every single Elimination Ceremony. Be honest—did the producers put you up to that?”
“Honestly? Not after the first night. It was me. I was never sure I should keep you.”
“Should is a dirty word.”
“So is might.”
He frowned, clearly not catching her meaning. That was Craig. He might be in love with her, but it would never occur to him that she would be pissed at him for his inability to even commit to the words. Women let him get away with too much. And she was just as guilty as the rest of them. She let him get far too far on charm.
She rose, smoothing her skirt. “I’m going downstairs.”
He quickly came to his feet. “Should we check out our suite?”
“I’m not going to sleep with you, Craig.”
“Did I say you would?” He trailed after her toward the roof access door, the cameramen scrambling to track them. “You think I can’t be a perfect gentleman like Danny Boy?”
“I think you don’t know when to stop pushing and an overnight date is a bad idea,” she said over her shoulder.
“So you don’t trust me, is that it?”
“Not really.”
“That’s not really it or you don’t really trust me?”
“I don’t trust you.”
He stopped in his tracks for a moment, stunned, but as soon as she said the words, she realized how true they were—and how big a lie. She trusted him to be completely himself, to push her and challenge her and try to get everything he could for himself. She just didn’t trust him to take care of her, to look after her, to cherish her the way Daniel would without even thinking about it.
She kept walking.
“Marcy.”
She ignored Craig’s irritated call behind her as she pushed through the door and wended through the maze of stairs
and hallways to get back to the main part of the hotel. She moved quickly, wanting to put some distance between her and her latest mistake, but she could hear his footsteps on her heels. He was only a few feet behind her when she realized she must have taken a wrong turn.
She stopped, glaring at another hall that looked exactly like the one she’d just left. “Shit.”
“Do you trust me to at least help you get to your room?” he asked behind her, irritation thrumming through his voice.
She turned around, a refusal already on her lips, prepared to ask the nearest PA for directions rather than give in to him even that much—but they were alone in the hallway. No cameras, no producers. Just them.
Of course the one moment she actually wanted the cameras on her, they would be tangled up in their own cords on the freaking roof.
“Which way is it?” she asked grudgingly.
Craig jerked his chin and they started back in the direction they’d come. She wasn’t sure what she expected—definitely some sort of long-winded diatribe, no doubt; he wasn’t the strong silent type—but he didn’t say a word as he guided her through the maze of halls. They reached a cream colored door with Palazzo painted on it in flowery gold script and Craig stopped with a mocking half bow.
A single cameraman appeared at the end of the hallway, the red light gleaming above his lens.
“Do I at least get to know what I did wrong?” Craig asked, defensive acidity coating the words.
“It isn’t you. It’s me.” I realized you were never going to change. Never going to magically become the man who can let himself love me.
“I deserve more than a cliché, Marcy,” he growled.
“And I deserve more than a man who might feel something for me someday.” She plucked the key from his fingers, unlocked the door and slipped inside, keeping one hand on the door to make certain he knew he was not invited in. “Good night, Craig.”
The door shut with a definitive snap. Closure. That was it. The end of her last date with Craig Corrow. The next time she saw him would be the day of her Final Choice. She would tell him that she couldn’t be with him, pick Daniel, and be officially Daniel’s Girl for the rest of her life.
She’d never kiss another man.
She’d never kiss Craig again.
“Shit.”
Marcy whirled, throwing open the hotel door.
His name came out a panicked yelp. “Craig!”
Chapter Thirty-One
He’d only made it a few feet down the hall—still wondering what the hell was wrong with her all of a sudden—when he heard the door open and Marcy call out his name. The camera guy had stayed only long enough to catch the door slamming in his face before slipping away—doubtless eager to finish his own shift and call it a night—so there was no one watching them in the hall when Craig turned to face the woman who confused and intrigued and turned him on.
“Yeah?”
Some wild light lit her eyes, fervent and a little desperate.
He came closer and her hands shot out, gripping his lapels and yanking him into the room. The door clicked shut behind him and then she shoved him back against it, pressing her body against his as she went up on her toes and dragged him down for a kiss.
His blood heated as they went from zero to pure, blinding lust in two-point-two seconds. She was a live wire in his arms, twisting her arms around his neck, rubbing her breasts against his chest and grinding her hips into his. He barely had the presence of mind to lift his head, thunking it against the door. “Marcy, damn. Not that I’m complaining, but what the hell?”
“No regrets. Okay?”
She lunged for his mouth again and he dodged—why the fuck was he dodging? “I don’t know what that means.”
“It means kiss me.”
He caught her hands as they tangled in his hair, carefully unwinding her. “Marcy…”
“It means if this is the only night we’re ever going to spend together, I don’t want to waste it.”
The only night. The words hit him hard and he sucked in a breath heavy with the scent of her. She hadn’t made up her mind yet, he knew that. But it hadn’t occurred to him that if she really did choose Daniel, this might be all he ever got of her.
He claimed her mouth without another word, spinning them so it was her back pressed to the door, pinning her tight against him. She made a sound, half pleasure half plea, and lifted her arms around his neck. He spanned her waist, lifting her, and her legs came around his waist. He groaned and his hips pulsed forward of their own volition, rubbing his erection against the apex of her thighs.
She twisted her lips away from his with a gasp, meeting his eyes with big blue pools of lust. “Did they rig this room with cameras?”
He struggled to make sense of her words with all the blood rushing away from his brain. “Just the other bedroom—for confessional footage. Overnights are private.”
She was yanking at something beneath her clothes and then the small black wireless microphone pack emerged. She flicked it off and flung it aside, along with the tiny mic from her hair. Her hands plunged beneath his clothes to rip off his mic and send it flying after hers.
“Nothing is private,” she muttered, and pulled him in for another kiss, tongues tangling and bodies straining toward one another until cameras were the farthest thing from his mind. He finally had her alone, in his arms, right where he wanted her.
“Bed,” she gasped against his lips.
Okay, good call, that was where he wanted her.
He hitched her up, stumbling into an end table he couldn’t see in the muted light filtering through the curtains, and strode toward the bedroom. He kicked the edge of a chair and cursed, making Marcy break away from his lips as she clung to him.
“You should put me down before you seriously injure yourself.”
“I’ve told you how I feel about should.” He made it through the door to the bedroom—with a blessedly unobstructed path to the bed. “Besides, I’d be crazy to let you go now that I’ve got you in my arms.”
“You are crazy.”
“Not that crazy.”
He eased her onto her back on top of the duvet, lowering himself over her until just the impression of his weight pressed her into the mattress.
She hadn’t chosen him yet—he knew that—but that uncertainty was part of the beginning of most relationships, wasn’t it? How many couples had everything perfectly defined the first time they had sex? This was just like that. Uncertainty and fire.
Craig looked down at her, caught by the expression on her face. There was lust and heat and need—but something else softened her eyes and parted her lips. Something he didn’t dare examine too closely.
He’d had plenty of meaningless sex, but as he studied the familiar shape of her face and got lost in the unplumbed depths of her eyes, he knew this would be different. It would mean something with Marcy. It would mark a piece of his soul he’d kept purposely untouched—but tonight he wanted that. He wanted her to brand him, even if it was just for tonight.
Tomorrow he could go back to being an island unto himself. Tonight he was hers.
Craig eased himself down and pressed his lips to hers, sealing the silent promise with a kiss.
Marcy stood in the hotel bathroom, swathed in a hotel robe, and stared at her face in the mirror, wondering why it didn’t look as cataclysmically changed as she felt.
She might have just cheated on Daniel. Sort of. They weren’t technically in a relationship and according to the rules they all lived by in this messed up situation Craig had as much claim on her as Daniel did—so why did it feel like cheating? Had she already made her decision on some instinctive level and this feeling was a reaction to that?
And if she had cheated, why didn’t she feel guilty? If she didn’t feel guilty for cheating, that definitely made her a terrible person. Didn’t it?
Either way, hiding out in the bathroom wasn’t going to help matters.
Marcy splashed some water on her face, p
atted it dry with a fluffy towel, and returned to the bedroom. Craig was sitting up in bed, naked—but at least there was a sheet draped over his lap. “You okay?” he asked, demonstrating that uncanny ability to read her as she approached the bed.
“Fine.” She knelt on the bed near his feet.
“Just fine?” he asked with mock affront.
“You know that was better than fine.”
Craig had aptly demonstrated that he knew how to make her feel very fine indeed. Multiple times. But taking pleasure in something didn’t make it right. Even if it was a lot of pleasure.
“It doesn’t have to be the only night,” he said, turning somber and soft on her.
Yes, it does. The thought rang in her mind with absolute certainty. “Daniel talks about forever. About marriage and kids and the future,” she said, her tone as soft as his, but twice as firm. “You can’t even admit you have feelings for me.”
His expression darkened in another lightning turn of his mood. “So this was what? Sowing wild oats?”
“Something like that. I haven’t chosen him yet, but as soon as I officially do, I can’t be with you anymore.”
“Are you so certain you will?”
She looked away, unable to answer the question, but knowing the answer had to be yes.
He reached for her, catching her by her robe and tugging her closer. “Then we’d better make this night count.”
She knew she should resist. She was Daniel’s now. Her heart and mind knew that now even if her body hadn’t quite caught up. She shouldn’t fall back into Craig’s arms again… but she was adopting his aversion to shoulds.
And it was so easy to fall.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Miranda sat in the hotel café with her tablet and didn’t bother looking up from the adjusted budget for the Final Choice shoot when a shadow appeared, hovering over her espresso and biscotti. “Spit it out, Emily.”
