Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
“What do you think you’re doing?” Rex rounded the counter in the kitchen, coming nearly face to face with Hope as she set up some of the final pieces on one of the plates she was making.
She narrowed her gaze at him and clenched her jaw. “My job.”
“This wasn’t in the plan, Hope.”
“No, it wasn’t. But if you remember anything from last season, we often have to go off plan to get what we need done.
” She flicked her gaze to him, fully aware of the fact that the kitchen bustled with people, that the mic was still taped to her chest, and that the cameras were somewhere. They were never far away.
“We set out a script and a plan for this episode. Both you and Ange agreed to it!” He hissed at her, getting even closer to her by the second.
If they’d been at home, Hope would have blown up at him for being an idiot already.
Well, maybe not, but her defenses were already up from the confrontation with Robin and Johnny, and she was massively on the struggle bus trying to keep her temper in.
“Look, you wanted Angelica and I to figure this out, to work together, to make sure there was tension still—that’s what we’re doing. ”
“This wasn’t part of the plan!”
“So you said!” she answered exasperated. Did he really not understand that she heard him? Because he wasn’t actually saying a whole lot to her in terms of filling in the blanks. Why was this such a big deal? They’d done this before.
Well, Hope had. And Angelica hadn’t liked it.
Maybe that was it.
“Are you scared this is going to piss her off?” Hope hissed, narrowing her gaze at him as she took a curl of chocolate and laid it precisely on top of one of the dishes.
“You don’t know what she’s capable of when she’s mad,” Rex mumbled under his breath. It was only then that Hope could see the nervous energy that ran underneath everything. “And I’ve pissed her off plenty this episode already.”
“I’m not entirely sure that you have.” Hope glanced at him again, trying to calm his raging nerves. “I’m pretty sure you’d know if you did. One thing I do admire about Angelica is that she doesn’t hide what she’s feeling—well, at least not in that way. If she’s mad at you, then you’ll know it.”
Angelica did, however, hide just about every other feeling she had.
Hope frowned as she moved on to another dish.
The crew behind her had chosen ten of their favorites and best-cooked on the menu and they were preparing them.
Hope was working on her own. She had exactly an hour and a half until she needed to be ready for this taste testing game Angelica had thrown her into.
She leaned down to her phone and added to the text message that she was building to Angelica.
Hope: The plate with the chocolate on top is safe for you.
Rex narrowed his eyes at the phone and then spun it around, reading it.
Nothing in the text would give anything away as to how Hope felt about Angelica or what they’d done the previous season.
It was simply a list of the plates Hope was making and the ones the staff were making, and which ones Angelica could eat and which ones she should avoid.
“What the hell is this?” Rex narrowed his eyes at her and shoved the phone into her face.
“A list of the plates I’m making.” Hope snagged the phone back and dropped it into her pocket. She glowered at him. Did he really see nothing wrong with what he’d just done? And he was pissing her off even more by the second.
“For what?” Rex’s face read as though he was offended. But why the hell would he be?
Hope shook her head at him, pausing her work so that she could fully focus on him. “What’s this really about?”
“What’s the text?”
“I told you.” Hope rolled her eyes even though she tried to resist the urge. “It’s a text of what plates I’m making for the game.”
“Why? Why would you need to text Angelica that?”
“Because she’s allergic to half the food in the dishes, Rex!
” Hope scowled, her voice biting and sharp.
“And she needs to know what she can eat and what she can’t eat.
” She put her hands on her hips and glared.
That was Angelica’s story to tell, and she was ticked off that she felt forced into sharing that information with him.
But she also knew him. And he wasn’t going to give up pushing her for an answer until he got one. And this was a rather benign story.
“A-allergic?” Rex stuttered.
“Yes, allergic. If you paid half as much attention to shit, you’d know that.
” Hope wrinkled her nose and went back to making one of the plates, but her movements were stiff, and instead of dropping the flower petals in a pretty pattern around the outside of the dish, she managed to get them all over it instead. “Damn it.”
Rex was still silent. Perhaps she’d finally stunned him into a state where he could get hold of himself.
Hope took a breath and then took tweezers as she started to pull off the petals one by one so that she could redo them. If she had to do this more than once, she was going to boot him out of the kitchen faster than he could say finger licking good.
“She should have told production if she was allergic to something.”
“It’s foods that aren’t hard to avoid,” Hope mumbled under her breath. “Unless you’re cooking upscale food, in which case, I use a lot of them in my dishes.” She threw him another glare and plucked off one more flower petal. “Now, if that’s all you needed to complain about—”
“You two can’t just decide to go off script like this. Not without talking to me first about it.” Rex crossed his arms, pushing his side into the countertop as he watched over everything that Hope was doing.
“I think we can, and I think we have. More times than just this.” Hope flicked him a glance.
“Isn’t this a reality television show, Rex?
The goal is to have a foundation and a basis for what we’re doing, but the idea isn’t to have every single line scripted out so we have to memorize it.
And let’s be honest, it’s fucking hard to play a script when the hotels often lie to us about the disasters they’re running.
Probably because if they were to tell us the truth and the whole truth, they wouldn’t have been picked for this show. ”
“This one would have.” Rex pursed his lips and stared down at the plate.
“What do you mean?” Hope furrowed her brow and gently plucked the next petal off the plate with a sigh.
“This one would have been chosen. They invested in the show.”
Hope’s shoulders tensed. “You mean they bought their way in?” she whispered that accusation under her breath, all too aware of the fact that it was very damn likely every person on the other end of the microphone had just heard what was being said.
“Sort of? It wasn’t a requirement of the investing.”
“Wasn’t a requirement…” Hope said slowly “…but was an expectation?”
Rex gritted his teeth and shrugged slightly, which was as much of a confirmation as Hope needed.
She rolled her eyes and finally pulled the last petal off the plate.
Now, before she made a mistake like that again, she needed to center herself and relax her body.
She knew better than to try and cook like this when she was all riled up.
“I’m not sure that it was. That’s above my pay grade.”
“But not above Angelica’s,” Hope muttered under her breath.
They both heard her, and she knew it was a low blow, but she couldn’t stop the thought from leaving her head.
She’d thought that she and Angelica were doing so much better.
That they were actually working together on this show instead of against each other, and then something like this threw a wrench into all of that.
“I’d hope not.” Rex scowled and stared at the counter and the food Hope was making. “Is she really allergic to a lot?”
“It could be considered a lot of foods. Some she’s more sensitive to than others.”
“How did you figure it out?”
Hope pressed her lips together hard and risked him a glance. “Remember when she got so ticked off about the game last season?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s because every single dish I made had something that she couldn’t eat in it, and she didn’t want that splattered across the show. So she made a fuss to avoid it.”
“Be a bitch instead of admitting she has a weakness?”
“An allergy isn’t a weakness.” Hope furrowed her brow at him, confused as to why he’d even say that. “Angelica is an extremely private person, and she doesn’t like her personal information splattered across the internet or television for the world to see.”
“Could have fooled me.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Hope was only half paying attention, thinking about the fact that she’d told Rex only half the story of how she’d found out about Angelica’s allergies.
The accidental poisoning of her during a special meal Hope had cooked just for the two of them in the gazebo in Estes Park would remain just theirs and no one else’s.
She’d figure out why she wanted to keep that a secret tonight when she had more time to think.
Or maybe tomorrow.
“Hope?”
“What?”
“You were miles away just now.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head a little. “What do you mean that she could have fooled you?” Hope focused back on the food she was making. Two more dishes and then she’d be done with her half of the game.
“I’ve seen the social media posts, Hope.”
Hope froze. She cocked her head, narrowed her eyes, and stared at him. “What social media posts?”
“The ones from this episode filming so far and the ones from the photo shoot. You can’t tell me that she doesn’t get personal in them.”
Hope frowned, a deep line forming in the center of her forehead.
She wiped her hands on the towel and then pulled up her phone again.
Bypassing the text message she had started for Angelica, she opened up Instagram, which was the only social media platform that Angelica had as far as she knew.
She searched Angelica’s name quickly and then her heart stuttered to a screeching halt.
“Oh my God,” she whispered.
There was picture after picture of Angelica and Hope posted over the last couple of weeks.
A couple of them had been made into reels with music in the background, music that insinuated something.
Hope’s heart raced wildly. She clicked on one of them, immediately lowering the volume so that the rest of the kitchen couldn’t hear it.
This one was from the photo shoot.
Pictures of them together from a distance. Back-to-back. Looking over their shoulders. Staring into each other’s eyes. Hope looking at Angelica’s mouth and licking her lips.
Holy fuck!
Her heart raced. Her stomach tightened into a knot. She wanted to puke.
“You really didn’t know?” Rex asked, his voice softening.
“Why the hell would I know?” Hope growled out. “I haven’t had a moment to breathe since we started prepping for this season, between finishing up the cooking show filming and then getting ready for this. I haven’t been on social media at all.”
“So she’s been doing this without your permission.”
“I think it’s being done without hers as well,” Hope whispered and sighed.
She bit the inside of her cheek as she read the text below one of the images.
It didn’t even sound like Angelica, which for the rest of the world was probably a good thing.
Angelica wouldn’t know what to say or write there—she’d make it bland and boring.
But Lyric…
Hope sighed again.
“I didn’t know about this, Rex.”
“I don’t know if I can believe you.” Rex leaned in even closer. “Ever since we started filming, you’ve been different. You’ve been acting funny. Am I supposed to trust that you and Ange aren’t doing anything that you shouldn’t be doing?”
Hope tensed. She raised her gaze slowly over the tight lines in his face to meet his deep brown eyes. He’d never outright accused her like this before. Yes, she was impulsive. Yes, she’d fucked up when it came to violating his trust. But she’d sworn to him that she wouldn’t.
“I told you nothing was happening.”
“These photos say something else.” He pointed down at the phone. “And I’m inclined to believe them.”
“Rex…” Hope sighed heavily. “They’re just photos. Nothing is happening. You need to stop being paranoid about it all and actually believe me.”
“I saw where that got me the last time. I don’t plan on making the same mistake twice.”
He shook his head at her and stepped back, the glare and hurt running across his face making it impossible for her to ignore. He was hurting, and he was damn scared. Hope wished she could tell him that it wasn’t a problem.
She wanted to scream at him that there was nothing going on.
And while nothing physical had happened, she couldn’t deny that there was more than what met the eye between her and Angelica.