Chapter 13 Brynn
I’d been squeezing my phone in my hands since I ended the call with Colton, but as I climbed out of the Bronco behind Orly,
I shoved it into my pocket. I reached back in and grabbed the camera equipment from the back seat, handed it to Orly, and
then shut the door.
“You ready for this?” I asked him.
“Are you ?”
“I’ll be fine.”
And I meant it. The last few minutes had done more for my confidence than thirty minutes in hair and makeup at Sunup —and that was really saying something. You could walk in there feeling like Miracle Max’s wife, Valerie, and before you knew
it, Pierce, Greta, and Deb made you feel like Princess Buttercup after a Dirty Martini blowout at Drybar. But even Pierce’s
skills with dry shampoo and sea-salt spray had nothing on the feeling that came from winning over Sebastian Sudworth.
Okay... slow down, Brynn. I hadn’t won him over. Not yet. Not entirely. But we’d connected during those last few minutes. I was sure of it.
Connected? Now you’re really getting carried away. At the very least, I suspected he wasn’t quite as unwavering and resolute in his disdain for me as he had been just a few
minutes prior.
I’d take it.
I leaned up against the vehicle and held one of Orly’s camera bags while he adjusted a lens, and quickly looked over my left
shoulder to make sure Sebastian wasn’t within earshot. No worries there. He had wandered off without us and was easily twenty
feet away, up on the sidewalk chatting with some guy who, at first glance, reminded me of Kevin Costner. Like, Kevin Costner
now. On Yellowstone , maybe, but without all the murder and branding and stuff—I hoped. Too old for me to think of in terms of attraction, but
definitely sort of hunky in that Kevin-Costner-will-never-not-be-hunky sort of way.
I pulled my eyes away, eager to catch a few seconds alone with Orly. Leaning in, I spoke quietly. “I think it’s going really
well, don’t you?”
“How do you mean?”
I shrugged. “You know. With Mr. Nightly News over there. It’s better. Don’t you think it’s better?”
“I guess so.” Orly’s eyes darted upward to verify we were still alone. “You don’t think Colton was serious, do you? About
you needing to turn Sebastian into your biggest fan, I mean.”
“It couldn’t hurt. It’s better than the alternative.”
He opened the bag I was holding and pulled out a battery. “What’s the alternative?”
“The alternative is him hating me, writing a story for his little newspaper about how much he hates me, and then doing an
interview with Anderson Cooper, who also hates me, about said hatred.”
Orly chuckled. “Anderson Cooper hates you?”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s a whole thing.” A whole thing going back to that Sunup3 feature I did on the legacy of his late mother, Gloria Vanderbilt, in which I gave him the nickname Andy Vandy. I thought
it was charming, and based on how quickly it was trending and the way it caught on among Anderson’s friends and foes, I’d
say most of the world agreed with me. Andy Vandy was not amused.
“You didn’t seem too worried about the prospect of him writing about you in that newspaper before you knew who he was.”
“Orly!” My voice was a little louder than I had meant it to be, so I glanced over my shoulder again. He was still standing
there with Costner, but also had his neck hunched over and was busily typing into his phone. “Of course I wasn’t worried.
I didn’t know he was a real journalist who may actually know Anderson Cooper!”
He sighed. “Here’s the thing, Brynn. I meant what I said to Colton. I think Sebastian’s a really good guy. I know Colton said
he was a news snob or whatever, but he always seemed nice and down to earth to me.”
“Okay, okay. I know. Sure. Maybe he’s a decent human being.” I was still skeptical, but whatever. “Maybe he won’t write anything
bad. But if I can get him to write something good... ”
“So what if he does? Sure... great. But we’ll be back in New York, and you’ll probably be back on the couch before that
story hits the local papers, I’m thinking. At least that’s the plan, if we focus on what we came here to do, right? Let’s
get some good footage. Go in there and win these people over. Don’t make it all about Sebastian. I really feel like that would
be a mistake.”
“But people listen to this guy, Orly. That was obvious this morning, before I even had a clue who he was. So don’t you think
it’s still worthwhile to make nice? To really treat him like he’s somebody? Like he matters?”
He raised his eyebrow and studied me intently. “I do. Maybe even just because that’s how we should treat all people.”
“You know what I mean.”
I looked in the other direction at the coffeehouse. The Bean Franklin. Cute. Very on brand—you know, for Adelaide Springs,
if not for any other towns west of the Appalachian Mountains. When I was young, I’d known it as Marietta’s, a tiny little
homestyle diner owned and operated by Wes’s mom until she died our senior year. Countless hours—enough hours to add up to
months, probably—had been spent at those tables, drinking root beer floats and eating green chile stew.
I peered through the glass windows that covered most of the storefront. It didn’t look all that different inside, apart from
the fact that Marietta’s had always been packed. As often as my friends and I sat at the tables, we probably sat on the floor
in the kitchen more often, when paying customers took up all the other seats. The Bean Franklin was practically empty. I could
see a grand total of three shadowy figures inside, two sitting near the far wall and one standing behind the counter.
“There’s no one here. I don’t have time to win over one person at a time!” Orly followed my gaze and I groaned. “Still think
your buddy’s not trying to sabotage anything?”
“Look... I don’t know Sebastian well. I’m not claiming that I do. Back when I was working on the nightly news, he stepped
in as substitute anchor three, maybe four times. That’s the only time I ever met him. I’m nobody on a set, Brynn. You know
that. I was really a nobody on that set. And yet seven years later, the guy recognized me on a prop plane in Colorado. I can’t help but feel a little protective
of a guy like that. That’s a salt-of-the-earth kinda guy right there, and I just think that maybe you could...” He stopped,
took the bag from me, zipped it up, and put the strap over his shoulder. “Never mind.”
“No, what?”
He took a deep breath and then spoke more quietly but also more authoritatively. “It probably isn’t my place to say anything, but I figure you and I are in this together. And I hope you know I’m rooting for you.”
I crossed my arms across my chest. “Say it, Orly.”
“Maybe rather than trying to figure out how you can best recover your image after what happened last week, you could try to
learn from it.” He leaned in and spoke discreetly. “Maybe rather than trying to make it seem like you’re a good person, you
could just... be one.”