Chapter 34
REESE
TRACK: Donovan, “Catch the Wind”
“I’m putting an offer in on a house today,” Eli says beside me in the bathroom mirror.
I nearly choke on my toothpaste for the second time in half a minute. The first time was when Eli walked in behind me, right after I’d stuck my toothbrush in my mouth. His hair was rumpled from sleep, and he was yawning.
He was also completely naked.
My throat’s still tender from choking this time. At least he pulled his shorts on.
I spit out my toothpaste. “That’s why you’re still barely dressed, isn’t it? To break this to me softly.”
“Or hardly.” He winks in the mirror at me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “At least I was when I woke up. Pretty impressive considering it’s practically the middle of the night.”
“I noticed.” A tickle of heat rises up from where his crotch brushes against me. “And it’s not the middle of the night, it’s four thirty. But don’t distract me! What do you mean a house?”
“Winona from poker said the neighbor next door to her old place apparently passed this summer. The people who bought it gutted it, but decided they wanted something outside downtown. It popped up on the market, so I bought it.”
“You going to flip it?”
“I was thinking I was going to live in it. Maybe with someone else?”
Eli tucks my hair back from my neck and kisses my shoulder, sending a tingling warmth radiating from where his lips make contact with my skin. I let out a little groan, smiling. “Stop. I can’t concentrate when you do that.”
Eli lets go of my hair and steps sideways. “That better?” Except then he makes his pecs dance.
I laugh as I turn to face him. “Eli, stop. Are you serious?”
Eli gives me the specific smile like he makes when he’s done something impulsive, but he’s not upset about it. “Yes?” He loops his arms around my hips. “Listen, I have to move out of the staff apartments anyway, and you don’t have to live there with me. Promise.”
He kisses the tip of my nose, then his expression grows a little more serious as he says, gently, “But you’re going to have to make a decision about Stu’s offer at some point, and if you—we—stay here, wouldn’t it be nice to be someplace that’s ours?”
I worry my lip. “Yeah. I do. But I told him the same thing I told you back when I didn’t want to make a decision—I just need to wait until the show’s over.”
“Isn’t that happening today?”
My stomach does a little flip. He knows full well it’s happening today. “No! I thought I’d get up at four for fun,” I say, hip checking him out of the way.
But I quickly grow serious. “I’m just…still not done thinking about it.” I rest my palms on the counter. Even though things have been incredible since I started singing again, they’ve been terrifying too. My singing makes me so, so happy. But it’s also invited so much ugliness.
Eli knows this; we’ve discussed it at length, but he’s unendingly patient when he says, “Haters gonna hate, baby.”
I drop my head, laughing. He’s reminded me of this more eloquently already—that the more exposure I get, the more feedback I’m going to get from people, good and bad.
“Okay, I need to get dressed before you distract me into staying. I can’t be late today.”
Eli winks and leaves me to it, heading for the kitchen.
Today’s the last day of filming, and I’m surprisingly emotional about it.
Augusta already won the contest, so it kind of feels half over already, but today’s the big closing day.
All the contestants have been flown back and are staying at the hotel, and Neil’s going to do his customary goodbye speech.
Not that I want to hear it. Eli told me about the day he came to set finding him all over Augusta, and I haven’t been able to look him in the eye or laugh at his jokes since, even though he did make sure the Simon footage got destroyed.
At least Kelly’s started coming back to set, though she looks like she hardly wants to see him either.
I think everyone just wants to get through this last day in one piece.
“What are you going to do today, man of leisure?” I ask once I get to the kitchen.
“Vacuum your apartment in my underwear, obviously. Maybe sprinkle some rose petals on the bed for later.” He winks, handing me a mug of coffee.
“Actually I’m going into the office for a bit, after I go for a run with our lazy friend.
” He points his chin to Rufus through the bedroom door, still sprawled at the end of the bed.
“Then I’m going to check out how the new floors are coming along at the Waterfront. ”
Eli’s sister came back to him and asked if he’d stay on at the hotel for another few weeks until they found a replacement for him, which of course he’d planned from the beginning, so he accepted. But he’s started getting more involved in some of his investment properties.
And buying houses.
“Okay, well don’t forget you’re supposed to be making something for Thanksgiving at your sister’s later this week.”
“I definitely didn’t forget,” Eli says as he abruptly turns around, grabbing a pen from my cup filled with them by the fridge.
“Are you writing that down on your hand?”
“No. But don’t look at my hand after.”
I laugh and am pulling on my boots when my phone buzzes. I’d ignore it except Eli’s goes off too. It’s a group text.
CASS: Crisis Meeting at L’Aubergine in 15 minutes. Need you both there.
“Shit,” Eli says. “Guess we’re going in to work together?”
It’s still dark out when we enter the Rolling Hills hotel, but the lights are on in the main dining area of L’Aubergine, and there are crew members bustling about everywhere.
We’ve shut down the restaurant for the day so the crew can dismantle and remove all the set pieces for the last time.
And so we can hold the wrap party tonight.
But it’s not the crew members I’m focusing on. It’s Cass, lifting her hand up to wave us over to the table she’s sitting at.
With Augusta Lopez and Kelly.
“What the hell?” Eli says under his breath.
We approach the table and Cass nods, curtly. “Take a seat. Thanks for coming so quickly.”
“I was on my way anyway,” I say.
“Right. Well, there’s no easy way to say this, but Neil’s off the show.”
For a moment, neither Eli nor I say anything. Then I ask the obvious question. “Why?”
Kelly looks at Augusta. “Do you want to tell them? Or should I?”
Augusta pinches her lips, and Kelly continues.
“Despite your best efforts at setting him straight,” she says, looking at Eli, “my husband has continued to harass Ms. Lopez. She indicated she did not feel she was in danger, and rightly wanted to continue to see the show through. However, last night, Neil unfortunately went so far as to send her unsolicited images.”
“Les ‘dick pics,’” Jacques clarifies.
Eli and I look at each other in abject shock.
“Now,” Kelly says, sounding shockingly level-headed about all of this, “I’ve spoken to my superiors, and they’ve left the decision with me. But we essentially have two options. Tank the entire show or film the remainder of the final episode with a new host.
She looks to Cass. “Hosts.”
“Wait,” Eli says, “You mean…the two of you?”
Cass looks at her brother with an expression I’ve never seen on her before. Like she’s looking for his approval. “It’s not so crazy, is it?”
“No,” Augusta says. “It is perfect.”
The four of them—Kelly, Cass, Augusta, and Jacques—all turn to me. “Reese,” Kelly says, “Cassandra, Augusta, and I talked a great deal about this before you got here. We think there’s an opportunity to turn this into something groundbreaking.”
Cass looks at me, almost wringing her hands on the tabletop.
“I gave them a little insight into your history with your ex—no details at all, just that you didn’t sing until now.
I remember how you were that night up there a couple of years ago, how it looked like you dragged yourself onto the stage.
I look up there now, remembering the scared, broken woman I was when Cass hired me. Michelle had talked me into getting up there; I wasn’t ready.
“I thought it was Eli who’d done that to you,” she says. “But seeing that man last week—I should have known better. I’m sorry, Eli.”
Eli squeezes my hand but doesn’t say anything.
She turns back to me. “To see you sing in that video was inspiring. Persevering when an asshole has tried to break you.”
Kelly picks up the thread. “We know Mr. Houghton won’t be an issue now, despite Eli’s actions.
” She darts a glance at him that looks half irritated and half affectionate, only not in a way that feels threatening to me.
Not at all, I realize. “What we’d like to do is host the show as normal, keeping the reason we’re doing so a mystery until the end of the show, when we will make an announcement about why we took over hosting.
We’ll explain why we’re not tanking the show, despite the wretched actions of my husband.
We won’t let one man’s actions destroy the trajectory of Ms. Lopez’s career. ”
My chest feels tight as I look at these women, but not with something uncomfortable.
With amazement at how they’ve pulled together to do something incredible.
I can’t help wondering what it took for Kelly to convince the suits at her network to go through with this. I think we’ve all underestimated her.
“This all sounds amazing,” I say. “But what does it have to do with me? My story’s not public.”
“It’s not,” Cass says. “But to us, you embody courage. And after we say our piece, we’d like you to perform your song.
The one Eli keeps singing to himself in the office about the shoots through the leaves.
You know, Eli, the one that should drive me batty because of the Kelly family’s inability to hold a tune. ”
I whip my face to Eli, who makes a pulling-his-collar gesture. “It’s good, what can I say?”