Chapter 13
Nina
Last week, I was worried about being stuck in the hotel—cleaning and laundering, tutoring my cousins, and knitting for my aunt’s African Relief Society—for the entire eight weeks of our stay in Green Valley.
Now, I’m part of the wardrobe department for a reality series, and I’m also an informant for the FBI.
Life can be strange sometimes.
My new handler, Morrie, made contact with me the day after my conversation with Cass and brought me on board.
Sorry, not Cass—Wes. I’m still wrapping my head around that one.
Anyway, after giving me a special burner phone for all our communications, Morrie explained that the FBI may or may not use me for information.
Apparently they’re still in the process of running my background check, so for now, nothing can be explained to me about the case, but the FBI might have questions for me based on anything I might observe.
In the meantime, Morrie reminded me that under no circumstances am I to tell anyone Wes is an undercover agent, so help me God.
(That last part may have even been verbatim.)
I wish I could fully explain to Morrie how few people there are for me to tell anything to.
Everyone in my family pretty much treats me like I’m part of the furniture.
If I were suddenly to announce at dinner that I was working with the FBI, I’m pretty sure they’d just keep talking over me like I hadn’t spoken at all.
To be fair, I don’t usually have very much to say that’s interesting.
The thought depresses me, so I turn my mind to my friends. WWHTMKG&LD. If anyone from my book club were here, I guess I might be in some danger of spilling the beans, although even then, I’m pretty good at keeping a secret.
I’ve had a lot of practice, after all.
As I ready each of the carefully selected beanies the men will be wearing for their first scene today, I entertain myself by musing over which of my friends would make the best confidant, if I were going to tell someone about the FBI being on set, which I most definitely will not.
Matilda would be the absolute worst person to tell, I decide.
I love her with all my heart, but she is not someone who can keep her opinions to herself.
She would out Wes within minutes, then probably give him unsolicited advice about what he was doing wrong in the investigation—and she’d probably be right.
Helen is no better at keeping secrets. Even though she would try to keep the information to herself, she would probably inadvertently give it all away, because her face reveals everything she’s feeling, all the time.
Kimo? No. Just, no. I love him to pieces, but what a trainwreck that would be.
Thad could probably be trusted to keep the secret to himself, but based off conversations I’ve had with him in the past, I suspect he has strong opinions about law enforcement officers, all the different types.
In his job as a bounty hunter, he’s had run-ins with everyone from the Boy Scouts to the CIA.
I’ve never heard him talk about the FBI specifically, but if he dislikes them as a rule, he might not be as cooperative as Morrie and Wes would want him to be.
No one makes Thad do what he doesn’t want to do—except Helen.
Grady, I decide, smiling to myself. Grady would be the best person to confide in, if I were going to tell somebody, which I’m definitely not. Grady is an escape room in human form. He is a puzzle. A mystery. He might even be keeping more secrets than me.
“Nina.”
Hearing my name is startling enough. Hearing my name murmured in Wes’s voice right next to my ear sends my heart racing and my limbs flailing. I knock a bunch of the beanies off the table. Embarrassed, I whirl around to face him, only for my heart to take off at a gallop anew at the sight of him.
The other day for the photoshoot, the men were dressed up like lumberjacks, but highly stylized, almost cartoonish versions of lumberjacks, to play into the stereotype of the mountain man. They looked good, but a little ridiculous, in a fun, extra-cheesy way.
Today the goal was for the men to dress like actual rugged mountain men, emphasis on the sex appeal.
As I slowly look Wes up and down from top to bottom, all I can say is, Deja and her team have really outdone themselves. If the men are supposed to be walking embodiments of a sexual fantasy, the wardrobe department has nailed it. Wes is already a good-looking man, but right now he is . . . wow.
Boots. Dark, snug-fit jeans. A flannel shirt rolled up to the elbows and unbuttoned down the front to reveal a generous glimpse of chest underneath.
The garishly bright red flannel all the men were wearing in the photoshoot has been switched out for a much more muted pattern with blues and blacks and dark red.
Even though I know firsthand that the shirts have been distressed by a team of wardrobe consultants (including yours truly) to make them look more authentically lived-in, the effect is .
. . good. Very, very good. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was really a mysterious, sexy woodsman who just happened to wander down the mountain and onto set.
I must be acting like a real weirdo, because when I finally stop ogling Wes and meet his gaze, his brow is furrowed in concern. “You okay? I didn’t mean to startle you.”
Ah, right. Because I turned into a human windmill, knocked a bunch of hats everywhere, and then spent two completely silent minutes just staring at his body. Those veins on his forearms.
“Hats,” I say stupidly, squatting down to pick up the beanies.
Wes drops down with me, helping to gather them up.
I am incredibly aware of my body, his body, and their proximity to each other.
The heat emanating off him. The almost brush of our hands as we reach for the same hat, only to both jerk away like we’ve been burned.
I try to steal another sly peek at him, but find him already looking back at me. A jolt of warmth passes through me.
I feel hot and bothered. He looks concerned. That’s an embarrassing combination.
“Listen,” he says quietly, “I know Morrie talked to you. If all of this is too much, you don’t need to get involved.”
Oh. That. He thinks I’m being weird because he’s in the FBI, not because he’s got just the right amount of stubble on his face or because the color combination on his shirt makes his eyes look super green.
On the one hand, it’s much less embarrassing for me if he thinks I’m knocking things off tables because I’m intimidated by the investigation.
On the other hand . . . I don’t want to be uninvolved.
I’m surprised, honestly, to find how much I want to be involved.
This is by far the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me—well, except for that time I was in the middle of a prison riot.
Wes was there then, too, come to think of it.
I stammer, trying to come up with a plausible excuse for why I am so jumpy. “No, I want to help! I do. You just startled me, that’s all.” I dare a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure no one else is paying too much attention. “How will I be helping, exactly?”
Wes glances around, too, before responding. “After your clearance comes through, we’ll mostly ask you for information about our person of interest. Day-to-day activities. Habits, preferences, things like that.”
Oh. I’m half relieved, half disappointed.
I thought being an FBI informant would be much more proactive—rifling through the suspect’s belongings, hacking into computers, beating up bad guys who are trying to destroy the world.
Come to think of it, I think I’m just imagining scenarios from Kim Possible.
The way Wes describes it, I’m not going to be in any danger whatsoever. It’ll be like I’m the FBI’s official gossip. Which is fine, I just thought that maybe . . .
If you were more involved, you’d get to spend more time with Wes.
As soon as the thought crosses my mind, I reproach myself for it.
How stupid can one person be? Wes is being as professional with me as possible, because this is his job.
But a part of me keeps expecting Cass to be somewhere in there—the guy who couldn’t keep his eyes off me, who drew me like I was the most beautiful woman in the world. Who kissed me like . . .
Stop it, Nina. That wasn’t Wes. Or maybe it was, that part of it, but not all of it?
I think? The whole identity of Cass was just a part he was playing, as much as Nate R.
is a role he’s taking on for the show. The truth is, I have no idea who this man is, not really, and I need to stop hoping for anything more.
I need to officially and completely move on.
It’s just like Grady always says—“You’ll never plow a field by turnin’ it over in your mind.
” And okay, I know that doesn’t exactly apply here, because in this case the field shouldn’t be plowed .
. . Wait, am I the field? No. What I mean to say is, I need to stop going in circles, stuck on an endless loop of thinking about Wes and Cass and wishing they were the same. Wishing won’t make it so.
The entire war that just played out in my head must have also played out on my face because when I blink back at Wes, he’s looking at me with clear concern. “Where’d you go just now?”
I obviously am not going to tell him that. “I was just thinking. About my friend. My friend Grady. Back in Chicago.”
The gentleness on Wes’s face immediately hardens. “Ah.”
Ah? What ah? Why ah? He rises back up to his feet and I follow after him, confused, clutching the beanies I gathered in my hands. He drops the rest on the table, but does so with just a little too much force, sending the remaining pile scattering onto the floor.
“Shit,” he says, dropping down to gather them.
A few of the other contestants are turning to look now. “Now, I’ll take care of it,” I whisper to him, motioning for him to leave.
He seems caught up in a wave of frustration, though, and continues to bunch up and toss the beanies onto the table like they’ve done something to personally offend him.
His movements are so erratic and jerky that half the beanies he tosses on the table end up overshooting and falling back off again.
Finally, with a frustrated harrumphing noise, he stands and kicks one of the beanies lying on the floor. He just stands there, hands clenched. “I should get back,” he says abruptly, then pivots and stalks over to rejoin the other contestants.