Ellie

Dinner with Gage was both magical and melancholy. So were the sexy times that followed it. Our touches were both frantic and lingering, as though we were all too aware that our time together was down to hours.

Gage fell asleep almost immediately after, his arm heavy on my waist, his breath steady against the back of my neck.

But I can’t fall asleep. Maybe because of the pre-dinner nap, maybe because of the coffee with dessert.

Maybe because I’ve got too much on my mind. On my heart.

I glance at the clock. It’s only eleven, which means it’s one in the morning in California. Too late to call normal people, but…

I ease out from under Gage’s arm, moving slowly so as not to wake him.

His cellphone’s on the desk, but even if I knew his passcode, it feels like far too big an invasion of privacy. And since mine is still hidden under my pillow at the villa, I pick up the cordless phone on the desk. The long-distance call will be expensive, but I’ll keep it short and pay Gage back later.

I quietly open the sliding glass door to the balcony, shutting it behind me. Grateful that the cordless phone’s signal is strong enough to reach out here, I make the call.

She picks up on the third ring. “Hello?”

I rest my forearms on the railing and look out at the water. “Hi, Mom.”

She lets out a little gasp of happiness. “Ellie! I thought you said not to expect to hear from you until you got sent home.” Suddenly her voice shifts. “Oh, honey. Did that boy send you home? That can’t be—you’re so pretty and he’s so handsome.”

I smile, because it’s so Mom.

“No, I’m just sneaking in a phone call when I shouldn’t,” I say, not wanting to explain that I’m not exactly following the rules of my contract. “And you know I’m not allowed to talk about the elimination process.”

“Damn, I know. But…Hold on, let me just get this pizza out of the oven…”

I hear some banging, then a muttered curse, probably because she always forgets that her old hot mitts have holes, and inevitably loses every new one I buy her.

“Sorry, honey. Just making a late dinner.”

Only my mom would consider frozen pizza at one in the morning “a late dinner.” When I was a teenager, this sort of flaky disregard for normal patterns caused much frustration—and hunger.

Now, though, I can’t help but smile. My mom makes me crazy, but with adulthood comes a bit of distance, and with distance comes fondness for the things that once drove me nuts.

“So, I know you can’t tell me much, but…what’s he like?” I hear her blow on the pizza, then noisily take a bite.

I look over my shoulder to make sure Gage isn’t lurking at the door, horror-movie style. But the room is dark, nothing but stillness inside.

“Ellie?”

I look back out at the water. “I never actually did this with the intention of marrying the guy. You know that.”

“Right, I know,” she says. “It was…what did Marjorie call it? Viral marketing? Have the other girls liked your T-shirts? I bet they have, they’re so flattering. I told my haircutter about it, and she definitely wants one.”

“Thanks, Mom.” I rub my eyes. “And I haven’t really pushed the shirts on the other women; I just try to wear them on camera as much as I can.”

She makes a happy little squeal, muffled by a mouthful of pizza. “I can’t wait to see you on TV. When does it air again?”

“It’ll start in a couple of months. They’ve talked a lot about wanting to keep the gap between filming and air date as short as possible.”

“It’s going to be so weird to watch yourself, isn’t it!”

“Oh, God, I’m not watching,” I say, feeling a stab of horror at the very thought.

“I watched you on that ‘meet the groom’ special, and you were very sassy! Everyone’s been talking about how much chemistry you have.”

Yeah, well, chemistry alone does not happily-ever-after make. I’m not even sure love results in a happy ending. Depressed by the thought, I change the subject. “How are things there?”

“Oh, same old. Hugh likes to spoil me, and I don’t complain!”

I blink. “Who’s Hugh?”

She laughs as though this is obvious. “My new sweetheart!”

“What about Tim? You told me right before that you two went ring shopping.”

“Eh.” I imagine her waving her hand, dismissing Tim and the fact that a month ago she’d been planning to marry him.

I don’t even know how my brain still has the knee-jerk reaction of surprise. She’s been this way as long as I can remember. And though I don’t begrudge her choices—not anymore—I’d be lying if I said they didn’t affect me.

See, it’s a little hard to believe in happily-ever-after when you don’t have any real-life examples. On one hand, I’ve got my mom and her serial dating—she’s in love with love, but never the lasting kind. And Marjorie’s married, but happily? I don’t know. She and Steve aren’t miserable, but she’s more or less confided that having a baby was a last-ditch effort to reinsert the magic into their relationship, which…Well, I don’t know that I get to judge, and they seem to be reasonably content. It’s just not exactly the way the movies make it seem like it could be.

Because real life isn’t a movie, Ellie. There’s a reason hardly any fairy tales have sequels.

“Oh, and I’m in between jobs again,” Mom is saying. “Things didn’t work out at that cute little boutique. The owner and I just didn’t mesh well.”

“Mmm-hmm,” I say to let her know I’m still listening. If I had to guess, the owner probably expected things like her employees showing up for shifts consistently and on time. Not my mother’s specialty.

“Anyway, enough about me. What’s up, sweetie? You’re doing that quiet thing you always do when you have something on your mind.”

I stand up and cross my free arm over my stomach. “I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

“I’m your mom. You can trust me.”

I can’t, though. That’s the thing. My mom’s got the biggest heart in the world, but she’s not exactly a vault when it comes to keeping secrets. She’s just a little too impulsive, a bit too fond of juicy gossip.

And even if I could trust her not to get me into trouble for being in breach of contract, I don’t know that I’d trust her advice.

If I told her I was scared of falling for Gage, she’d tell me to go for it. To close my eyes and free-fall, because that’s where the “good stuff” in life takes place.

And that’s exactly why I’ve called her, I realize. To remember why I can’t take this thing with Gage any further. It’s what my mom would do. She’d throw herself headfirst into a relationship with a movie star, only to get her heart broken, sob on the couch for a week, and promptly fall in love with someone else the week after that. Then repeat.

And that’s fine—for her. I don’t want that.

I don’t want to get hurt. I mean, yeah, I understand that getting hurt is a part of life, and mostly I can handle it. But getting hurt by Gage—I don’t know that I could survive it. I already care too much about a guy who, starting tomorrow, is going to go back to courting a dozen women. Maybe marrying one of them, because it’s his job.

Gage said it himself just tonight—what he wants more than anything is to make a career out of being someone else. He’s an actor first and foremost and always. The job will always come first with him, and we’re not talking about a quiet nine-to-five kind of job. Hell, didn’t I hear the next Killboy movie is filming in Dubai? Not exactly the modest, suburban American dream of my fantasies.

“I’ve got to go, Mom. It was good to hear your voice.”

“Okay,” she says hesitantly. “I’ll see you when I see you?”

“Definitely. As soon as I’m back in San Diego, I’ll swing by the house.”

“When will that be?”

Probably a couple of days at the most.

“Not sure. I’ll call first.”

“Okay, honey. You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Definitely.”

But when I say goodbye and hang up the phone, slipping back into bed beside a still-sleeping Gage, I know I’ve just told a bald-faced lie.

I’m not okay. Not even a little bit.