“Are we almost there yet?”

From behind the frames of her black sunglasses, Lexie gave a quick glance across her car at Geraldine. Sean’s mother held the armrest so tight, Lexie wouldn’t be in the least surprised to discover nail marks in the leather. “Almost.”

“Is there always this much traffic?”

“This isn’t bad.” It was one o’clock on a February afternoon. “Wait until five. That’s bad traffic.”

“I don’t know how you live like this.” She wore a blue parka and mukluks. Perfect winter gear for an island just south of Alaska, but a little overdressed for Seattle’s fifty-degree weather. “Too many people.”

Sean had been right about his mother. She didn’t like feeling like a little fish. “Wait until you see my store,” Lexie said to change the subject. “It’s fabulous.”

As if on cue, Yum Yum barked from her pink mesh car seat in the back. “That’s right, Yummy Cakes,” Lexie gushed as she slowed and merged into the center lane.

“You call your dog Yummy Cakes?”

Lexie looked at Geraldine, who wore an identical expression as her son when talking about Yum Yum. “It fits her and she likes it.” Discussion closed.

They turned into the high-end strip mall not far from Bellevue Square, and Lexie was relieved to hear silence from the passenger seat. The only sound to fill the car was her gasp as she pulled into a parking slot of her first store. The backlit dormer and Venetian awnings were up and Lexie paused to look at the deep red storefront. She’d worked so hard, and her heart gave a little hiccup of pride. The physical store had been purposely branded with Yum Yum’s Closet online, but it looked so much richer in real life. On the dormer, “Yum Yum’s Closet” was painted in bold black letters lined in gold. It looked so fabulous tears pinched the backs of her eyes.

“Your dog is weird-looking.”

Evidently the discussion was not closed. “Yum Yum has tender feelings.” She turned off the car and unbelted herself. “She knows when you say hurtful things about her.”

Geraldine turned to Lexie. “How?”

“She is very intuitive and gets sad.”

This time Geraldine looked at Lexie as if she’d lost her mind. Coming from a woman who’d put her patch on the wrong eye, Lexie wasn’t all that bent out of shape over her opinion.

“Sorry,” Geraldine mumbled, and reached for her seat belt.

“Thank you.” The front doors of the store were open, which was always a good sign, and when Lexie got out of the car, she heard the glorious sounds of power tools. Dog in one arm and Geraldine in tow, she walked into the building. Sawdust filled the air toward the back and settled on the plastic covering the front counter and several white tables. In her four-inch pumps, Lexie picked her way toward the back, stepping over boxes of nails and parts to the shelving system. She wore a white blouse and pinstriped skirt. Whenever she met with the general contractor, she always liked to look professional. She was the Owner/President, CEO, Director of Products, and sole designer of Yum Yum Inc. She’d discovered that people sometimes needed to be reminded that she was the boss, but of course the contractor wasn’t on scene. She spoke with the site manager instead. The crystal chandelier hadn’t arrived, nor had the freestanding wardrobe closets. The manager assured her everything would be ready for the grand opening in two and a half weeks. Looking around, Lexie wasn’t convinced.

“All this is for dog clothes?” Geraldine asked.

“Not just clothes,” she answered as they picked their way back toward the front. “Accessories, treats, bedding. Whatever a dog could possibly need, and a few things the owner hadn’t thought of needing.”

On the way back to Lexie’s apartment, they stopped off at Whole Foods and bought fresh fruits and vegetables and meat. Lexie was going to overdose Geraldine on healthy food, even if it killed her. Lexie always watched what she ate, but could always eat more veggies.

Once they were home, Lexie put away the groceries while Geraldine watched the television above the fireplace; from the sounds of it, Ellen. If Lexie leaned back just far enough, she could see Geraldine’s left hand, stroking the ponytail Lexie had put in Yum Yum’s hair. From her reaction at the pink tea and today in the car, Lexie wouldn’t have thought the woman even liked dogs.

Crazy. Crazier still, Lexie had somehow become Geraldine’s keeper again. Sean had been gone two days and his mother had moved into Lexie’s condo the night before. According to Geraldine, Sean’s apartment was too noisy and the neighbors looked at her funny, which was no doubt true.

While Geraldine watched daytime TV, Lexie worked on the fall line for Yum Yum’s Closet. She’d been inspired by the rich fabrics of the latest Beauty and the Beast movie. The one with Emma Watson. She designed everything from leashes and collars to soft bedding and cavalier vests.

Just after four, her entertainment lawyer got back to her regarding a few stipulations she wanted added to the Gettin’ Hitched reunion contract: No, she couldn’t storm out after five minutes and not return. Yes, she could refuse to answer intimate questions.

At five-thirty, Sean texted an inquiry after his mother: Has Mother driven you insane yet?

Yes, she replied. You owe me.

Within moments he texted back: What do you want?

A kiss was the first thing that popped into her head. A kiss like the one he’d given her in a downtown parking lot. Like the one she’d wanted him to give her at the pink tea as he’d looked across their hands.

Before she could answer he texted: I have a few suggestions.

She thought of a punishment commensurate with his crime. Something beneficial for her, yet miserable for him at the same time:

1. Pink tea at Bay View Retirement Home.
2. Heels for Meals marathon.
3. Gettin’ Hitched reunion.

It took him an hour to return her text, and she didn’t even like to think about how many times she’d checked before he wrote:

1. Probably not.
2. Maybe.
3. Give it up.

When he learned that he’d have to run in a pair of pumps, she felt certain he’d choose a tea with seniors. She smiled at the memory of Sean drinking from a teacup and his bewilderment at the petits fours and cucumber sandwiches. She wasn’t certain why her father and Sean had crashed the tea, but it had been interesting to watch them watch each other. It was like a battle of testosterone. A game of quien es mas macho surrounded by pink frills and delicate china. She wasn’t sure of a winner, though.

At five, she made chicken and spinach Cordon Bleu, and they sat down to dinner at six.

“I don’t drink,” Geraldine said as Lexie set two wineglasses on the table, but when Lexie popped the cork of a chardonnay perfectly paired with the meal, she changed her mind. “Well, maybe just a sip. Sean will never go hungry with you around cooking for him. I can see why he kidnapped you away from Pete.”

Lexie wasn’t sure if that was a compliment, but it did make her feel guilty. She hadn’t been kidnapped and she was only going to be “around” another month.

By the time dinner was over, Geraldine’s plate was cleaned, the bottle was empty, and the woman was feeling no pain, for a change.

“I used to dance,” she told Lexie as they did the dishes together. “My mother took me to lessons every Wednesday. I could have been really good if I’d stuck at it.”

“Why’d you quit?” Lexie asked as she loaded the plates.

“Off to other things, I suppose. I’d get bored with piano or ballet or painting and I’d take up something else.” She handed Lexie a mixing bowl. “I was the only girl and very spoiled. I loved it. I almost died when I was born, and my mother and father carried me around in a shoebox filled with satin. They were so afraid I’d break.” As Lexie hand-washed the wineglasses, she kept quiet and let Geraldine talk. Something she had no problem doing. The more Geraldine talked, the more Lexie gathered that Geraldine had been the center of her family’s universe. Which made sense, she supposed.

“My two older brothers are deceased now, but my brother Abe practically raised Sean. He was such an unusual child.”

Lexie’s ears perked up and she reached for a dish towel. Ever since he’d kissed her hand and looked into her eyes at the pink tea, she found herself thinking about him at odd and random times of the day. She knew a bit more than she had the night she’d had sex with him in the Canadian motel, which wasn’t saying much since she hadn’t even known his real name, but when she’d looked at him across their entwined hands, something happened. Something changed. Her world tipped and she’d caught her breath waiting for it to right itself again.

“I watched you at your store today. Ordering those men around and telling them what you wanted done. You’re a smart girl.”

Lexie was still, waiting. “Thank you.”

“Pretty, too.”

“Again, thank you.”

“You’re not at all dusty in the attic like Sean said.”

“Excuse me?” She guessed she didn’t have to wait any longer. Sean was still a jerk. “He said what?”

“That your attic is dusty.” Geraldine folded her arms across her skinny chest and thought she should further explain, “You know, not very bright. Special. Like special-needs special.”

“Really?”

Sean didn’t think she was smart. That just showed he didn’t know her at all. “When did he say that?”

“Sandspit.” She looked at Lexie and shrugged. “I think he just said that so I wouldn’t ask lots of questions.”

“I noticed he doesn’t like to answer.” She set the glasses on the counter, then walked down the hall to the laundry room. She guessed she did know more about him than she’d thought. He didn’t like questions and he thought she was stupid. She was going to remind herself of that the next time her world felt all tippy.

“It’s the way he was raised,” Geraldine said from the doorway. “Kids would ask him about me and he’d get embarrassed.”

Lexie turned with a clean T-shirt in one hand.

“After a while he quit bringin’ kids around.”

There had been a time in her life when her world had changed so dramatically, she hadn’t wanted to talk about it, either. When old friends and new friends asked questions that she didn’t want to answer. That hadn’t made her a secretive liar, though. Well, maybe she had gone through a fibbing period.

“He was alone most of the time and kept to himself. He wouldn’t tell me when there were other kids’ birthdays or school plays or nothing.” Geraldine shook her head. “So we went to live with my brother Abe ’cause I thought he needed a man’s influence. I meant for us to stay for one summer, but Sean didn’t leave until he was eighteen and went off to play hockey in Calgary. I missed him but was too sick to follow.”

Sean probably hadn’t wept buckets about that, she thought as she folded the shirt and put it in a basket.

“He avoids any kind of drama. Although I swear he’s paranoid about the smallest things sometimes.”

No shit storms. No drama. No questions. His refusal to take part in the Gettin’ Hitched reunion made perfect sense. That was going to be a shit storm of shit storms, and she wasn’t looking forward to it.

Shortly after Lexie finished folding clothes, Geraldine went to bed. Lexie stayed up making outlines and lists and possible Gettin’ Hitched scenarios. She fell asleep grumpy and got up cranky. Her eyes were hardly open a crack when she walked into her kitchen to the sight of Geraldine and the sound of her sputtering Keurig.

“What are we doing today?” Geraldine asked, all bright-eyed and happy.

“I have to pick up dog food.” Lexie scrubbed her eyes and she yawned. “It’s my donation day at the pet rescue downtown. I have to go to PetSmart, fill up the back of my car with food, and drop it off at the shelter where I adopted Yum Yum.” She yawned again and added, “It’s sad and I wish there was more I could do to help.”

“I have bursitis in my left shoulder, but I can lift with my right arm.”

Through the slits in her scratchy eyes, Lexie looked across at Sean’s mother and her flat bed head. At least the woman was off the couch. “I didn’t think you liked animals.”

Her bathrobe hung off the one skinny shoulder and she shrugged. “Maybe I like ’em. Last night, your little dog curled up next to my neck like a little heating pad and my fibromyalgia pain went right away.”

That’s where Yum Yum had disappeared. She should have guessed.

Geraldine’s nose wrinkled. “She kinda stinks though.”

“Just when she sweats.”

“I can’t help with only the one arm, though.”

Lexie had been kind of hoping to get a break from Geraldine. No such luck. Three hours later, and weighted down with hundreds of pounds of dry food, Lexie pulled to the back of the shelter and reversed to the door. Geraldine wore a shoulder sling to make sure no one accidentally mistook her for an able-bodied worker, and she instantly disappeared as the big bags of food were unloaded. Lexie didn’t need the help or want to be responsible for Geraldine accidentally contracting a rare and unidentifiable illness.

As she wheeled the last bag inside, she found Geraldine sitting in a chair by one of the grooming stations, Buddy the three-legged bichon frise curled up in her lap. Two-year-old Buddy had been found on the 405, his right front leg so mangled there had been no choice but to amputate. Lexie had sponsored his care and rehab, and he was well enough now to find a special home.

“She’s soft.” Geraldine’s free hand stroked his fur.

They made quite the picture. A disabled dog and a hypochondriac. “His name is Buddy.” No one knew his real name, but everyone at the shelter had started calling him that because he got along so well with other dogs.

“He’s hot with all that hair.”

“That’s because he has a dense coat and doesn’t shed much, like a poodle. He’s hypoallergenic and . . .” He needed a more subdued family where he didn’t have to run around a lot. “Buddy is a special-needs dog.” Maybe Geraldine could benefit from thinking about something other than herself all the time. Lexie knelt on one knee beside the chair. “He’s a sweet boy and never smells when he sweats.” She smiled and told a little fib. “He’s a therapy dog. In training.”

“How about that.”

Lexie sat on a love seat made from a claw-foot bathtub. Now cut in half, it was tricked out in a coat of red paint and outfitted with tuck-and-roll leopard cushions. The rest of the Gettin’ Hitched set had been shipped to the Fairmont, and the ballroom now resembled the inside of a barn, complete with the tractor they’d all climbed down from on the first episode. A small studio audience sat on bleachers behind the cameras, blacked out of sight from the stage.

The show had been taping for several segments before Lexie was brought out and shown her place on the love seat. She wore a cobalt turtleneck dress that clung to her like a second skin and blue suede heels. The perfect touch of modest and sexy. Of class and in-your-face sensuality.

Across the stage, the more memorable members of the cast sat on hay bales while the hostess of the show, Jemma Monaco from The Young and the Restless, sat on a leather buggy seat on Lexie’s left. The wheelbarrow chair where Pete sat while Lexie had been backstage was empty. For now. Lexie would have to face him on camera, but the hitchin’ brides wanted a piece of her first.

“Welcome Lexie to the show,” hostess Jemma Monaco greeted after the light on the main camera turned green. The audience alternately booed and cheered, but Lexie couldn’t see them so they were easy to ignore.

“Thank you.”

“Have you brought the infamous Yum Yum with you?”

Yum Yum was curled into Lexie’s lap and shook from nerves. “Yes. She’s a little shy.” Lexie pulled one side of her long hair behind her shoulder and ran a soothing palm down her dog’s back. “She’ll warm up in a few minutes.” She looked across the stage at the ten or so of the hitchin’ brides poised on bales of hay. They all looked cleaned up and polished for the show. They wore stilettos, short skirts, and phony smiles with nasty intentions. Lexie almost felt bad that they had to have itchy hay up their butts. Almost but not quite. During the first segments, she’d sat in her dressing room while Pete and the women had really piled on the insults.

“What is your dog wearing?” The tone of Jemma’s voice implied that she might not be on board with animal couture.

“A blue dress and white pinafore from my Alice in Wonderglam collection.” The mumblings from the hay bales across the set made her smile. “She loves the little bow in her hair,” she said, and adjusted the ribbon on top of her dog’s head. “It’s sold out online.” Which was thankfully true. “We’re taking preorders and hope it will be back in stock for the grand opening of my Bellevue store in two weeks. We’d love to have everyone stop in.”

“I don’t think the other girls will hang around.” Jemma turned her legs to one side, attempting to figure out her best angles beneath the studio lighting. “I’m sure you’ve been listening to what the other girls had to say.”

“Yes. I heard them.”

“Do you have a response?”

Lexie gave them the smile she’d always reserved for church. The I’m-bursting-with-God’s-holy-love smile. “I understand they’re upset. We all went on the show to find love, and rejection is never easy. Some people strike out at others instead of dealing constructively with their own disappointment.”

“You shouldn’t have been allowed on the show,” Davina from Scottsdale said. “You obviously weren’t there to find love like the rest of us.”

Lexie turned up her smile instead of rolling her eyes. Davina was an actress and had figured reality television would make her a star. A chance that was as fat as her head. “I’m sorry you feel that way.”

“God, I’d like to smack that smile off your face,” Davina added, followed by a smattering of applause that Lexie couldn’t ignore.

“No one is getting up from their seats,” Jemma warned. “Violence is never the answer.”

Lexie straightened her little dog’s pinafore. “Yum Yum is a pacifist. So am I.”

“You’re a sneaky liar!” Mandy from Wooster pointed at her.

“You think you’re better than all of us,” Desiree from Jersey said, triggering full-on tirades from the other girls on the set.

“You spent most of your time on the pig phone.”

“You stole my lip chap!” Whitney from Paducah claimed, and the audience howled with laughter.

Oh God, not Lip Chap–Gate, again. Whitney’s Chap Stick had gone missing around week three and she’d turned it into a huge ordeal. As if it was worth a million dollars instead of costing around two bucks.

“You told Jody I walk like a poodle. What the hell does that mean?”

“Well, it—” Lexie tried to explain but was interrupted by Jenny from Salem, who pointed at her. “You tripped me in the chicken-and-egg contest. That’s the only reason you won.” Jenny scooted to the edge of the bale. “I should have gone on that hayride date with Cindy Lee and Pete. Not you.”

“I didn’t trip you.” That wasn’t an outright fib. She just hadn’t tried to trip her. “Your running in five-inch wedges through a chicken coop tripped you up.”

“Speaking of the chicken coop challenge, you all had your share of trips and falls.” Jemma pointed at a big overhead television. “Let’s take a look.”

On the screen ran a montage of various challenges, starting with the pig chase and ending with Lexie winning the obstacle course, pumping her fist in the air and hotdogging the hell out of it. “Booya, suckers!” she said into the camera as the other girls struggled to get over the last wall.

The lights came up, and Lexie shrugged. “Perhaps I am guilty of excessive celebration.”

“Lexie and Pete will come face to face for the first time since the ring ceremony.” Jemma smiled into the camera. “We’ll be right back.”

A red light signaled the commercial break, and the makeup artist appeared to reapply Lexie’s lipstick. The cast gave her evil looks as they vacated the hay bales, and Pete took the wheelbarrow chair on Jemma’s left. Lexie glanced at his face but couldn’t tell if he was going to play the part of the wounded groom or get real.

“We’re back with Pete Dalton. Welcome back, Pete. How does it feel seeing Lexie again?”

This was the moment where he either manned up or threw her under the bus again. “You look nice,” he said.

“Thank you. You look good, Pete,” she said, which was true. Blond streaks in his hair made him look like a surfer.

“What do you feel now that you see Pete again?”

Relief. Joy. A bit of guilt. “That we experienced something unique together, but it didn’t work out.”

“Did you ever think you were in love with Pete?”

“At the time, yes. I was caught up in the show.” She put a hand on her chest, then motioned toward Pete. “I think we were all caught up in it, but once I went back to my real life, reality hit me and I realized that it takes more than ten weeks, and half that many dates, to know a person well enough to fall in love. Let alone get married.”

“What do you have to say to that, Pete?”

“My heart was involved.”

He was all tanned and healthy from his show in the Acapulco sun, where he got to pimp a whole new batch of women.

“It hurts,” he added.

If Lexie believed him for one minute she might feel bad, but they both knew the only thing she’d hurt was his pride. “I’ve apologized to Pete repeatedly. I know that an apology doesn’t assuage his pain, but I am very sorry.” There, that sounded sincere. And it was—mostly.

“I was there to find my soul mate,” he said. “All Lexie wanted was her face on television.” A smattering of applause broke out from behind the cameras.

That was true, but no truer for her than for any of the rest of them. Even Pete.

“You were on the rebound from your hockey player and you used me to get back at him. As soon as he showed up again, you went running back to him.”

“It wasn’t quite like that.” In fact, it was nothing like that. “I should have handled things differently. I wish I had.”

“Pete mentioned something that I wanted to get into with you, Lexie.” Jemma turned to her and said, “You told a Seattle newspaper that Sean Knox got a note to you moments before you were to walk down the aisle with Pete. If Sean hadn’t sent you the message, would you have married Pete?”

That was easy, since the message was a lie. “No. I knew I couldn’t go through with it before Sean contacted me,” she confessed, which earned her a wall of boos from the audience.

“Quiet down.” Jemma held up one hand. “Tell us where you went when you left the Fairmont.”

Yum Yum shifted in Lexie’s lap, and she ran a soothing hand over her dog as she repeated the story she and Sean had told the Seattle Times. When she was through, Pete looked ready to explode, and Jemma said, “We’ll be right back.”

The makeup artist appeared again and this time brushed Lexie’s hair as well as retouching her lips. As the woman worked, Pete’s wounded-guy veneer slipped and he laughed and joked with some of the crew. She had two more segments to go before the reunion was over. Two more segments that were bound to be worse than the previous segments combined. The cast only had twenty minutes to get in their last minutes of fame. They all knew the most outrageous behavior would be showed on commercial clips to hype the show, and she braced herself for the inevitable.

The first and second runners-up for the Gettin’ Hitched title were brought out next and sat next to Lexie’s bathtub in a pair of rawhide chairs. Cindy Lee from Clearwater, Florida, and Summer from Bell Buckle, Tennessee, cried huge tears as clips from the show replayed snippets of each woman’s private “dates” with Pete in the Pig Pen, and him leading each girl to the Hog Heaven bedroom. Lexie thanked God she hadn’t been filmed anywhere near Hog Heaven or the subsequent walk of shame the next morning. The clip ended with Cindy Lee’s and Summer’s tearful exits from the show.

“You didn’t choose either Cindy Lee or Summer,” Jemma pointed out to Pete when the camera returned to them. “They cared enough about you to sleep with you in Hog Heaven.”

Pete shrugged a nonchalant shoulder. “In the end, it came down to how I was raised. I’m an old-fashioned guy.”

“Are you saying you didn’t choose them because they had sex with you?”

“It was a consideration, Jemma. Someday I hope to have children, and wouldn’t want any of my future children to see their mother being promiscuous on television.”

The women beside Lexie gasped.

“I loved you,” Summer managed through her tears.

Cindy Lee crossed her arms over her chest. “I thought we had good chemistry.”

Lexie frowned. “You’re a jerk, Pete.”

Summer and Cindy Lee turned toward Lexie, and instead of agreeing, they turned on her. By the time the final segment started, Lexie was tired. She had a headache. Her face hurt from smiling and her stomach was twisted into a knot.

The other hitchin’ brides returned to their hay, and a crew member took Yum Yum to her pet carrier. As soon as the cameras turned off for the last time, Lexie planned to run as fast as her Manolos could take her, and put this chapter of her life in the rearview mirror.

“What are your plans now?” Jemma asked the other women. The first few cast members answered, but after a few minutes, the question got turned and twisted back on Lexie. She was called Lex Luthor and heartless and an entitled bitch, again. Davina threatened to smack her in the face and charged across the stage. A crew member detained her, and the audience cheered and booed at the same time.

“I’m not heartless or entitled.” Lexie put a hand on her chest and felt her heart pound. “I am comfortable with who I am, and if you think that makes me a bitch, that’s your problem.”

“No, that’s your problem,” someone countered, and the conversation warped into everyone’s problem with everyone else. Mandy and Desiree almost came to blows. Summer and Whitney cried big weeping tears, as Pete sat back, loving every last minute.

“Everyone calm down,” Jemma spoke above the bickering.

“Someday you’re going to get what’s coming to you!” Davina yelled, and even though Lexie knew it was all for ratings and an attempt at ten extra minutes of fame, her heart pounded and she swallowed hard.

“Speaking of getting what’s coming to her, we have one last guest,” Jemma announced.

Lexie tried to recall which cast member wasn’t on the set today. Rhonda, the girl who was kicked off on the first episode, maybe. But she was fairly certain she’d never done anything to Rhonda.

Jemma looked offstage to her left. “Come on out, Sean, and tell us what you think of all this drama.”

Right. Lexie hadn’t spoken with Sean since the last text. Even then he’d made it very clear that he wanted nothing to do with the reunion show.

A smattering of applause started toward the front and grew louder as a knot of production crew members moved from the left wing. In the middle, Sean’s dark hair and face towered above them. Lexie’s heart felt like a five-point star and got stuck in her windpipe. He wore the blue dress shirt and gray trousers the Chinooks always wore on the road. He’d loosened the striped tie around his neck and unbuttoned his collar like he’d been about to undress when he’d been interrupted.

Applause and a few whoops broke out as Lexie stood and straightened her dress. A strange sob clogged her throat just above her stuck heart. He looked so good, she wasn’t positive he was real. Maybe she was suffering from some sort of stress-induced delusion. A delusion of dark scruffy beard and big shoulders that made her feel a little light-headed. Then he stood before her and wrapped her up in his arms. It was all for show, but she didn’t care. He was warm and solid and she felt protected. “You’re here.”

“I just got in.” He pulled back far enough to look into her face.

“You’re here,” she repeated herself.

“What my baby wants, my baby gets.” Then he lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her several seconds past a simple hello. For all the world, and especially the television audience, they looked like two young lovers, their lips clinging in anticipation of more. Lexie’s sore stomach got hot and squishy, and the sob clogging her throat came out as a breathy sigh.

Sean pulled back and softly pinched her chin. “You look beautiful.”

She opened her mouth, but all that came out was a weird garbled sound.

He bent forward and whispered in her ear, “You’re supposed to say, ‘You make me feel beautiful,’ or ‘I want to feel our beautiful love forever.’” She recognized the sayings she’d sent him but she was too shocked to respond at all. “And my personal favorite, ‘I want to be filled with your beautiful love lance forever.’”

Lexie’s neck and face caught fire and her throat closed. She’d never added that last one to the list. Ever! “Love lance?” she managed.

He pulled back and laughed.

“Ahh . . .” Jemma said, “I think we caught some of that on Lexie’s hidden mic.”

“Sorry.” He dropped a quick kiss on her lips but he didn’t look sorry at all.

“Why don’t you take a seat with Lexie,” Jemma suggested. “We only have about five minutes, and I’m sure viewers would love to hear your thoughts and what’s been going on.”

Clearly, she and Sean couldn’t fit comfortably in the tub, and a stagehand brought back the two rawhide chairs. Silence fell over the hay bale section, and Pete went from looking smug to looking very uncomfortable.

“We know that you’ve been on the road, but we’re glad you could join us at the last minute.”

“Anything for Lexie.” He took her hand as they sat next to each other.

Lexie looked up into his face. “I appreciate you coming.”

Amusement creased the corners of his green eyes as his gaze met hers. “Sorry I didn’t shave first.” A lock of his hair fell over his forehead like a big comma and touched his dark brow. “But I couldn’t let you face the wrath of those other girls all by yourself.”

Her poor heart grew bigger, the points sharper, her breathing impossible. This was bad. Really really bad. He’d rescued her again, and she hadn’t even had to blackmail him this time.

“Have you watched the show?” Jemma asked.

“Bits and pieces here and there. Watching my woman compete to be another man’s wife wasn’t high on my TV viewing list.” He looked down at her hand and played with her fingers. It was the day. The whole emotional day was playing tricks on her. “It’s over now and we’ve moved on.”

“Pete, do you have anything you’d like to say to Sean? Now’s your chance.”

That had to be it, because, God help her, falling in love with Sean Knox was impossible.

“No,” Pete answered. “Not really.”

Jemma looked at Sean. “Anything you want to say to Pete?”

“No. I think he’s suffered enough without my opinion.”

“What is your opinion?” Jemma wanted to know.

If Lexie had her wits about her she might have intervened before Sean answered, “He must have a small dick if he needs a TV show to get women.”

But her wits were nowhere near the Fairmont Hotel, and she could only gasp, “Sean!”

“Luckily that will get bleeped out in production.” Jemma gave a bark of laughter and was joined by a few of the girls across the stage.

“That’s not true!” Pete defended himself and turned red in the face. “I didn’t need the show to find women.”

Sean looked at him and grinned like they were standing in the face-off circle at the Key, and he was going to drop his gloves the second the whistle blew. “Some of us don’t need a TV show. We’re good on our own.”

If Lexie didn’t know better, she might think he was jealous, but she did know better. This was all an act. One she’d outlined for him, including sections, subsections, and bullet points.

He squeezed her hand and said against the side of her forehead, “You know it’s true.”

Lexie didn’t know what was true anymore. Not him or her or her pointy heart.

Jemma cleared her throat and continued, “It sounds like you don’t like reality TV.”

“It’s fine.”

“Sean doesn’t like chaos and drama,” Lexie provided for him. He glanced at her out of the corners of his eyes and she added, “I’ve given him both and I am sorry for that.”

“You two look like a couple in love,” Jemma said with a sigh.

“Yes.” She’d really done it this time. Despite her notes and memos and knowing better, her heart twisted and turned and gutted her from the inside out.

She was in trouble. Deep, deep trouble. She sat between her fake ex-fiancé on one side and her pretend boyfriend on the other:

1. She’d tried to love Pete.
   1. a. That had ended in disaster.
2. She’d tried not to love Sean.
   1. a. That was a disaster waiting to happen.

It didn’t matter. She’d gone ahead and done it. She’d gone ahead and fallen in love with Sean Knox.