"The way I see it," she continued, shrugging one of her strong shoulders, "no one puts themselves in a situation that could lead to ruin unless they were really hungry for something. I looked into you, Brin, remember? You were starving for a break. You saw one, you were offered one, and so what if you had to bend the truth to get it?"
"It was more than a bend."
"Was it?" she asked, lips curving up slyly. "I mean, maybe at first."
"We still aren't married, Rachel."
"And yet," she said, reaching out, closing her hand around mine, and dragging it upward, running a finger across the band on my ring finger, "you have yet to take this off. I bet he still has his on too."
Actually, he did.
I hadn't noticed until she'd mentioned it.
"He probably just forgot to take it off," I insisted, pulling my hand away. Because, well, I couldn't claim the same. The band had caught my eye a dozen times since we packed up and left the townhouse in Cape May. I even remembered thinking that I should take it off, but could never seem to make myself do it.
"Yes, that must be it," she said, attempting to give me a stern look, but her eyes were dancing.
"How are you not angry?"
"I think Andy has the anger covered. There's no need for more of that. Besides, if I had questions about your sincerity - and I did - I should have come to you about it before this blew up."
"But?"
She did let herself smile then, a bit wistfully. "It's cheesy, I know, to call yourself a hopeless romantic these days. It's not something I would ever admit in mixed company. My colleagues would never take me seriously again, but that is exactly what I am. It is exactly why I didn't pull you two aside, and call you on it. I wanted to see the story of you two unfold. I had a feeling if we had that talk, the show would implode, and the two of you would go your separate ways."
"We would have," I agreed, nodding, suddenly realizing what a shame that would have been, how easily our lives could be thrown onto a completely different path, and all the possible repercussions of that.
"And what a shame that would have been," she agreed. "Because you two, well, you're..." she paused, the twitching of her lips and light in her eyes saying she knew exactly what people thought of how she used the word, but didn't care in the least, "fantastic."
"If it is any consolation at all, we're officially together now," I admitted, feeling my stomach flutter a bit at admitting it. "We're going to take on this farm as a project next," I added, waving to it.
"Now... wouldn't that make good television?" she asked, brow raising, something about the keen look in her eye telling me that maybe, just maybe, our TV careers weren't exactly finished. "The disgraced Fix It Up couple finding actual love on the set, then fixing up a house together to live and love in? My heart is pitter-pattering just imagining it. Plus, the ratings for the four episodes of this season would skyrocket."
"You're still going to air them?" I asked, brows lowering.
"If there is one thing you learn in reality television, dear, it is there is always a scandal buried somewhere. The key is to capitalize on it, not hide from it. The episodes that air - or even re-aired after the hooker nonsense last season ended up being the best ratings for the channel all year. Not just the show, the network. People are rather predictable that way, rubbernecking to watch the remains of a car wreck, watching endless news stories about some senator's private disgrace, obsessively watching old episodes of shows to see if they can spot when the marriage started to fail. If we market this right, we can make them look for the time when you two stopped faking, when you really did fall in love."
"We didn..." I started to object, having to stop myself. Because, well, we did, didn't we? Warren sure had, had even admitted it in detail. Me, yeah, I wasn't as forthcoming. But there was no denying it. It had been happening for longer than I realized, than I would have let myself admit back then. Falling for him. I had been falling for him since we first moved in together.
"Sure you did, dear. And that is why I am happy for you, not angry. Had this just been a scam from start to finish, maybe this would be a different conversation. But this? This I can work with. I can have the media team spin this, market it right. If I'm correct - and I usually am about this sort of thing - there will be demands for a finished season, for a special about you working on your own home. Because the general public, they love a good scandal, but like me, they like a good love story just as much. And this? This has the making of a rom-com. Except it is real life. Which makes it all the more heart-melting. We can work this, Brin."
"But Andy..."
"Sees nothing but dollar signs and bottom lines. If we buckle down and show him what this has to offer his pocket lining, he will be on board in a heartbeat."
"But... how would we go about that?" I asked as I saw Warren's truck turn down the long drive, kicking up dust as he went. He slammed on the brake, throwing the door open without even cutting the ignition, making it beep for a second before he slammed the door, rushing up to us. Like, dare I even think it, he was worried about me having to face Rachel and the repercussions of our actions alone.
"Warren," she said, giving him a warm smile. "Your girl and I were just discussing how we can turn this all around in our favor."
"Apparently, we are shitty liars," I told him with a smile as his arm slid around my waist, pulling me closer, creating a united front.
"Well, I always knew that about you," he told me, smiling when I small-eyed him. "But I figured I was always pretty convincing."
"Rachel thinks we can spin this, that we can maybe get to finish the season."
"And don't forget the special!"
"The special?" Warren asked, but directed it at me.
"Rachel thinks watching us work on your farm would make for good ratings. I mean, of course, that is entirely up to you. She was just throwing out options."
"Us."
"Hm?" I asked, unsure why he was giving me such a hard look.
"It is up to us, not just me," he corrected.
"Well, yeah, of course. But I mean... the farm is..."
"Where your ass is going to be staying," he cut me off. "So, it is a mutual discussion to be had. If or when the time comes for that."
Oh, my heart.
My poor, overflowing heart.
"Oh, look at you two," Rachel said, grinning, clearly holding back a knee-jerk 'fantastic' as she watched us. "Have you two been off the grid? Or have you been keeping up with the story?"
"I got a text from my friend late last night telling us. Since then, we haven't seen anything," I admitted. I'd even been online. For hours. But I managed to find some self-control in the matter, refusing to let myself look, to hear the nasty things people might be saying about us. "Is it bad?"
"There is a fair bit of mocking, but luckily for us, the show hasn't aired yet, so no one really knows you except for the show's social media and that one interview. So no one really knows how to work with this story. Which is good. Because it means, by the large, they are staying quiet. That likely won't last, though, so I had better get a hold of Andy now that I know you guys are willing to go with it, hang in there for the ride. The sooner we can act like nothing is off, the better."
"Is there anything we should be doing?" I asked when Warren stayed silent, making me wonder if he was actually on board as well, or just agreeing because I clearly wanted it.
"Honestly, if you can think of a clever way to play with this on your own or the show's social media, do it. Keep it light, but no more lying."
"I can think about it," I agreed, nodding.
"Okay, good. Other than that, just take a little vacation. You two were working to the bone. You've earned it. I will call one of you with more information when I have it," she told us, moving to turn away again.
"Rachel, really, we are genuinely for..."
"Fantastic," she cut me off, not even bothering to turn around. "You are genuinely fantastic."
"What the hell was that?"
Warren asked as we watched her back out of the drive, just narrowly missing the side of his still-running truck.
"Apparently, she and Mica both had suspicions for a while."
"Why wouldn't they say something?"
"According to Rachel, they are hopeless romantics."
"And that's enough reason to risk a show's success?"
"They seem to think this will all work out. I'm sorry, I really should have waited for you to come back before I discussed anything with her. I didn't get a chance to ask if you'd be into this."
"Into it?"
"Continuing the show. Coming clean."
"The way I see it, regardless of what we decide to do, we're gonna have to choke down some crow. We could do it privately, and hope we manage to drum up enough business to keep ourselves afloat. Or we could do it publicly, finish the show, know for sure we will have the money to do whatever we wanted after the season is over. Call it quits, do our private work. Or sign up for another season. No matter what, though, what we did is something we're gonna have to own up to, accept the repercussions of. So, what matters now is how we want to handle it."
"What are your thoughts running toward?"
"The food in my truck," he said with a small smile. "Why don't we save the talk for dinner?"
We did that.
Mulled things over privately as Warren carried in bags, something he wouldn't let me help with, but set me to cleaning out the cabinets to store the food in, so I wasn't completely useless.
Warren cooked.
I set the table.
And almost as soon as we sat down, I couldn't hold the words in any longer.
"What are you leaning toward?"
"Gonna have a crippling mortgage once this place is officially in my hands. One that could be eased a lot if we finish the season. Maybe negotiate hard for the special on this place."
"You'd be willing to do that?" I asked, surprised. "Open this place up to everyone's eyes?"
"Baby, we opened ourselves up for everyone's eyes already. I figure this pales in comparison to that."
"It makes the most sense," I agreed, poking at the green beans on the plate. They were nice ones - genuine bone China from days gone by, the kind that belonged on display, not to be eaten on, white with little gray birds hand painted around the edge. I was careful not to let the tongs of my fork scrape the surface, no matter how many times it had clearly been done before by a careless boy and his grandfather. "And I really don't like leaving things unfinished, y'know? We had all kinds of plans for the next two houses."
"You were bouncing at the idea of getting your hands on that stained glass."
I smiled because he wasn't wrong.
"So, we're gonna do it. If they come back with the offer to finish."
"Yeah, we're gonna do it."
I wouldn't pretend that it was a feeling of comfort that overcame me then. The general feeling of everything will shake out. But that wasn't right.
Warren was right.
We'd have to eat crow.
Publicly.
We might choke on it.
There would be questions, hard ones. There would be criticism, people calling us liars and opportunists. And they wouldn't exactly be wrong. We couldn't defend ourselves against that. We'd have to take the punches square on the chin. And, well, keep taking them. Until the scandal of it all faded away, and they would get to know us as a couple again. But this time for real.
"We'll get through it," Warren assured me, seeming to read my thoughts. "It will suck. But it will only suck for a few minutes. Then we can come back here, jump into bed, and forget all about it."
"Well," I said, smiling as I looked up at him from under my lashes. "When you put it that way..."
Later that night, sitting up in bed in one of his tees, I reached for my phone.
"Take off your ring," I demanded as I slipped off my own. He seemed to hesitate as I swiped the camera to front facing. "We need to do that post, remember?" I told him, handing him my ring. "Put your arm around my shoulder with these rings visible between your fingers." He gave me a brow raise, but did as I told him as I mussed my hair, swiped my eyebrows into better order. I let my lips fall open about an inch, bringing my hand up near them in a very 'oops' pose.
That was exactly what I captioned the picture with too before uploading it to mine, Warren's, and the show's social media.
"That is going to be fucking everywhere tomorrow," Warren told me, handing me back my ring which I knew I couldn't put on, no matter how empty my hand felt without it.
Warren couldn't seem to figure out what to do either as he twirled the band between his fingers, watching as it caught the light.
It took all of one minute before both our phones started dinging with notifications. Five, ten, two dozen in a row.
We should have turned them off.
They were like a constant music, frantic and distracting, as we tried to relax, unwind, with no TV or even a radio to distract us.
Finally, unable to drown it all out, we shut them down, fell back into each other's arms, and forgot about it.
Just the way he told me we could.
And, well, it was fantastic.
EPILOGUE
Warren - 1 day
If it were up to me, we'd have left the phones off for a full day. Just so we could have an extra day just being us, just being normal.
But Brin was worried that Rachel would try to get in touch, and that it wouldn't look good if we couldn't be reached.
So we turned the phones back on after breakfast, when there was nothing else to use as an excuse not to.
"Oh, my God," she hissed as soon as her phone powered up.
"Is that a good or bad 'oh, my God'?" I asked, not looking at mine yet.
"It's an... Oh, my God oh, my God," she said, shaking her head. "There are ten thousand likes on the Instagram post. On my Instagram post. My personal one. Where, if I'm lucky, my posts get maybe fifty or sixty likes. I'm afraid to read the comments," she admitted, giving me a wobbly smile that I knew her well enough at this point to call insecurity. It wasn't something you saw on her often, and it looked wholly out of place.
"So don't scroll," I suggested, shrugging. "For now. Until you know what the tone is. I'm sure you got other shit to deal with now."
She did, too.
Six missed calls from her family.
Two from Brent.
One from Rachel demanding a call back.
I wasn't quite as busy, not having family who I was close to. So unlike Brin, I scrolled. I read the comments. I found that I went from one follower - Brin - yesterday to over two thousand overnight. It wasn't exactly superstardom, but it was more than I could have gotten on my own.
"Mom, no, calm down. Let me talk," she said, climbing off the couch to move outside. Wearing nothing buy my tee and panties that left half of her ass hanging out of the bottom, yeah, I damn sure couldn't complain about the view. It was one I could get used to.
That was the plan, after all.
Though I was pretty sure that no matter how many times I saw it, I would never get used to seeing her body so openly on display for me.
She was outside for nearly an hour, pacing the deck, only once almost falling through the crumbling floorboards.
I moved out there with coffee - that I had laced with caramel syrup that I'd needed to go to a specialty store to pick up for her - when her hand finally left her ear.
"How'd that go?" I asked, not really able to relate to having a family all up in your business, and finding myself almost glad to have that opportunity moving forward. Because of her.
I hadn't met any of them yet, but she'd told me stories. Long, rambling stories that took off in fifteen different directions before they circled back to the original point to conclude. She called her mother a hothead, but able to control it a tad better than she could. Just a tad, though. If the story was true, the same could be said of her sister and nieces. For some reason, the Italian blood did not run so fie
ry in the male veins, something she shrugged at when I brought it up.
They were a tight group, never spending holidays apart, not even now that her brother moved a bit further away. They all came down to her parents' house the day before each holiday, slept over, celebrated together.
I'd never really had that.
Sure, I had gifts under my tree at Christmas, and we had small, festive meals at Thanksgiving, and dyed eggs on Easter, but it had always just been the two of us.
I could barely imagine the scenes she painted, loud voices yelling over each other, brightly colored wrapping paper flying, so much food leftover that they were eating it for a week after.
More than I would admit, I was excited to experience that, to feel that energy.
"She is demanding I bring you to dinner before we leave again, so she and my dad can get to know you."
"We can make that happen."
"Yeah?" she asked, turning her head over her shoulder to look at me, face cautious, but hopeful.
"Of course. I figured we'd be getting together. Got to get their seal of approval and all that."
"You don't have to worry about my parents. Or siblings."
"I have to worry about Brent," I guessed.
"You have to worry about Brent," she agreed. "He will be the one giving you speeches about treating me right. And how he's learned a lot of clever ways to kill someone at the prison. And he might always refer to you as That asshole since that is what he has been calling you for months now."
"He's like a brother," I nodded, understanding. If I had a sister, I was sure I'd be the same way with her men.
"Yeah. I mean my brother is too straight-up-and-down to give you a threat. And even if he tried, you'd know he was talking out of his ass. But Brent means it. But he is also the one who told me I screwed up."
"Screwed up how?" I asked, moving to step behind her, pulling her back to me, sharing my body heat since she was still without pants.
Fix It Up Page 21