He couldn’t believe that. He couldn’t believe Zoe’s feelings hadn’t been real. The way she looked at him, the way she touched him, the way she kissed him … it had all been real. Hadn’t it?
“The light is fading fast, boss. Are we almost ready to finish up?” a cameraman asked, pulling him out of his torturous thoughts.
“Let me go find Zoe while you get everyone into their places.” He still hadn’t figured out how to save the show, but they needed to finish filming one way or another. Maybe he could edit it in a way that made some sort of sense later.
Chip started off in the direction he’d seen Zoe go early. How long had she been freshening up? Seemed like it had been a long time. The rain continued to beat down on them and the cameraman was right, the light was fading fast this afternoon. The cloud cover made it seem darker quicker. They really needed to get this filming wrapped, announce a winner and be done with it.
“Zoe,” he called as he walked further and further away from the filming area. “Zoe, where are you?” He stopped and listened for her response. Maybe she’d wandered further away than she’d realized.
Silence.
Maybe she’d needed to wash her face with all the crying and the rain. Maybe she’d headed down to the stream that wasn’t far from here. He quickly found the path that would take him to the stream and started jogging, anxious to find Zoe. Something inside him warned this didn’t feel right.
“Zoe,” he called again louder as he reached the edge of the stream. Zoe wasn’t there and judging by the lack of tracks in the soft mud, she hadn’t been here recently. No one had.
Chip unclipped his two-way radio from his belt. “Is Zoe anywhere in the filming area?” he asked the production assistant on the other end of the line. He wandered back down the trail he’d just walked as he waited for a response.
“Nope. I can’t find her anywhere,” the assistant said.
“Damn,” he muttered under his breath before pushing the button to talk into the radio again. “I can’t find her anywhere either and I went all the way to the stream. I need you to send a couple of the crew back to base camp and see if she went back to her tent for something. Tell the other production people to fan out and search the perimeter out about twenty feet but no further. I don’t want everyone getting lost in the woods.”
“Got it. What about the contestants? Should I send them back to their camps?”
“Not yet. Chances are Zoe wandered a little further than she meant to. We need to find her and get the filming wrapped. I’m going to keep heading south and see if I can find her this way since this is the direction I thought I saw her leave.”
Chip went back to where he’d originally thought he’d find Zoe outside of the filming area and looked around to see if he could find any hint at the direction she might have gone. A few moments later he noticed some of the soft grass in one area was pressed flat, almost as if it had been stepped on recently.
With nothing else to go on, he jogged down what his gut told him was Zoe’s trail. With the rain continuing to fall and the light fading, soon there would be no trail to follow at all. He had to find Zoe. Fast.
• • •
Zoe ran until the stitch in her side was too painful to ignore then continued walking until she was too winded to keep going. Rain had thoroughly drenched every square inch of her body, her clothes now clung to her, making her cold. She needed to stop for a few minutes to think. She sank down onto a large boulder and put her head in her hands.
What had she done? How had she let everything spiral out of control so quickly? This wasn’t at all how she thought her easy hosting gig would go.
And now she’d made her situation even worse by running off into the woods without a second thought as to where she was going.
Smart. Real smart.
It wasn’t as if she could go back now. She didn’t have a bit of makeup left on her face, her hair hung in tangled clumps like an old rag mop, and humiliation burned in her chest. No, she definitely couldn’t go back.
Chip would hate her for bailing on the finale, but knowing him, he’d find some way to piece together other audio clips to get the finale finished so the show could still air. He probably already hated her anyway now that he thought she’d used him to gather information for Alex. She had used their relationship … friendship … whatever it was, to get him to tell her what she’d needed to know, but the connection they had between them had been one hundred percent real.
No way would he believe that now.
New tears fell down her cheeks at the thought of everything she’d lost. She wouldn’t get paid, her secret was out for the world to hear, and Chip would never forgive her. Everything she’d worked for was gone. Over.
And it was all her fault. Sure, if Alex hadn’t figured out who she was, she could have finished her hosting responsibilities without so much trouble. But no one forced her to hide who she really was. If she’d only faced her fears and had been strong enough to believe in herself after the accident happened, Alex wouldn’t have had any power to blackmail her.
But she hadn’t. She’d lied to everyone. She’d lied to herself.
She’d lied to Chip.
There was nothing left for her here. No reason to go back and try to make things right. Maybe if she walked further on, she’d find some civilization and then she could get a hotel room. She had her credit card number memorized so maybe someone would rent her a room. If not, she could call her brother and beg him to call in a room for her. It would be hard to ask for his help, but it would be better than going back to base camp. She could never face those people again.
She pulled herself up from the boulder and glanced around, not remembering which direction she’d come from. The ground showed no traces of her steps. Or at least none that she could see. Sighing, she picked a direction at random and started walking. Sooner or later she’d either run into one of the show’s camps or she’d find the edge of the forest and hopefully people. Either way, she wasn’t staying still any longer.
It was dark, she was cold, and the thought of being in the woods alone at night was anything but appealing.
Zoe walked on, listening to the leaves crunching under her feet while trying to shut out the sound of her thoughts. She didn’t want to think anymore. Thinking was stressful and exhausting. Right now she needed to conserve her energy and get somewhere safe.
A loud snap of a breaking branch startled her. She froze. Another loud snap of a branch caused her hands to shake. The noise sounded like it was somewhere nearby. Instantly images of snarling bears and growling wolves filled her mind.
A shape stepped out from behind a cluster of trees and a scream caught in her throat. Paralyzed by fear, she could do nothing but stand there with her mouth hanging open, waiting to be eaten.
“Zoe, is that you?”
The sound of Chip’s voice hit her with a wave of relief and guilt.
She wasn’t seconds away from being eaten by a bear.
Chip was probably going to kill her for ruining his show.
The bear would have been better to find in the woods after all. At least with a bear it would be a quick and efficient death. With Chip it would be slow and painful and she’d only want to die.
“Hey,” she said weakly with a small wave as he wandered over to her.
Without a word, Chip closed the distance between them and pulled her into his arms. He held her tight and dipped his head to bury his face in her neck.
“I’m so glad you’re okay. I’ve been looking for hours. My mind started to make up all these different, awful scenarios about what condition I’d find you in. Are you hurt?”
He pulled back and looked her up and down. His concern was obvious and it made her heart ache. He was such a wonderful man and she’d done nothing but use and hurt him. She’d always known she didn’t deser
ve someone like Chip risking his own life to follow her out in the woods but today’s events and her recent behavior absolutely proved it.
“I’m not hurt,” she said, unable to meet his imploring gaze. “You shouldn’t have followed me.”
“What was I supposed to do when you didn’t come back to finish filming, let you wander out in the woods lost forever?” he asked, his hands resting on her shoulders. She could feel his body shaking with shivers almost as much as hers.
“Oh.” She nodded. “I get it. You wanted me to come back to finish filming the finale. Sorry, but I can’t do that. I’ll record some audio for you or something to announce Rick’s team as the winners, but I’m not going back to film. And I’m definitely not going back to camp.”
Chip dropped his hands from her shoulders and folded them across his chest instead. “Do you really think I’d come all this way, walk all this time in the woods risking my own safety because I want to drag you back to finish filming?”
Well, when he said it that way, it didn’t sound very likely.
“Isn’t that why you’re here?” She glanced up at him as best she could while keeping her head bent. It wasn’t yet completely dark and looking up at him would surely show off the now naked scars running along the edge of her jaw and under her chin.
“I don’t give a crap about the finale. I came after you because I was worried about you after everything that happened back there and I couldn’t imagine you out here alone.”
He reached out for her but before he could touch her, she turned her back and took a few steps away. She might be fully clothed, but she felt far too naked to be near him.
“I’m going to radio back to base camp and get us out of here.” He pulled his radio from the waistband of his pants and pressed a button before speaking into it. “I’ve found Zoe. But I’m not sure where we are. I’m going to need you to check the map and navigate us back to camp.”
Zoe stayed quiet while he told the production assistant their current coordinates according to the radio equipped with a built in GPS tracker and waited for directions on how to get back. She didn’t want to go back, but she couldn’t very well spend the night in the woods with no shelter. And her quest to find outside civilization hadn’t worked so well either. Going back to base camp with Chip was her only option.
“I’ve found your location on the map,” the voice on the radio said a few minutes later. “But I’m afraid you’re too far out to make it back to camp tonight. Jenny called the closest rangers and gave them your coordinates. They said to sit tight until they find you. They should be there shortly then they’ll take you into the nearest city for the night.”
“I guess we’ll see you back at base camp sometime tomorrow. Make sure everyone is ready to film the final segment tomorrow when we get back.”
“Will do. Stay safe out there you guys.”
Chip said goodbye then clipped his radio back to his waistband. “Now we wait, I guess.”
She nodded, wrapping her arms around herself. Now that she wasn’t walking, the cold and wet settled over her with a chill. The rangers couldn’t get there soon enough.
“It looks like there’s an outcropping of rocks right over there. We’ll still be close enough to the coordinates the rangers have for them to find us, but it should help us stay a little warmer if we’re out of the rain.”
Zoe followed him seeing no other options. She was freezing and any chance at warming up was a welcome one. He brushed off a spot on the rocks and sat, motioning for her to sit next to him. Seeing no immediate evidence of scary spiders, she joined him.
“So why did you run away exactly?” he asked, breaking the silence.
“I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t stand knowing I’d ruined everything. And … ” Her voice trailed off.
“And what?” he asked quietly.
“And I couldn’t face the cameras and the final filming with my secret out there for the world to see. It was bad enough that Alex told everyone my real name, but once we started filming again, the entire national viewing audience would have seen the evidence of his words on my face. I couldn’t let them see me like that. I couldn’t let you see me that way either.”
“Zoe, I’ve known about your scars since you were on The One.”
She sucked in a breath. “What? How?”
“Your makeup hasn’t always been perfectly applied, as much as you think it has been. Every now and then, the camera picked up your scars if the lighting was right.”
“But I never saw that when I watched the show.”
“I know, because I got the filmed touched up before the episodes aired.” He shrugged like it was no big deal. It was a big deal to her though.
“Thank you. That was really nice of you. I had no idea.”
“I knew when I saw your file that I’d have to watch for them so I always did.”
“What do you mean? What was in my file?”
“Everything. Or well, I guess I thought everything. I know about the car accident and the cosmetic surgery. I knew it was something you struggled with. I didn’t realize you’d changed your name though. And I could never make sense of how you and Jack Miles were related. That whole story you told Paige during Treasure Trekkers about your parents divorcing never really made sense because I couldn’t find your name in connection with Miles’s history. But I assumed it was something with the divorce and I didn’t dig too hard when it came to you.”
“Why not?”
“Because I didn’t want to find a reason to keep you off the show.”
Oh.
“So you didn’t know that Alex was someone from my past? Someone who would have known me before my accident? You didn’t put him on the show to cause drama for me?”
Chip leaned away from Zoe and she instantly regretted her words. “Wow. You really think very little of me, don’t you?”
“Well, you have to admit you have done some pretty shady things all in the name of producing a show that will earn big ratings. Like the whole finale thing between Cassidy and me. You did do that.”
“So you thought I’d bring on an asshole like Alex from your past to humiliate the host of my show during the finale? That’s really nice of you, Zoe.” He got up and paced out in the rain in front of the outcropping. “I can’t believe everything I’ve done for you and all you can think of me is that I’ve been out to get you this whole time.”
“Chip, you’re taking this the wrong way. I don’t know what I thought. It’s weird that Alex would be here out of everyone you could have chosen. I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t really think badly of you, I’m just trying to figure this all out. I don’t understand how everything went downhill for me so quickly.”
“Everything I’ve done on my shows concerning you has been with your best interest at heart and this is what you think of me.”
Zoe felt her temper rising at the situation. She was cold and tired and not at all in the mood to have this conversation. “Not everything was in my best interest. Dragging me along for Cassidy’s humiliation on the finale of The One was an embarrassment for me too. But you wanted the ratings. You didn’t even consider how being rejected by Brad would affect me, did you?”
Chip stopped walking and stared at her. “You’re right. When it came down to the finale for The One, I wasn’t thinking about your feelings. I did get caught up in the scandal and the ratings and I forgot that there were real people involved. I’m sorry. If I could take back any moment in my production history, it would be that one. But every other thing concerning you has been with you in mind. And honestly, Zoe, I didn’t think you’d be so upset over Brad.”
“Why wouldn’t I be upset about getting rejected on live TV?” She couldn’t remember ever feeling so irritated by Chip before. Didn’t he get it? Didn’t he understand she wasn’t some pawn in his game?
“Because he wasn’t the right guy for you and I thought you knew that. I thought you were playing along with the game because you wanted to win, not because you really cared for him.” Chip slumped down onto a wet stump, sighing and dropping his head into his hands. When he looked up at her, she saw something in his eyes she hadn’t seen before. Sadness, regret, and uncertainty all rolled into one. “And I sort of thought you wouldn’t care about Brad because maybe you already had feelings for me the way I already had feelings for you.”
She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out.
Chip’s jaw set into a hard line. “I should have known better. You don’t care about anyone but yourself. Certainly you don’t care about me. Never have, never will.”
That last comment lit a fire inside her so bright she could barely see straight. “Don’t you dare talk to me as if you know me. You don’t know anything about me. Not really anyway. Sure, you know whatever is in that little file of yours, but that’s just facts. Where I live, what kind of things I like to do for fun, and who my friends are. But that doesn’t tell you anything about what I think or how I feel. You’re so busy trying to be a big shot reality TV producer that you’ve forgotten how real life really works. You make these ‘reality’ TV shows and you think that makes you some kind of expert on people. But guess what? You aren’t an expert on me or anyone else. You’re just some sleazy producer who’s looking for the best thing to capitalize on and I’m not going to be that person for you anymore.”
“Do you even hear yourself right now? You’re so wrapped up in your own insecurities that you can’t even see how you are to everyone else. You spend all of your time pushing people away by being a gigantic bitch so no one can ever get close to you. And you’ve done it again. I can’t do this anymore. I could have had any number of people as the host for this show, but I picked you because I knew you had medical bills to still pay off.”
Lost Without You Page 19