“Your aunt and I need to discuss your browsing history,” Barnes groaned. “Look, Andie, just because you don’t get along with someone doesn’t mean they lack merit. Imogen and I fought because she was my biggest threat in the game, but we still had things in common.”
“Like you’re both on TV?”
“Like we both love your daddy, and we both think you’re pretty special too.”
The gentleness in his voice gnawed at my chest, and Imogen summarily ushered me into the kitchen. “God, it’s so much easier to hate him,” she grumbled.
“Tell me about it.” I thought of how he’d sat by me the night before, tender and protective, the man I’d married. How could that person still return when I least expected him?
“Well, I can accuse Barnes of plenty, but I’ll never call him a bad father.” Imogen ruefully grabbed a yogurt from the buffet. “On that cheery note, I’ll go check on Erika.”
“Take her to Greta’s room. Zara just had the cameras removed.”
I sank into a bar stool and slopped rubbery eggs onto my plate. Minutes later, Barnes entered. “Your audience awaits.”
I stood, but as he reached to put my dirty dish in the sink, I was suddenly transported to another kitchen, ready to wake the kids before Barnes went to work. Watching him, I understood—no matter what we’d put each other through, no matter how impossible it was to go back—it had all been real. Our life. I’ll never know if I could have had the same with Arjun, but even if Barnes and I had failed, we’dtried. Once upon a time, Barnes had picked me alone, when no one else would. “I didn’t mean it last night.”
His face rose uncertainly above the sink.
“You were never my second choice.”
“That’s not true,” he answered after a moment. “But thanks for saying it.”
“Will you at least believe you were the right choice?”
His eyes shifted to the lazy tap pouring down the drain. “They’re waiting for you.”
I lumbered down the hall to the production office, unsure why a calm was settling in my stomach. I’d provided unimpeachable footage that people’s worst suspicions of me were in fact true, and yet things felt simplefor the first time in months. There was nothing left to confess. All that remained was to compete in the final episode and go home, to determine the new definition of that word.
I greeted Troy, perched across the room. “You were busy last night,” he noted curtly.
“Luke?” Jenny’s voice called from the laptop.
“After the kids?” I asked Troy, receiving an exaggerated shrug in response. However, when I sat down, only Jenny was on-screen. “Hey, where—”
“The kids saw a hawk outside!” Something was off. Her voice waswaytoo perky. “Guess I’ll entertain you in the meantime…”
And then a woman with platinum hair joined her in the frame.
Melange.
At my house in DC.
She held a manicured finger to her lips and swiftly raised a notepad to the screen, a directive scrawled in purple Sharpie. DON’T SAY ANYTHING. THEY SET YOU UP.
46
2015
SEASON 20, EPISODE 10:
“The Book of Luke, Vol. 2”
I’m watching that miniseries you recommended about the affair at the… insurance agency,” Jenny said, anxiety radiating.
Page turn. BARNES HAS BEEN PLAYING YOU THE WHOLE TIME.
“I never saw the twist coming!”
