‘If he picks you,’ Priya murmured, smiling broadly at the audience, ‘I’m pushing you into traffic.’
Callie snorted before she could stop herself. ‘If he picks me, I’ll want you to.’
Priya’s smile widened. She was wearing something silver and cut to within an inch of decency, and she looked completely at ease.
Callie had never achieved that. She hated every second of this.
Callie clasped her hands together in her lap and focused on keeping her breathing even. The audience was a blur of faces beyond the lights.
Somewhere off to the side, Neil lurked. He hadn’t spoken to Callie much since the car ride back from Westerleigh.
He’d been clear that she would be allowed to go through the homecoming elimination because she made a better finalist than Cara, whose colossal tits could not fully disguise her lack of personality. But the final? No.
‘I’m gonna have to reshoot because of you. And I lost juicy footage too, which you could have easily turned into a redemption arc. God, what a winner you would have made! But no, you had to play silly buggers to save your bloody baker ex from an uncomfortable moment, didn’t you? Well, you don’t get to waste my time and money and still get a fairy-tale ending,’ he’d said, voice light, eyes cold. ‘And if you think this doesn’t follow you, you’re kidding yourself.’
Callie had nodded. What else was there to do?
So she sat now, waiting for a result she already knew, watching Sam talk about ‘connection’ and ‘journeys’ and ‘being true to himself’.
Callie felt strangely calm. She’d already lost the important thing. The rest of it—money, whatever fragile career she’d been propping up—felt silly by comparison.
Sam took a breath. He looked at Priya and then at Callie.
‘This hasn’t been easy,’ he said, voice wobbling just enough to sound authentic. ‘But I’ve had to listen to my heart.’ Sam closed his eyes and inhaled. Then his eyes popped open, and he smiled his best wife-guy smile. ‘Priya.’
Applause erupted. Priya made a convincingly shocked face, hands flying to her mouth, before she crossed the stageand let Sam hug her. Confetti cannons went off overhead. The audience whooped. Someone yelled ‘YES!’ like they had money on the result.
Callie stood when she was meant to stand. She smiled when the camera swung to her as graciously as she knew how. She let Sam hug her. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I really did like getting to know you.’
‘Mmm,’ she nodded, disinterested. She wanted to go home now.
Callie stepped back to where she’d been told to stand, hands clasped in front of her, while Priya and Sam kissed and held each other by the hand and said some cheesy bullshit to each other. The camera pulled out into a wide shot, sweeping the stage and the cheering crowd.
Callie’s gaze glided away from it all. It wasn’t deliberate. It was just her attention drifting, waiting for all this to be over so she could get out of this straitjacket of a dress.
But halfway up the seating, past the faces and clapping hands, past the people who had come for a factory-produced spectacle, Callie saw her.
Mae.
Sitting rigid in her seat as if the chair had grown there around her. No smile. No clapping. Just watching.
For a heartbeat, Callie forgot where she was. The noise of the stage dimmed to a distant roar. Their eyes met. Mae didn’t look away. Neither did Callie. And then Mae raised her hand and gave a little awkward wave and mouthed, ‘Hi.’
Callie did the same, a real smile replacing the trained teeth-baring she’d been doing for the last hour.
The applause thundered on, the show wrapping up, but none of it mattered when there was the truly impossible sight of Mae Morgan, here in this room. At this moment. After everything.
Thirty-Nine
Mae hadn’t necessarily planned to see Callie. She hadn’t planned anything. All the way on the train to London, she was arguing with herself.
She’d sat halfway up the audience, coat still on, watching Callie, trying to understand what she’d even come for.
Then Sam had chosen Priya, and the audience had whooped, and confetti had gone off, and Callie, confined to a dress so tight Mae could count her ribs, had smiled with a total lack of surprise.
She’d looked hollowed out. It was terrible to see. Mae began to regret coming, seeing Callie like this. Like a puppet with its strings cut.
Until she saw Mae. Then the life seemed to return to her eyes. And Mae knew this was not a mistake. She was precisely where she should be. She felt something vital return to her, too. Something tired and cold was waking up. For both of them.
