Louise tilted her head and then nudged it toward Birdie and Alexis, who were both quietly stomping grapes like their lives depended on it. “What do you think, Alexis?” Birdie asked. “Influencer or content creator?”
Alexis stiffened beside Birdie. It wasn’t even subtle. Her shoulders went rigid like a board, and Birdie caught herself wondering if Alexis feared saying the wrong thing, given her history. Maybe she felt like she needed to overcorrect after last season’s chaos.
“Well,” she said finally. “I’d say she found a way to make her passions work for her. I’d call that smart.”
Bianca grinned from ear to ear. “Well, thank you, Alexis. I appreciate that coming from you.”
Alexis nodded and then said nothing. Just silence. Louise turned back to ask a few more questions, and Bianca cheerily launched into explanations. Birdie could easily let Alexis sulk in silence. That was exactly what it looked like she was doing. But Birdie had to say something. She couldn’t keep quiet any longer. And so, she bent her head slightly to speak in a voice low enough that the cameras wouldn’t pick it up, even though none were aimed at them anyway. Two were fixed on Bianca, who had just hiked up her skirt, revealing long, unnaturally gorgeous legs. Birdie had gone green with envy when she’d first seen Bianca’s legs. It wasn’t fair that some people were blessed and others were not. Birdie’s silhouette wasn’t exactly frumpy, but it wasn’t Gisele Bündchen either.
Birdie stole a quick glance in Vivian’s direction. She was distracted by a piece of paper in her hand. She didn’t want her to see them interact right now, not after last night when Vivian had looked at them so suspiciously. Birdie hadn’t considered this before, but what if there was a rule against being a contestant whom the bachelorette had previously slept with? What if someone found out, and she got shipped home on the spot?
But that wasn’t what she was thinking right now. There was something far more pressing she needed to know. She tilted her head closer to Alexis and murmured, “Why’d you choose me if you don’t want me to be here?”
Alexis didn’t look at her. And when she did speak, her mouth barely moved. “It was a slip of the tongue.”
“Right,” Birdie whispered. “Because my name just accidentally fell out of your mouth.”
“Exactly,” Alexis snapped back, still whispering, still looking ahead at the cellar wall. “It was a mistake. I planned to call Harper’s name, but I don’t know. I don’t know what happened.”
Birdie’s foot pressed harder into the grapes, and the juice splashed up against her calves. Bianca said something about traveling to Turkey and some famous cheesecake she’d eaten called the San Sebastian cheesecake. Louise had followed it up with, “Who the hell is recording you doing all this?”
“Geez,” Birdie said, her chest tightening as heat pricked behind her ears. She heard Louise tell Bianca that she’d once asked a cutesy older Korean couple to take a photo of her with the Space Needle in the background, but they took selfies instead. Bianca laughed loudly, and Birdie took the chance to spit out another whisper to Alexis. “That makes me feel really special.”
Alexis gave her the side-eye but didn’t answer.
“Are you going to act like this every single time we’re in the same room together?” Birdie mumbled, well aware that the cameras were about to shift toward them again. If she had anything else to say, now was the time to do it. “Because if you are, you might as well just send me home.”
“Fine! The next ceremony is in two days. You might not want to unpack your suitcase,”Alexis replied, breathing hard out of her nose.
Birdie was about to fire back something biting, something that would sting, but then Alexis’s heel slipped on a clump of grape skins. She lurched sideways with a yelp.
Instinct kicked in. Birdie grabbed Alexis’s arm and yanked her upright. Which would’ve been fine, except Birdie’s own footing was treacherous, because the grapes were slicker than soap. Her ankle slid, and her balance tipped. Suddenly she was clutching onto Alexis, trying not to topple over like two drunks at a wedding. Their knees knocked, shoulders collided, and Birdie’s hand ended up braced against Alexis’s ribcage, holding on tighter than she meant to.
For one dizzying second, the world shrank to the sticky slosh of grapes and the hot thud of her pulse. Alexis’s breath was quick against her cheek, and her hand was on Birdie’s hip, with her fingers gripping a touch harder than they should.
But then Alexis caught herself and pulled away like Birdie’s touch burned.
“Can you please just concentrate on what we’re supposed to be doing?” Alexis hissed, glaring at her feet.
“Hey, I wasn’t the one who fell,”Birdie shot back.
She had lots more to say, but the cameras were squarely on them now, and out of the corner of her eye she caught Vivian watching. She was smiling but there was something else to it and suddenly Birdie was reminded of a childhood memory when they’d visited her aunt in Brisbane, and she’d gobbled up three lemon slices at morning tea after being told one only and her aunt had smiled. But it was more like an,I’m watching you, so don’t think about taking any moretype of smile.
Birdie let out a frustrated sigh and balanced herself.
Vivian shouted from the side. “Good work, ladies! Keep it up. That picnic is going to be well-deserved. Keep going! Stomp. Stomp. Stomp!”
Chapter Nine
Alexis was absolutely not concentrating on Birdie’s knee, which was almost touching hers. Instead, she was focused on the wheel of chèvre softening in the sun, on the pile of glossy olives glistening with rosemary sprigs, the thin grissini breadsticks in a tall glass bowl, the tapenade nobody touched, and on the bottle of rosé sweating against the gingham cloth.
“You can’t miss the bouchons in Lyon,” Bianca said, popping an olive in her mouth. “They’re basically a religion there.”
“I won’t have time to go to Lyon if you want me to visit the French Riviera,” Louise said, sounding far too exasperated for discussing an upcoming holiday. Bianca was helping her with the itinerary, though Louise seemed more frustrated than anything. “Remember, I only get one week of vacation time.”
“Well then, you must try Strasbourg, at least,” Bianca replied. She grabbed a breadstick and ran the tip through the soft chèvre. “It has half-timbered houses, winstubs, the works.”
“Where the hell is that?” Louise stammered, browssqueezed tight together.
