I gave him a brief summary of what had been going on, and braced myself.
“Well, you do whatever you think is best.” He sounded so distracted. I knew he wasn’t really listening.
“I just want you to know that if it looks like I’m flirting with Dante or anything, I’m only doing it because the producer is making me.”
“Sure, sure, fine. I really need to go.”
He hung up before I could tell him good-bye or that I loved him. He acted like he didn’t care. Shouldn’t it upset him? Shouldn’t he be even a little bit jealous?
And why did it bother me so much that he wasn’t?
Chapter 8
Where are you? I have put you on text probation.
I expect prompt and witty textual responses posthaste.
After giving Taylor my phone back, I was leaving the bathroom when someone opened the door to the story producers’ room. Matthew Burdette was in there. I scurried back to the party before he realized that I wasn’t where I was supposed to be.
Time to put on a show.
And I told myself that it had nothing to do with Sterling’s lack of reaction.
Dante stood in the middle of the room, talking to four different women at once. He wore an expensive custom Armani suit and looked mouth-wateringly good. I walked up to him, put my hand in his and gave him my best come-hither look. “I need you,” I said.
His hand tightened around mine as I led him out back. A cameraman had been filming a conversation between a girl who was crying and the one who was comforting her, but he came over when he saw us.
I stood too close to Dante. I ran my hand up his arm and bit my lower lip before looking up at him through lowered lashes. “I forgot how strong you are,” I said to him in a low voice. I was trying to give the show what they wanted, but instead it was making me crazy. Being this close to him; him smelling so, so amazing; touching him without feeling like I shouldn’t.
I was liable to be reckless because I was mad and disappointed.
It was not good.
“What’s happening, Limone? I don’t understand.”
I got even closer to him and stood on tippy-toe in an attempt to whisper in his ear. His breath was hot on my neck and it made my stomach do gymnastics and my head feel light. He instinctively moved a hand to the small of my back and I wanted to sigh. “Burdette ordered me to flirt with you.” I should have moved away, but I didn’t. I stayed put, loving the way it felt when we were pressed together. Like I belonged there. Like it was right. I contemplated nibbling on his ear, remembering how much I’d liked it when he’d done it to me.
But before I could do something dumber than a bag of hammers, he stepped back, anger flashing in his eyes. “Don’t. You should only do something like that if it’s really the way you feel.”
He went back inside, leaving me alone and extremely confused.
Dante flirted with me constantly. Did that mean that was how he actually felt?
Emily B., a girl I hadn’t spoken to yet, got sent home amidst more tears and promises from the other contestants to stay in touch.
We turned in for the night, and Dante had barely looked at me. When he called my name, he couldn’t have sounded more unenthusiastic. Had I really upset him outside?
Some of the other girls stayed up to party after he and Harris left. Genesis and I agreed to call it a night, only we didn’t manage to do much sleeping. It was like being back in college with Kat our freshman year, staying up laughing and whispering and finding out everything about each other.
Well, almost everything. I had no intention of telling her about any possible residual feelings for Dante.
No one needed to know that.
We did make a promise that no matter what happened, we wouldn’t ruin our friendship and we wouldn’t talk about our time alone with Dante. I didn’t want to hurt her if she ended up really liking him, and I worried that her stories might hurt me.
The next day was much like the first. We cooked and ate, put on our mike packs, hung out by the pool, found out about the date we’d go on that day or night. Sometimes we got pulled for formal interviews with the field producers. Other times we had ITMs, or “on the fly” interviews that happened right there, right then.