Finding Mr. Right Now (31 page)

Damn, damn, double damn!
None of this was supposed to happen. Ronnie wasn’t supposed to lose her starry-eyed attitude about finding Mr. Right. She wasn’t supposed to throw Billy Joe off the show in a fit of pique. And she wasn’t supposed to think Brendan was boring, even if it was true. And she wasn’t supposed to want Paul Dewitt.

Neither was Monica.

But she did. And now, like Ronnie said, it was her problem.

Paul intended to sleep in, largely because he didn’t have anything in particular he wanted to get up for. He woke up at seven, though, still feeling pissed from the night before.

He was supposed to be free of this idiotic circus by now. He was supposed to have been cut last night. Hell, he was supposed to have been cut in the first week.

Of course if he
had
been cut in the first week, he’d never have gotten to know Monica. They’d never have had those two days in Salt Box, and he wouldn’t be sitting here now trying to figure out some way to get together with her away from Glenn and Ronnie.

All in all, Monica was worth being one of Ronnie’s suitors. Hell, she was worth a lot more than that.

When his phone rang, he checked the number carefully, screening for Cathe. He’d already ignored several days’ worth of calls from her. The last two had sounded particularly menacing, with a lot of dark threats about future retribution. At least he didn’t have to pretend they were friends anymore.

When he saw his agent’s number, he connected quickly. “Hi Denny. What’s up?”

“We’re closing in on El Capitan making a final offer. Just talked to them last night. It’s looking very good.” Denny actually sounded excited for once, maybe because his commission stood to become a lot fatter in the near future.

Paul let out a whoop. “What now? When do they give you an answer?”

“They want to talk to you, kid. Some points they have to go over. I need you back here ASAP.”

“Back in LA? Now?” Paul blew out a breath. “I can make it by the end of the week. Maybe. Can’t you stall them?”

“Damn it, Paul, do you want this thing or not? If you want this deal with El Capitan to go through, you need to be here tomorrow. It’s make or break time, kid. If you don’t show up, chances are they’ll pass.”

Paul’s shoulders tightened almost painfully.
Shit, shit, shit.
“I’ll do what I can, Denny. I’ll see if I can get a flight out of the regional airport today. I’ll call you back in a couple of hours.”

“Do that, Paulie.” He gave one of his less convincing chuckles. “Just make Miss Dingbat hate your guts, okay? You’ve got to get back here. Now.”

“There’s an idea. Talk to you later.”

He tossed the phone on the bed, then stood staring out the window at Elkhorn Mountain.
Make Miss Dingbat hate your guts.
He wondered if he had time to do that. Up until last night, he’d been relying on Ronnie to understand his relationship with Monica
.
After last night, he wasn’t sure he could rely on Ronnie for anything.

He grabbed a cup of coffee and headed off to look for Donovan, but he found Sid and Brendan instead.

“He’s in the conference room in the main building,” Sid explained. “He wanted you two to meet him there to set up the finale.”

Brendan was looking nervous again, but Paul didn’t feel up to reassuring him. Maybe he could figure out a way to convince Donovan to streamline the final two episodes and let him loose this afternoon. Maybe they could shoot his farewell episode when he got back.

After all, it was a given that Ronnie wasn’t going to choose him, right?
And she can’t choose me if I’m not around.

Monica was sitting beside Donovan when they entered the room. She had her clipboard in front of her, industriously scribbling notes as Donovan barked orders in her general direction.

Paul looked at her and felt like sighing.
Too good for them, Monica.

Donovan beckoned impatiently. “Come on, sit down. I’ve got stuff to do. Each of you’ll have one more date with Ronnie, tonight and tomorrow night. Then the big finale where she’ll make her choice.”

“Where’s Ronnie now?” Brendan ventured.

“We’ve already gotten all the information we need from her. Now we need to get the same shit from you.” Donovan waved at the table again. “Sit down, I said.”

Brendan sank into a chair as far from Donovan as he could get while staying in the same room. Paul stayed on his feet. “I need to talk to you,” he began.

Donovan headed toward the door, motioning for Sid to follow him. “Talk to Monica. I’ve got to call Artie. We’ll do the toss to decide who goes for the first date later on.” He stalked out of the room, pulling Sid along behind him like a rowboat in the wake of an ocean liner.

Monica blew out a long breath, then flipped a new page on her clipboard. “What’s the problem?”

Paul rubbed his eyes, dropping into a chair.
It’s make or break time, kid. If you don’t show up, chances are they’ll pass.
“I need to go back to L.A. for a day or so. Today. It’s an emergency.”

Monica blinked. “I don’t know if that’s possible, but I’ll ask. Let me just run through this with you.”

He managed not to grit his teeth. “Monica, this is important. It’s about my deal with El Capitan. I need to go. Now.”

“I said I’d ask,” she snapped. “But there’s no point in my talking to Glenn until I get this information from you. He won’t pay any attention to me until I do.”

He sighed, leaning back in his chair. “What do you need?”

She gave him a guarded smile that slipped quickly into a grimace, then glanced at Brendan, including him in the conversation. “I need the same information from both of you. Your parents’ names, addresses and phone numbers. If you’ve got more than one set of parents, you’ll need to decide who you want on the show. Glenn says they won’t bring in multiples.”

“My parents. On the show. On
Finding Mr. Right
.” Paul stared at her.

She looked away. “We do it all the time on
Finding Miss Right
,” she said quickly. “The parents and the contestants. Your parents will meet Ronnie and you’ll meet Ronnie’s parents and then we’ll film all the reactions. It won’t take long.”

“My folks are down in Denton,” Brendan said. “That’s north of Fort Worth. This time of year they’ll probably be real glad to come up to Colorado for a couple of days.”

“Do they usually fly out of the Dallas-Fort Worth airport?” she asked.

Brendan nodded. “Sure. They haven’t flown too much, though. This’ll be kind of an adventure for them.”

“We’ll have to figure a way to get them up here, then. Maybe I’ll drive down and pick them up in Denver.” She grimaced again, probably remembering what that drive to Denver was like. She turned back to Paul. “Your folks are already in Denver, right?”

“No,” he said quietly.

She frowned. “No? Where are they?”

“I mean, no, my folks won’t be coming.” He blew out a breath, trying to ignore the tiny prickling of guilt along his conscience.
You’re making things tougher for her, asshole.

She stared at him for a long moment, then lowered her pen to the table. “Why not?”

“My parents aren’t going to be involved in this. Any of this. That wasn’t part of the deal. I’m not letting you drag them up here under false pretenses. Fairstein doesn’t get to parade them around for the country’s amusement.” He let his jaw go hard as he stared her down.

She stared back for another moment, then shrugged. “They might not mind, Paul. You could explain that it’s not for real. It’s just a couple of days.”

He balled his fists on the table in front of him, trying to find something to say that wouldn’t make her life even more difficult and coming up dry. He remembered all the snide comments about contestants’ parents on
Finding Miss Right
, the sneers in the tabloids. He wasn’t putting his folks through that just because Ronnie had decided to cut Billy Joe instead of him. “No, Monica. I won’t ask them. And I won’t let you ask them. They’re not part of this.”

Brendan turned toward them, his eyes widening. “What do you mean it’s not for real? The hell it’s not!”

Paul sighed. Time to explain the facts of life, although it felt sort of like stomping on a buttercup. “It’s real for you. It’s not for me. I’m a writer on
Finding Miss Right
. They pulled me in when somebody else dropped out of the show at the last minute.”

Brendan’s jaw dropped almost to his chest. “You mean you’re not one of the bachelors?”

Paul shook his head. “I was just supposed to be a fill-in. I don’t know why Ronnie didn’t cut me early on, but she didn’t.”

He glanced at Monica, but her gaze was locked on her clipboard again.

“Well, that wasn’t fair now, was it?” Brendan sounded outraged. “I mean you got to the finals and you weren’t even supposed to be here. And now guys like Billy Joe and Lex, guys who really wanted to be with Ronnie, got cut.”

Paul shrugged. “I guess in that sense it wasn’t fair. But Ronnie’s the one who made the choices. She knew all about me before we started.”

Monica sighed. “If we could get back to the subject of how we’re going to handle the whole parents thing.”

Paul pushed himself up. “I don’t know what else to tell you, Monica. I won’t let Fairstein bring my parents up here. I know that’s going to get you in shit with Donovan, and I’m sorry. But I can’t help that. It’s not negotiable.” He turned toward the door, then paused. “He may want to fire me anyway. Like I said, I’ve really got to go back to L.A. today. Right now, in fact. I’ll fly in and out of the regional airport, and I’ll get back as soon as I can, but I’ve got to go.” His conscience was screaming at him. He ignored it.

She closed her eyes. “You’re leaving now?”

He nodded, watching her face. “As soon as I can rent a car and drive to the airport in Hayden.” He flexed his shoulders, trying to relieve the tension. “I’m sorry. Believe me, I wouldn’t do this to you if I didn’t have to.”
Please, please, please understand, babe.

“You can’t do that,” Brendan squawked. “We got contracts. Mr. Donovan won’t let you go.”

Paul shook his head. “You’ve got a contract. I’ve got a contract to write
Finding Miss Right
. Nobody ever had me sign anything for this one.”

Monica’s jaw clenched. Something else Glenn was probably going to take out of her hide.

“Well shit,” Brendan blurted. “This is one prime fuck-up, ain’t it?”

They both stared. Paul wasn’t sure he’d ever heard Brendan use any word stronger than
damn
before.

Monica’s lips inched up into a sour smile. “Yeah, Brendan, I’d say that pretty much sums it up. This is one prime, grade-A fuck-up.”

She grabbed her clipboard and pushed past Paul, heading out the door and down the hall, probably in search of Donovan.

As she rounded the corner, she didn’t bother to look back.

Paul closed his eyes.
Grade-A fuck-up is right.
He only hoped he could discover a way out of it when he got back.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Monica was fairly sure the day that followed was the worst of her life. It was unquestionably the worst day of her life at Fairstein Productions. By the time Glenn had finished yelling at her, it was too late for them to catch Paul, who must have taken the shuttle downtown immediately after their meeting.

The rest of the day was taken up with Glenn’s rants about everything from her error in not throwing herself bodily in front of the shuttle bus to her idiocy in not signing Paul to an ironclad contract that would have given them grounds to sue him. In fact, she hadn’t signed Paul to a contract because he already had one with Fairstein and because Glenn had told her not to bother stirring up the legal department over the complications. But Glenn’s memory was notoriously selective, and he’d chosen to forget that bit.

They rescheduled the shoot to set up an evening picnic for Ronnie and Brendan, rather than the kayaking class they’d planned for Ronnie and Paul, but then afternoon rainstorms had rolled in and drenched the mountainside, so the picnic had had to be postponed.

She’d tried scheduling a flight for Ronnie’s parents, only to have another set of storms ground all the planes in Atlanta.

Glenn snarled, Ronnie pouted, and Brendan gave her the kind of disillusioned puppy look that made her want to go back to her room and hide.

She tried very hard not to think about Paul. But the ache in her chest and the occasional throbbing in her temples were reminder enough. He’d walked out. He’d left her to flounder around in the midst of the chaos he’d created. And the best he could say was “Sorry, Monica.”

So much for having somebody to come home to. Clearly, she had once again chosen a winner.
Yay, me.

She ignored the rational part of her mind, which pointed out that he’d told her it was about the El Capitan deal, and that deal was the most important one of his career. She hated it when her rational side tried to undercut good solid rage.