Ineligible Bachelor (4 page)

He rolled his eyes and went on. “Upstairs to the left is the three-room master suite with master bath spa. That’s where you’ll be, Logan.”

“Am I somewhere downstairs?” Freddy asked.

“No. The circular staircase leading upstairs ends in an open-style balcony connecting the master suite to another bedroom with its own master bath spa, study, and hobby room. Beyond are rooms only used for storage.” Roberto pointed at Freddy. “That’s your side.”

She blinked in awe of the sheer scope of the estate. “I can’t imagine planning something this grand.”

“It took about four years. The architect wanted this house to employ ancient geometrical principles including the Fibonacci series and the Golden section, which is apparent in portions of the elevations and floor plan. The architect used all manner of Euclidean geometry tying together the square, rectangle, octagon, hexagon, and circle into this—a pleasing three-dimensional design tapestry.”

Freddy shook her head. “What did you just say?” She turned to Logan. “Did you understand any of what he just said?”

Logan tented his fingers and rested his forefingers on his lips to cover the smirk.

“Of course you did. You’re in marketing. You have to know everything.”

Roberto sighed. “But the only thing you have to know is that the top level is off limits to the film crew. Everywhere else, there will be either people following you with handheld cameras or remotes that can track everything. Plus, whenever you are on the lower levels, you need to be miked, so Annie,” he said, gesturing to her sitting quietly in a chair at the back of the room, “will show you how to use the mikes along with anything else we need to do to make the show a success. She’ll also be the go-to person if either of you need anything.”

Freddy raised her hand. “I need everything. Pj’s, makeup, shoes, clothes.”

Roberto pulled two sheets of paper from the clipboard and handed one to Freddy and one to Logan. “You’re a little ahead of
me. When you get upstairs, you’ll both find closets packed with most of what you’ll need during your stay here. Anything else you want, fill out this form and Annie will arrange to get it for you.”

Freddy raised her hand again. “How do you know what size I am?”

Roberto sighed as if in annoyance. “Average dress size. Shoes, seven. Bra size…”

This time Freddy’s hand shot out in warning. “Don’t go there.” She glanced at Logan. He appeared to be paying a lot more attention to Roberto. She hitched her thumb toward him. “What about our bachelor here?”

Roberto didn’t miss a beat. “Forty regular, with a thirty-two-inch waist, a departure from the six-inch norm.” He leaned forward and assessed Logan. “You work out, right?”

Logan nodded.

“Shoe size, ten. Briefs, thirty-two.”

Freddy’s mouth dropped open as her mind used what Roberto described to put together a perfect picture of Logan standing in the entrance foyer with a dozen roses in his hand. “Boxers or tighty whities?” she whispered almost breathlessly.

Logan leaned over to her, his hand still covering his mouth. “Freddy, what are you doing?”

“Research,” she whispered back. “Shh. Let the man continue.”

Roberto pursed his lips and not in amusement. “Depends on what he’s wearing. Can’t have the package outlined on prime time TV when the kiddies might be watching.”

Freddy felt her cheeks warm from what had to be a blush when she saw Logan’s grin break wide.

Roberto rescued her from the awkward moment. “Can we go on please? We have a lot of detail to cover and not much time to do it. The women will be coming in tomorrow evening for a short reception before starting the competition. Logan will wear a
tuxedo when he greets them.” He pointed at Freddy. “And I suggest that you go through your closet and pick out something suitable. We have a whole wardrobe department on standby if you can’t find something you like or that fits properly.”

“I thought you said you knew my size,” Freddy countered.

“You do know the average American woman is a size fourteen, and the average reality show woman is a size two.” He looked her over, from shoes to hairline. “We may need to do some alterations with you.”

“Are you saying I’m fat?” Freddy asked him, punctuating the last word between clenched teeth. She felt her nostrils flair.

Logan’s hand on her arm was the only thing that prevented her from jumping over the desk. “He means you have curves, and they don’t. Isn’t that right, Roberto?”

Roberto leaned back and clasped his hands over his chest. “Mostly.”

“I can’t do this,” Freddy said after a few moments of silence. “There has to be a way out.” An edgy feeling she couldn’t control built inside her. “Maybe some creative accounting so the network doesn’t lose money if the show doesn’t air?”

“Creative accountants and people who try to break contracts often end up in court,” Roberto offered.

Freddy looked at him. Roberto’s face read dead serious. He flipped through the papers on the clipboard and detached a stack before sliding them across the desktop to her.

“I’ll leave you a copy of the entry contract you signed and give you time to review it overnight. I think you’ll find everything has been spelled out quite clearly. We can meet again tomorrow after breakfast to go over anything you might not understand or want to understand.”

She frowned at his dry tone. “I don’t like your attitude. Maybe the network can send someone else.”

“Good luck with that request.” Roberto’s voice projected confidence.

“I’d need luck?”

“Because I asked Uncle Efron for this show, and nothing is going to stop it from airing. It’s going to earn me an Emmy.”

“Uncle Efron?”

“Efron Canterwilde III, the executive producer. My mother’s brother.”

“Oh, great,” Freddy said, sinking back down into the leather chair.

Roberto smiled with the victory. “Now, let’s go over some of the basics of what we expect of both of you, shall we?”

Logan and Freddy looked at each other. What other option did they really have?

Freddy roamed the top floor of the mansion. She could hear noise coming from Logan’s side. Sometimes it sounded like doors banging, and sometimes it sounded like water running. She couldn’t imagine what was going on.

Maybe she should go over there and offer to help him settle in. She started to walk across the connecting walkway and stopped. Considering the situation in which she’d put him, maybe she should just mind her own business for once. She walked back toward her own suite. At least two more times, her mind flipped one way and then the other until she felt like a sentinel walking a war post.

This was ridiculous. She took a deep breath. She was going over there. At his doorway, she pasted on what she hoped was a charming smile and lifted her hand to knock. But as the thought of sharing the upper level of the mansion with him for the next six weeks flashed across her mind, her fist stopped an inch before it struck the door as she suffered what she was sure was a hot flash. She really wanted to share something significant with Logan; something more than “Pass the fries” at a fast-food place. Had wanted to since she began to think of him as more than just a running back on the opposing football team when she was a kid. She just never thought it would be sharing a house with him with the goal of getting him a date with someone else.

Too far past the time to worry about that now, she blew out a long breath of air and finally knocked. “Logan,” she called out, “I heard you slamming doors and hoped it wasn’t on my account.”

“It is, but come in anyway,” she heard him call back.

She couldn’t see him when she first stepped into the room. “Logan?”

“In here.”

He stepped out from inside the room beyond a second doorway, boyish wonder in his eyes as he leaned on the door frame. When he looked at her, she found herself so captivated by his eyes that she barely heard him speak.

“You have got to see this.”

She raised her face to the ceiling to gather herself after he disappeared back inside. In this intimate setting, she felt a little weak in the knees. The thought of walking around his bedroom generated enough heat inside her to make her feel like she was walking into a furnace.

“Come in here,” he said, reappearing briefly.

She took a deep breath and followed him into a room larger than the whole downstairs of her house. Built-in shelves covered with shoes, accessories, and neatly folded shirts lined the wall to the right. To the left, a thickly upholstered loveseat and matching chair with a small table between them sat in front of two sets of French doors. A mirror covered part of the wall behind her and the door on the opposite side led to the master spa.

“Over here.” Logan gestured for Freddy to sit on one of the chairs and opened one of the sets of closet doors. Inside, two rows of bars filled with shirts and trousers were divided by rows of drawers.

“And look at this,” he said, walking to the center island and pulling open the drawers.

Freddy swallowed hard, praying he didn’t notice. She hoped she wasn’t about to look at his underwear. Oh well, she decided, at least she’d get the answer to her earlier question: boxers or briefs? At this point, who cared? He probably looked great in either one. She peeked over. The drawers were packed with stuff.

“Socks, jeans, gym pants.” He walked back to the closet. “Suits, dress shirts, polos, khakis.” He stepped back and turned in a small circle. “Can you believe this stuff? The list I gave the assistant earlier had two entries—my favorite blue jeans and my robe. I may never wear them.”

Lordy,
she thought,
don’t say that
. She pictured him naked and made a mental note to poke out her mind’s eye.

He swiveled his head and shot her one of the devastating grins she’d come to know over the years. Now all she wanted to do was grab his cheeks and kiss him the way she always had in her dreams. The urge to find out if reality could be as perfect as fantasy grew inside her as fast as weeds did on a New Jersey lawn on a hot summer day. With each second passing, every feminine hormone in her body shouted,
Kiss him, stupid,
until all their tempting voices blurred into one big buzz inside her head.

She stood up and put as much distance between them as the room allowed, trying not to act on the building urge. “How can you possibly wear all this stuff in six weeks?” she asked him, lightly fingering the shirts neatly folded on the shelves on the opposite wall.

He shrugged. “Don’t know, but everything seems to be my size. That alone amazes me.”

“I did have to put down a physical description on the entry form.”

His hand was on a pair of jeans. “Exactly what did you describe?”

“The form asked for height, weight, build, stuff like that.” She left out the part about the narrative she’d added, suddenly embarrassed by the detail she had gone into about his likes and dislikes. From the look of everything in the walk-in closet, someone had taken her word as gospel.

“Do you have the same thing in your room?” he asked her.

She felt her cheeks warm in a blush. “To be honest, I spent most of the last few hours sitting on a chair in a daze and didn’t get past the bedroom. I was trying to wrap my head around what happened when I heard doors slam and thought you might be trying to escape.”

Logan laughed. “Back at the office, I thought seriously about skipping out on the whole idea, but when I saw how much my boss was into this, and what it could mean to my career, I figured I’d ride it out and see what happened.”

Freddy felt her stomach clench. He actually sounded happy. She wasn’t sure if that could be a good thing or a bad thing, considering he was about to spend the next six weeks getting to know women better, none of them her.

“So you’re not mad anymore then?” she asked tentatively.

“More overwhelmed than anything.”

“Me, too,” she admitted. “Starting tomorrow, there are going to be a lot of people around here poking microphones and lights in our faces.” An odd mixture of fear and disappointment suddenly rifled through her as she realized the next few hours might be the only ones they would have together without the entire country watching them on TV. She began to pace. “We’re going to be miked and followed and then edited. Who knows what’s going to be aired.” She stopped and put a hand to her stomach. “I think I’m going to be sick.” Most of the blood left her head, and the room began to spin.

Logan reacted instantly. He grabbed her shoulders and dragged her back to the chaise. “Don’t move. I’m going to get you some water.”

She leaned her head back onto the padded backrest and closed her eyes to stop the spinning. What had she done? The enormity of how unprepared she was for this hit her hard.

“Fred. Are you all right?”

His voice sounded like an echo. She wanted to respond, but she couldn’t find the energy. She heard him slide something onto a tabletop next to the chaise. Still, she couldn’t open her eyes.

“Fred. Answer me.” He patted her hand as he spoke.

With great effort, she fluttered her eyes open and was immediately hit by the full force of concern she saw on his face. “I’m okay.”

He didn’t let go of her hand when he sat on the edge of the chaise. “You scared me. I thought you were going to faint for a moment.”