Adventure to Love (3 page)

She bit back the complaints that were rising up on the tip of her tongue. She didn’t want to start bitching just yet. She still had to make nice with all the ladies and win them over in case it was some kind of voting show. A bad first impression wouldn’t fly.

She pasted another euphoric smile on her face and cried out, “Well, girls! I guess we’re here! Does anyone need help with their bags?”

As she wrestled her three heavy Louis Vuitton bags out of the narrow school bus door, she realized that they actually weren’t in the middle of nowhere. At the end of a mile-long driveway stretching away from the main dirt road stood a small cluster of cabins. The cabins circled around a beautiful fountain with some kind of tropical wood carving in the middle that spouted water.

Behind the cabins was the most beautiful backdrop of all. The crystal-clear, bright blue ocean on the horizon studded with palm trees. It looked like paradise.
Thank God
. Because if she had unknowingly signed up for some kind of roughing it, bullshit reality treatment, she was going to turn right around and head back to the airport, no questions asked.

But this resort didn’t look half-bad. She began to make her way up the long driveway to the main building in front of the fountain. When she finally arrived at her destination, small brown butlers dressed in traditional Asian clothing appeared out of nowhere.

Three men grabbed her suitcases and whisked them away. A different young man dressed in all white linen offered her a glass of rum punch on a silver tray. Another young man took her heavy Fucci purse off her arm and guided her to an open cabana set with three tables full of hors d’oeuvres.

Now that was more like it.
She took a satisfied swig of champagne and settled back into the cushioned cabana. She watched as the rest of the women struggled to drag their luggage up the dusty driveway and received the same posh treatment when they arrived at the hotel.

Within fifteen minutes, all the women were seated comfortably in the cabana with a glass of champagne in hand. Harper decided to get the conversation going. She wanted to get the ladies gossiping before the cameras started rolling, whenever that might be.

It was the perfect off-camera time to dig up some juicy dirt and maybe use it against someone later on in the show. But only if absolutely necessary.
(You know how cutthroat reality dating shows could be.)

Harper beamed at the group. She raised her glass of champagne in a toast and grinned. “Here’s to our wonderful adventure awaiting us. May the best woman win!”

“Here, here!” the women chorused back as they clinked glasses together.

“Cheers, bitches!” She couldn’t resist. “So, ladies. It looks like we have a little time to get to know each other before the show starts. Did anybody just get out of a relationship?”

Brinkley giggled and drained her glass of champagne. “This is so good! Sorry, girls, I’m not usually a big drinker. But anyway, I just broke up with my high school boyfriend two weeks before I got cast for the show. I told him that this was the perfect opportunity for me because I couldn’t see myself living in our hometown for the rest of my life. But if things don’t work out on the show, then we’ll probably get back together.”

She resisted rolling her eyes.
Was this girl right out of
The Brady Bunch
or what? Who even had high school sweethearts anymore?

“So, Brinkley, was that the only boyfriend you’ve ever had? Seems kind of hard to break up with your high school sweetheart after all that time. How are you doing with everything?” Harper plastered a picture of empathy on her face.

Brinkley poured herself another glass of champagne. She misjudged the glass and sloshed champagne into her appetizer plate. “Oops!” She giggled again.

“I told you, I’m not really good with this whole drinking thing. I’m going to have to slow down.” Brinkley hiccupped and continued. “Yeah, it was pretty sad, and I still miss Cooper a lot. But I’ve never even traveled outside of the US. This is the perfect opportunity for me, especially if I want to break into a career in the news.”

Hmm
. . . a newscaster.
Now it all made sense.
It was no wonder that Brinkley seemed so . . . rehearsed. And perky. And well spoken. She had weathergirl written all over her.

Morgan spoke up. “Well, I think that’s sweet. It’s not that often you see two people stay together since high school. I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you guys, but I do think it’s important to do the things you want before you decide to get married.”

“My boyfriend and I broke up six months ago, and it was devastating. I thought the show would help me get over it because I can’t stop running into him. We work together. Actually, he’s my boss,” Kymm blurted out. She looked like a nervous deer frozen in front of oncoming traffic.

For a girl who was so quiet and soft spoken at their first meeting, Kymm sure had spilled the beans. Harper made a mental note of Kymm’s little scandal. She figured there was nothing wrong with sharing a bit of her insight with the bachelor if they happened to be discussing the other girls.

He’d probably want to know that a girl he was potentially falling in love with had been sleeping with her boss.
Wouldn’t he?

Six bottles of champagne later, and the women were feeling good.
How much time had passed, anyway?
They had covered a wide range of topics in their “get to know you” session.

Harper found out that most of the women had aspirations of breaking into a career in Hollywood. Samantha wanted to become an actress. Amber wanted to direct indie movies. And Lindsay had her heart set on becoming a celebrity stylist like Rachel Zoe.

As for the rest of the girls, they were actually here for love, if you could believe it. Brinkley was convinced that a man she hadn’t even met yet was perfect for her, and that they were “meant to be together.”

Kylie wanted to find “the one” to settle down with. And Sarah S. was hoping for a second chance at love after a brutal and quite recent divorce that left her a single mother to her two young daughters.
Boo-hoo.

The only girl that she couldn’t get a good read on was Morgan. No matter what type of sneaky questions that she threw at her, Morgan wouldn’t give her a straight answer. She was able to find out that Morgan had lived in Boston all of her life and worked at some advertising agency. Morgan actually explained her job in depth, but she had a hard time following since it sounded so
boo-ring
.

She tried to think of another clever question to throw at Morgan to find out what the girl was hiding. Like maybe asking her how many men she’d been with? That was too obvious. And Morgan wasn’t drunk enough for that yet.

Or what about asking her why her last relationship ended? Then she could probably get a pretty revealing answer out of her. She could find out if Morgan was clingy, needy, a psycho, or all of the above.

As she turned to Morgan, she saw a group of men approaching out of the corner of her eye. And they were holding cameras.
This was it!
The show was finally filming!
She had been explicitly instructed not to look at or even acknowledge the cameras. She and all the women had signed lengthy contracts promising that they wouldn’t look at or speak to any of the producers, no matter how freaked out, angry, or agitated they became.

She changed her tactic. She put her hand on Morgan’s arm and started laughing. Morgan looked back at her in surprise, probably because she was acting like a maniac and laughing for no reason at all.
But who cared? Laughter always looked good on camera.
A sexy woman laughing was like . . . Madonna or Beyoncé or some other ultra-confident sex symbol that men lusted after and women wanted to be.

“What are you laughing at?” Morgan asked her point-blank.

Damn
.
Didn’t this girl know how to improvise? Didn’t she see the five cameras that had circled their cabana?
Apparently not.

“Oh, sorry. I was just going to tell you this hilarious story!” She laughed again and made sure to show her good side to the cameras.

Suddenly, the women grew quiet. And thank God for that because she didn’t really have a hilarious story up her sleeve. She was going to make one up on the spot.

She turned to see what the women were looking at.
Oh my God.
It was
him
. Or at least it had to be. He was a walking cliché, but he was goddamn beautiful.

The man was tall, dark, and strikingly handsome. As he got closer, she saw that his dark brown eyes matched his shaggy brown hair perfectly. His olive skin looked like it was glowing next to the white linen shirt and slim-cut dark blue jeans he was wearing. In a word:
yum
.

For one split second, you could have heard a pin drop. And then the perfect silence was shattered by the shrieking, chattering, and giggling of twelve female voices.

All of the women tried to not-so-gracefully elbow their way to the front of the group to be the first to meet the bachelor. Morgan was the smart one. She held out her hand and asked his name. Why didn’t she think of that?

The bachelor grinned back at her with a mouthful of beautiful, white teeth. “It’s Ky. And you are?”

“Morgan.” Morgan smiled back. She seemed to be off to a great start. Harper was going to have to make her way to the front of the group to get a little face time with Ky, stat. But she’d have to get past Kylie, Brinkley, both Sarahs, and Amber first.

Those girls were like dogs with a bone. They all had gorgeous smiles plastered across their beautiful faces, but they meant business. And as for the women who were hanging back, what was their story? Kymm sat nervously on one of the cushioned cabana benches, picking at her nails and probably waiting for Ky to come to her.

W
ell, if she was playing hard to get, she was going to have to play really, really hard.
There was no way in hell Ky was going to notice a wallflower sitting in the background. Not when he had eleven other aggressive ladies to choose from.

And Lindsay appeared to be totally oblivious. She was topping off her glass of champagne and filling up her plate with crudités instead of standing in line to meet Ky for the first time.
What was this girl’s game?
Either she didn’t give a shit about the bachelor, or she was going for a mysterious, I-don’t-care-vibe, which wasn’t likely to get her anywhere.
Amateurs
.

Finally, it was her turn to meet the beautiful bachelor. She turned on the charm 100%. She dropped her voice an octave lower so that it sounded low, throaty, and husky. Her sex voice, as she liked to call it. She rasped, “Hi, Ky, I’m Harper.”

Although she held out her hand as a greeting, she stood a few steps back so that Ky had to step closer to her to shake her hand. It was that kind of subtle flirtation warfare that made it easy for her to get any guy she wanted. It was all about the subliminal. If a guy unconsciously had to step closer to you, he felt like he was chasing you, without you having to play hard to get.

Ky beamed back at her. “It’s wonderful to meet you. Where are you fr-”

But before he could finish the question, a slim, toned arm snaked through his and flipped him one hundred and eighty degrees in the opposite direction.
Damn that Amber.
No one liked a cockblocker this early in the game.

Amber pulled Ky toward her spot in the cabana and handed him a full glass of champagne. She giggled as she whispered in his ear, “I thought you might be thirsty. Isn’t this whole scene just over the top? Why don’t you sit down a moment and take a break. There’s lots of food and champagne. And I could rub your back.”

Um, that was a little obvious, wasn’t it?
No guy in his right mind would fall for that kind of cheesy, soap opera come on. But Ky seemed to take the bait. Or maybe he was just playing nice in front of the cameras. That was the thing about a reality dating show. You never knew if someone meant what they were saying or was just doing it for a good sound bite.

Finally, the women and the bachelor all managed to settle into the cushioned cabana together. The cameras were still rolling. The air was thick with excitement. Or was it tension? There seemed to be a few alpha dog females that were trying their hardest to get Ky’s attention.

Kylie, Samantha, and Amber were peppering him with question after question after question. Ky sounded like he was at an interview. A very bad interview.

The women were totally unoriginal. They were asking about stupid shit that nobody really cared about, let alone the viewers. Harper knew that the boring Q and A was going to be edited out before the first episode aired, making it a total waste of time.

Samantha got the ball rolling by asking if Ky had any pets. But before he could finish answering the question, Amber was on him like a ton of bricks.

“Oh, a dog! I love dogs! What’s your favorite place to travel? Have you ever been to Paris? It’s such a beautiful, romantic city.” Amber looked meaningfully into Ky’s eyes as she awaited his response.

“Um, no, I haven’t yet. But I have spent some time in London, which is a great city to visit, especially if—”

Sarah M. piped up out of nowhere. “So what do you look for in a woman? We would all really, really love to know the answer to that one.”

Whoa, Sarah M. came out with both guns blazing. Whatever happened to subtlety and the art of conversation?
Clearly, all bets were off.

Ky took a moment to reflect on her question. It might have been her imagination, but he seemed to turn slightly to the camera to his right as he pondered with a sexy frown on his face. “You know, Sarah, that’s a great question.”

Sarah beamed back at him with delight. Probably because he’d remembered her name.
Big fucking deal
.

She didn’t want to admit it, but she was all ears to hear the answer to that revealing question. If she could just find out what this gorgeous hunk of man was looking for, she could become that woman. And then they would have a chance at falling in love. On TV, no less!

She would finally be done dating geezer after geezer just because he had a semi-decent body and a fat bank account. She would finally be able to find a young, gorgeous man that matched her perfectly. Someone special she could spend the rest of her life with.

She felt herself getting sucked into the whole love thing the more the cameras kept rolling. Maybe it was the atmosphere—watching a beautiful tropical sunset at an exotic resort. Or maybe it was the company—a handsome single man looking for love.