Page 105 of Most Eligible
As he finishes singing, the crowd’s cheers are deafening. I seem to be the only one not screaming because I’m still stuck on this last line. Did he essentially just ask me to spend the rest of my life with him, while I’m disguised and we’re both trapped in an endless reality TV hamster wheel?
I catch his eye, and he winks at me. He leans into the microphone, says, “Or something like that,” and the crowd screams, dazzled by his humility.
Something like that. I smile.
That I can live with.
I’m waiting outside like a groupie when Rhett exits through the stage door of the club. A few others have lined up to see him, and I hover in the back of the crowd, waiting for him to disentangle himself from his fans.
Over the heads of a few teenagers, he catches my eye and gives me a small smile. Swinging his guitar behind his back, he excuses himself from the crowd and comes over to me.
He gives my baseball cap a playful tug and opens his mouth to speak.
“Don’t,” I whisper, putting my finger to his lips. “Me first?”
He nods as the crowd disperses around us. Once they’re gone, I take a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Rhett. I’m so sorry.” I start shaking and wind my arms around myself, trying to catch my breath. “I got in so deep and I was so desperate and I didn’t think I could trust you and… and I screwed this up so badly. I thought it was over, and I was going to let it be, because you made it clear that you didn’t want this. But then I talked to Serena, and she said…” I search his eyes, hoping he’ll silently confirm what I’m about to say. “She said you asked her to keep me out of the story. I know I don’t deserve it, but I want this so badly. And I need another chance to make it up to you.”
His eyes crinkle as he looks at me. “The stuff about Cassidy isn’t a big deal.” He sucks in a breath, shifting his weight. “Last year I hoped I could keep everyone in the dark, but I know now that I can’t. I told her to go ahead and publish it, and honestly… it’s freeing.” He rubs his jaw, eyebrows stitched in the middle of his forehead.
“I wanted to protect you,” I whisper. “Serena said that if I got her more about Roland, she’d leave you alone, so I had to stay, but then it all went to shit, and there wasn’t anything I could do. But I’m done with her now—the job, everything. It’s over.”
He nods slowly. “I wish we’d been able to talk about it.”
I press my lips together. Of course this wasn’t going to be easy. Of course, I couldn’t just apologize and kiss him and make everything better.
“I wish we had, too,” I say, taking a step back.
His mouth pulls up in a half smile and he catches my arm, drawing me back to him. “Georgia, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m wild about you. And I chose this—I could’ve lied to her, tried to get her not to publish it, but I want it out in the open. I want a clean slate.”
“I love you,” I whisper. It takes me by surprise, but the second I say it, I know it’s right. Saying it is as easy as breathing, nothing like the hack job confession I gave Roland last week. I wind my fingers in the hem of Rhett’s T-shirt and hope he’ll say it back to me.
He presses his lips to mine, pulling me in so close I’m on tiptoe as he whispers, “I love you,” against my lips. “Is that—is that possible? In six weeks?”
“A year and six weeks,” I remind him. “And if it isn’t possible, I think Lainey might be out of a job. But she might be anyway… I’m going to publish the article without Serena. As myself. I have to finish what I started.”
The smile on his face warms my chest. “I’m proud of you,” he says. “Can I give you an exclusive scoop?”
I grin at him. “Of course. But I’d like some things to stay off the record.” I stand on tiptoe to kiss him again, before pulling back.
“There’s one more thing.” I bite my lip. “I’m staying for the proposals. Not for Roland, or Lainey, or Serena… For Monica.I don’t—she shouldn’t have to feel like a last resort—the only one left, you know?”
His eyebrows scrunch together but he nods. “Of course,” he says. He points between us. “I trust this. I trust you.”
I beam at him. “Are you sure?”
He nods, staring into my eyes like I’m the whole world. “There’s nothing stopping us. We can run around LA like a couple of kids, I can take you back to Tennessee sometime, meet my mom, I’ll come meet your folks, we can get a kitten and watch it live forever, we—”
I throw my arms around his neck and hold on tight. “Thank you,” I choke out. “Thank you.”
“I want you, Georgia.” He tightens his arms around my back. “No expiration date.”
It’s so sweet that my chest caves in a little and my lips find his and I kiss him so long that I have to catch my breath.
“So.” The corners of Rhett’s kiss-swollen lips twitch up. “Did you like my song?”
“It was very cheeky of you, Rhett Auburn,” I say. “If I didn’t know any better…”If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were proposing to me.“Well, at any rate,” I say, and grin, “I’d like something like that.”
I thread my arm through his, and we head back to the street to catch a cab back to the mansion.
