Page 42 of Unscripted

Acting off instinct, I shoved his shoulder. “What the hell, you scared me!”

He had a weird look on his face, half aloof and half contemplative, as he remained still, standing between me and my exit out of the pantry.

He glanced over his shoulder for a second before stepping forward, crowding into me and the already small space, and closing the door behind him.

“What are you—” I started but stopped when he put a finger to my mouth, telling me to be quiet.

It was perhaps the utter shock of him touching me in such a personal way that had any retort dying on my tongue. I froze, both with surprise and curiosity. What was he doing?

He fiddled with something on his mic pack and then leaned forward toward mine. I looked down just as he was flipping the power button to “OFF.”

There were no cameras in the pantry, and once our mics were off, we were well and truly alone.

Before I could ask him what he was doing, why he had hidden us away and turned our mics off, he spoke.

“I need to ask you something,” he said. He still had that serious look on his face.

“What the hell are you doing?” I let out, finally finding my words. I was still stuck on the fact that he had sequestered us in the pantry.

“I need to ask you something, off camera and with no one listening, but I need you to tell me one thing first,” he said.

I had a million questions, a zigzag of thoughts running through my head. I didn’t know where to start, so I just nodded at him.

“Why are you here?”

“To find my one true love, of course,” I shot back at him.

“Poppy,” he said, seemingly already exasperated with me.

An odd thrill ran through me at hearing him say my name. I don’t think he’d said it out loud yet, and there was something surprisingly satisfying about hearing it, even if it was essentially to scold me.

“Callum,” I shot back.

“I’m serious,” he said.

I was about to give him another sarcastic reason. I had repeated about a million of them since agreeing to do the show.

I was here for love. I wanted a summer of fun under the sun. I was looking for my happily ever after.

But when I looked up at him, something in his gaze stopped me from brushing him off, just like it had that night on the hotel terrace. He was looking at me as though he really wanted to know. It was jarring, staring into his eyes like this, and coupled with the vulnerability I was already feeling, I found myself unable to lie to him.

“Truth?” I asked.

He nodded, still holding my gaze with that intensity I couldn’t place.

I sighed and looked away, unable to maintain eye contact as I told him my real reason for being here. Or, at least, the abridged version of it.

“I needed my work visa extended. I couldn’t . . . I just need to stay in the UK for as long as possible.” I could tell him the truth without telling him the truth. “Also,” I continued, finally looking back up at him, “I couldn’t say no to the money.”

He didn’t say anything for a long moment, and his eyes got a faraway look to them, as though he was working something out.

Then, he finally spoke, and what he said had the world around me spinning, like the Earth was off its axis.

“Let’s stay together for the rest of the show.”

It was so ridiculous that I laughed. Out loud and in his face.

He did not find it funny. In fact, he was scowling at my reaction.