He winked and mouthed, “Trust me.” Before taking his seat in front of one of the most renowned sports interviewers, Halie Jones.
Halie smiled and talked to Trip as they settled in the chairs. The crew scrambled around for the last minute checks before the woman in the red business suit shushed us again.
Halie smiled at the camera and started her intro. “Hello, sports fans. I have a special interview for you today. As you can see, Trip Butler’s here and has picked our show to come clear on the controversy surrounding his relationship with Robin Sands and the mystery woman he was kissing the other day. Welcome.”
Trip glanced at me before sucking in a deep breath. My mom came up and hugged me from behind, while Renee held my hand and Robin stood next to me.
I held my breath until Trip opened his mouth. “Thank you for letting me on your show to sort some things out.”
“You’re very welcome. This drama has had our viewers on the edge of their seats, and it will be nice to get this exclusive to them first.”
“Let me first say that Robin and I are not seeing each other. We’re mutual friends who respect each other deeply. And because of our friendship, Robin agreed to be my pretend girlfriend to help me keep my current girlfriend out of the spotlight.”
“So you’re telling me, you and Robin were never involved? That isn’t going to make our viewers happy at all.” Halie’s face turned to the camera with a glint in her eyes. She knew she was getting ratings gold.
“Sorry, but right now I’d rather make her happy. Don’t get me wrong, I love my fans. I know I wouldn’t be where I am without them, but I love her more. They can be as mad as they want as long as they direct it toward me and not her. She’s innocent.”
“So you’re telling me, Robin agreed to be your public girlfriend to protect your private one?”
“Can you blame me?” Trip asked her, leaning in as he spoke. “Look at what happened to her when they saw a picture of us kissing. The comments made about her, without having the whole story were vicious.”
“To be fair they thought you were in a committed relationship with Robin.”
“I understand, and I’m sorry for lying to all of you.” Trip stared straight into the camera. “But I wanted to protect her from exactly what happened, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. She’s the best thing to ever happen to me and I don’t want our relationship to suffer because of something taken out of context for a story. Since the cat’s out of the bag, and I can’t protect her from the spotlight any longer, I want to declare my intentions, and I wanted all of you to be a part of it. Just so everyone knows how I feel.”
Renee squeezed my hand while letting out a silent squeal, I could assume only dogs heard.
“Robin, can you please escort McKenna over here?” Trip asked.
Robin grabbed my hand and I floated across the lawn with her as my anchor.
Everything felt surreal. As if I were watching it from outside my body.
Everyone on the outside perimeter started whispering, and red suit lady gave them the evil eye. But even her fierce peepers couldn’t stop their excitement.
“I believe this woman’s yours,” Robin said to Trip, placing my hand in his.
“Thank you, Robin.”
She smiled and moved out of the shot, but lingered on the perimeter as she chewed on her fingernail.
“What are you doing?” I hissed at Trip, trying to fix my hair with my free hand.
“Something I’ve been thinking about for a while now.”
Trip went down on one knee and the whole crowd gasped, including me. “McKenna Hope Raine, I Alfred DeWayne Butler.”
“Oh my God, he said his full name,” Harley cried from somewhere on the lawn, receiving a loud hush from red suit lady.
“I’m here in front of as many people as I could gather in such a short period to declare my absolute love and devotion to you. And to ask you if you’d be my wife?”
My knees hit the porch as Trip held out a ring box. I watched in fascination as he opened it. A large black diamond nestled inside a ring of tiny yellow diamonds sparkled back at me.
“It looks like the bat symbol,” I said, staring down at it.
“You can wear it every day if you say yes,” Trip said with some hesitation in his voice.
“Yes, yes. A thousand times yes.”
