‘It wasn’t just once, was it,’ I said tightly.
‘No,’ Romeo-Dylan admitted.
I pinched the bridge of my nose, hard.
How the hell had they pulled this off? This room was wired with cameras. I’d been through a lot of the footage personally, and someone had at least glanced at all of it. Explaining away the one night that I’d let Romeo-Dylan come here and take Cece away had been difficult. Someone absolutely would have told me if it had been going on every—
Oh.
Oh hell.
‘Fuck me,’ I groaned.
There was only one person who could have masterminded this. One person who hadextensiveexperience sneaking out of the Convent for sex purposes.
‘Did you know about this?’ I asked Lily.
In that moment, if a genie had appeared and given me one wish, it would have been for her to say no.
If it had given me another, it would have been for her to say no in a way I actually believed.
If it had given me a third, it would be to turn back time.
I would sacrifice sleeping with her. I would sacrifice ever having any kind of romantic relationship with her. If she wanted to marry fifty other Jeffs, I would be the best man at every one of her weddings, if it meant I could have Lily Ong back – the best friend who would never lie to me, the womanI could trust implicitly, the partner who had my back the way I had hers.
The genie didn’t appear. There was only Lily Fireball, perched on the arm of an ugly armchair, batting her eyelashes.
‘You knew these two were undermining the whole show,’ I said, ‘and you didn’t say a word to me?’
‘I’m not your servant, Murray. You know that very well.’
All those times she’d been in bed with me. All those times she’d helped me with my plans. All those times she’d elbowed me jokingly in the ribs and told me rigging the show was a bad idea.
All that time,she’d known.
‘They didn’t undermine the show.’
‘What?’ I snapped.
It had been Amanda who’d spoken. ‘They didn’t undermine the show. It’s supposed to be about falling in love, isn’t it? They fell in love.’
I love you too, Lily had said to me, just this morning.
I had rigged this season in the first place because I wanted to make something perfect for her. My heart, laid on her doorstep.
And I had rigged it because I didn’t know how to make something perfect without her, the other half of my brain.
She knew all of this. How high the stakes were. How hard I had flung myself into a wall of work, trying to make it come together.
She’d undercut me anyway.
I was willing to break myself into a million pieces for her. Go along with her awful,awfulplan to turn herself into Lily Fireball. Have half a life with her, stolen moments inthe dark, late at night. I loved her so much I would do anything – become anything – compromise on anything – if it meant keeping her.
She had told me she loved me, and then she’ddone this anyway.
‘That’s not actually correct,’ I said tightly. ‘This show isn’t about falling in love. It’s about telling a love story the audience can believe.’
‘And who would believe he could fall in love with me, right?’ Cece muttered.
