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“And why are we here?” Will leaned over and asked Donovan in the auditorium of city hall.
“Shh,” Zoe whispered over her shoulder from where she sat in front of them to pay attention to the competition on the stage.
Not everyone in town filled the seats as Donovan had expected. It shocked him to find the disappointment rising in him over the lack of support the science teams received. He guessed most of the cheering crowds were parents of the participants. In his seat in the risers, Donovan couldn’t have been prouder, not just for the girls but also for himself. He’d finally said the words he felt. He loved British. With Tracy, they’d dated six weeks and he still wasn’t sure. With British, Donovan just knew. Every feeling—happiness, joy—felt right.
As of right now, the last two teams standing were the STEM for GRITS and the boys’ robotics team from Southwood. British sat in the row behind the judges. From Donovan’s understanding, when the girls advanced through each round, they were allowed to bring a member of their team, expanding from the original four: Stephanie, Lacey, Natasha and Kathleen. There were now two extra girls helping them.
The girls had taken Donovan’s suggestion and come up with a few holiday-themed suggestions. His favorite had been the one from Stephanie. She’d created a mood necklace with quartz glass and thermotropic liquid crystals to demonstrate the various heat levels. In the beginning of the experiment, the girls passed out crystals to the mothers in the audience. They also selected few random boys in the audience on the robotics team—including the Quandriguez fellow Stephanie had a crush on. The goal at the end of the demonstration for each participant was to keep the mood rock at a teal color, which meant a calm state, and the orders were to make sure the mothers remained teal during the holidays.
For a bonus round the GRITS team paraded in front of the boys’ team wearing various mood rocks. The girls brought the mothers of the committee onstage, handed them noise canceling earphones and then one by one listed off all the shopping, errands, decoration duties, holiday parties and everything needed for a smooth Christmas to each mother. To some, the girls said that everything was fine. The mood rocks for the mothers with less to do turned teal. The rings for the other mothers turned black, meaning they were stressed. The suggestion for the children of the mothers onstage was for them to know when to pitch in and help their moms or stay out of the way.
As for the boys, the girls examined their rocks, all while still wearing their various forms of jeans, T-shirts and turtlenecks. By the end of the experiment all the boys’ mood rocks stayed in the red zone, which varied between excited and stimulated. For Cam’s sake, the girls changed their variable each time by changing outfits, and no matter what they wore, from a lab coat to a pair of shorts and T-shirt or even a turtleneck, the boys were still distracted. The demonstration received a standing ovation from the mothers, female teachers and Donovan, as well.
Cam sneered a
nd sank lower in his seat. Donovan’s palms itched to be wrapped around his throat.
“See that girl,” Donovan said, pointing at Stephanie, who was front and center wearing a pink-Bedazzlered lab coat. “She’s going to be a future Ravens Cosmetics employee.”
“She’s a bit young to be the company’s face,” said Will. “I was looking for someone older. Speaking of which, can we end this search, get out of Southwood and just hire Tracy? She’s been all over social media, which works in our favor.”
Zoe twisted in her seat. “Excuse me?”
“I love Southwood, babe.” Will corrected himself and leaned over to kiss his wife on the cheek.
“Don’t forget my dad wants to sell the house,” she said, “and we could easily move back here.”
Donovan’s laugh froze and an idea popped into his head. The Mas house had once been used as a classroom and family home. Zoe’s great-grandmother had taught young ladies the chemistry behind makeup as well as how to sell beauty products and styling. Many of her students had worked with Donovan’s grandparents, who’d run the place in the early days of Ravens Cosmetics. Considering Miami was the home base for RC, having a satellite office might be ideal. He crunched the numbers in his head and in his heart.
He’d meant it when he said he loved British. He would do anything to stay with her.
“Look,” Will continued once his wife stopped giving him the evil eye. “Like the rest of us featured on Dana’s bright idea of a reality show, Tracy got hold of the prereleased episode airing tonight.”
There’d been a large attachment from MET Studios in Donovan’s work email earlier this week. He’d ignored it and focused on the thousands of corporate emails delegated to his job. During what time he did have to spend with British, television was the last thing on his mind.
“She wasn’t even in anything,” Donovan said bitterly. “When I left, I didn’t say a word to her. I didn’t wake her up or anything.”
Will leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and his fingers pressed to his temple. “What?”
“I was never on film with her. Why would she be included?”
“Donovan, she’s been tweeting for the last twenty-four hours about a huge secret.”
The pit of his stomach dropped. “What secret?”
“The hell if I know,” Will said, shaking his head.
Donovan reached into the lining of his suit jacket and extracted his cell phone. Nothing happened. He couldn’t get a signal. “I need to reach Amelia Reyes,” he said.
“Amelia?” Zoe turned around again in her seat. “She was actually in town. You know she’s from here.”
Now that he thought about it, Amelia was the one who’d recommended Donovan come here to hang out after they filmed. “I don’t have her number.”
“C’mon.” Zoe pushed away from her seat awkwardly and handed Will her program. “We’ll be right back.”
Will chuckled and rolled his eyes. “I’m coming, too.”
Donovan hated to skip out on the crowning portion of the competition but he knew the girls were going to win. They had it in the bag, thanks to Kathleen’s coding of a train robot with a vacuum that went around the stem of a Christmas tree and cleaned up pine needles and broken ornaments while it played Christmas songs.
