Chapter 23: Fact or Fake

Cora lay facedown on the beach lounger, soaking in the sensation of strong hands massaging sunscreen into her skin. She couldn't complain. Jamie certainly knew how to lay it on thick. He had been, ever since last night, whispering to her in the darkness.

Stay...

If it were up to me, I'd choose you in a heartbeat...

Blue eyes are beautiful, but hazel eyes are too...

Stay another night...

Exhaustion had settled over her by that point, a thick fog obscuring her thoughts. Too tired to argue, she'd promised to answer him in the morning, even though she knew in her gut that her decision wouldn't change.

She wanted to go home. Period. Final. Only one little problem with that plan...

They'd both overslept.

Cora's eyes had opened to the golden rays of morning light filtering through the curtains and the sound of the crew's all-terrain vehicles crunching on the sand outside the bungalow. The rumbling engines had shuddered into silence, and the silhouette of Mel's 4'11" frame loomed in the front doorway before Cora had time to remember where she was—or make a break for her own bedroom.

"Rise and shine, my lovelies! Are you decent?"

How could anyone have a voice that sunny at such an hour? A morning person. Ugh. "Go away," Cora had croaked in Mel's direction. But that hadn't stopped the producer from barging into the bungalow's main bedroom, streaming sunshine in her wake.

So there Cora had found herself. Caught in Jamie's bed with half a dress around her waist, a backward tuxedo jacket for a top, and a nearly-naked underwear model cloaking her from behind. Not exactly a picture of innocence. It certainly looked like something other than sleeping had happened in that bed last night, and trusty Cameron with his camera had captured all the damning evidence for the eyes of the viewing public.

All this had dawned on Cora's whirling mind in the moments before Jamie stirred beside her and un-snaked the arm curled around her waist.

To his credit, Jamie had made a scene, demanding they show some decency and get the camera out of the room until Cora had a chance to scramble for the bathroom. Mel and Robbie had granted them five minutes' grace to get dressed. Cora took four-and-a-half to change into a swimsuit and rope her hair into a messy bun, with 30 seconds remaining to hiss a few hasty words in Jamie's direction.

"Don't you dare send me home now. Do you hear me? Don't you dare."

It wasn't prudishness so much as pride that led to this abrupt alteration to her travel plans. Cora saw no shame in two consenting adults enjoying any sleeping arrangements they liked. No, the real humiliation would be if it looked like Jamie had slept with her and immediately regretted it.

That was exactly how it would look if he sent her home this morning--or even if he didn't send her home, but acted in any way embarrassed at being caught in bed with her.

"Don't pretend like nothing happened for the cameras," she had ordered him in the final fleeting seconds before the crew returned. "We slept together. Own it. Act like you had a good time."

There hadn't been enough time to explain her thinking. She'd bored her eyes into his, hoping the intensity of her look would somehow communicate what she meant telepathically.

Maybe it had worked. He had smiled at her in a different way over breakfast. Almost shy. A plausible rendition of the way a man might look at a woman who'd rocked his world the night before. His gaze kept wavering a trace below her own while they made small talk, as if he found her beauty too overwhelming and couldn't quite bear to look at her full on.

And he'd been touching her all day too. Meaningless little touches. A hand on her elbow as the crew set up their palapa. A knee against hers under the lunch table.  And now this. Offering to lather sunscreen on her back, hours before she needed to reapply.

Cora lay now on her front with her head cradled on her arms. She inhaled a deep lungful of the salty sea air as Jamie's fingers worked the lotion beneath the straps of her coral-pink bikini top. He must have rubbed the excess in by now, but he kept at it, kneading the muscles between her shoulder blades and spine.

A slight smile curled her lips. No sense fighting it. If the universe had conspired to keep her stranded here for another day of this unreality, she may as well relax and enjoy the show.

The producers certainly seemed happy enough with the new turn of events. She had miraculously redeemed herself in the eyes of the showrunners. It had to be mid-afternoon by now, and the producers had been content to let reality unfold all day long without their interference. No more parlor games with silly names. No more hostess with anger-management issues to berate them in between takes.

Jamie had moved on from her shoulders and turned his attention to the lower portion of her back. The heels of his hands ran down either side of her spine with long firm strokes.

Who needed manufactured romance, with Jamie here lathering it on for the cameras with all his might?

Cora let out an approving sigh. Good boy, she messaged telepathically.

Too bad her capacity for mental telepathy only extended to outgoing messages. She didn't have the faintest clue what might be going through her co-star's head.

Like his reaction to her story from last night...

She'd never told the full story of that car wreck to another living soul, and his reaction had her baffled. She'd expected judgment first and foremost. Instead, she'd been met by pleas for her to stay.

As if he didn't find the thought of her repugnant.

As if he preferred the company of "fiancé-killer Cora" over "beach-beauty Camilla."

Ludicrous.

Absurd.

But why?

Cora cracked an eye open. She craned her head around to glance down her back at the hands massaging her, mesmerized by the sight of the tendons moving in his forearms as his fingers worked.

"How's that?" Jamie's low murmur cut into her thoughts. "Should I keep going?"

She couldn't tell if his question referred to the state of her sunscreen or his level of attentiveness in general. She looked up at him, but a pair of wire-rimmed aviator sunglasses prevented her from seeing the expression in his eyes. Only the twin warped images of her own face reflected back to her.

"Should I keep going," he might have meant, "or have I expressed enough on-camera affection to satisfy your vanity?"

Cora replied to him in a lazy voice, matching his British accent with a fake one of her own. "Flattery will get you nowhere, Mr. Bond. But don't stop trying."

Jamie grinned. He settled on his beach lounger beside her without answering her back. She couldn't tell if he had caught her reference. That line from some old Bond film. Obviously he recognized it, but that wasn't the reference she meant.

It was the movie quote he had wanted her to say back to him the day they met, during their first conversation over cocktails. She used it now for a reason: To meet his unspoken question with a silent question of her own.

"Is any of this real? Or are we purely playing fictional characters for the cameras. Nothing more."

Jamie reached across the six inch expanse between their chairs and tucked a loosened strand of her hair behind her ear.

Well, that answered her. Loud and clear. Cora rolled onto her back and looked away. 

That little gesture communicated volumes more than any line he might have spoken in response. He'd used the exact same maneuver on her that day at the airport hotel. Two minutes after they met, just before the cameras started rolling. He'd reached across the cocktail table and tucked the exact same strand of hair behind her ear.

He'd repeated himself on purpose. There was no doubt in Cora's mind.

All for show.

She didn't need to be a mind reader to get the message. They were a pair of actors on a stage, and that's all they'd ever been. From the moment they met, he'd flirted with her for one reason and one reason only. A career move. To create the illusion of chemistry between them, and get himself cast on this show.

All these little touches and gestures today meant nothing, and neither did his supplications last night for her to stay. He'd simply decided, for whatever reason, that she would make a better scene partner than her understudy waiting in the wings.

Only one problem with that theory. One detail had been nagging at Cora for days now, and she still didn't have the answer straight. Why was he so desperate to be on this TV show in the first place?

He looked like a model, but he talked like someone she might have encountered in her social circle back at home. Mostly grad students and junior faculty and ivy league alums. It couldn't be an act. He might do impressions of James Bond or Mr. Darcy, but a good education was not something faked so easily. Cora narrowed her eyes, recalling drowsy words whispered in the dark of night.

"Perhaps I'm semi-literate after all..."

"My knowledge of arcana is vast and deep..."

Where had he gone to college? Why was he slumming as a model? She knew enough about British accents to recognize his as posh. The accent of the upper crust. That could be falsified with a bit of elocution practice, but he had the knowledge and vocabulary to back it up as well.

He might have gone to Oxford or Cambridge for all she knew. Maybe he had. Maybe he was the son of some titled family, secretly the heir to the earldom of Hampsterfordshire, only modeling as a way to pass the time until he went back to his real life and his seat in the House of Lords.

She could see it. She could imagine a whole elaborate backstory. It almost hung together, too, except for one little detail that didn't make sense.

Why the desperation? Why the life-or-death urgency not to be dropped by his modeling agency?

It made no sense.

The fact was, Cora knew next to nothing about her scene partner. In all their games of Truth or Dare, she hadn't asked him a single question about himself. Only about his impressions of her. She'd spent the entire time staring into a pair of mirrored lenses. Purely interested in seeing how she appeared through someone else's gaze.

The thought made Cora's face heat up. She turned away before Jamie could see, just in time to see Mel skipping down the beach in their direction.

"OK, love birds. Enough lounging around!"

Oh no. Cora groaned internally. Apparently, Jamie hadn't laid it on thick enough after all. All the sunscreen in the world couldn't shield her from Mel's sunbeam energy.

Jamie lowered his glasses to examine the producer above the frames. "And what delightful torment do you have in store for us today?"

But Cora's eyes had already trailed past Mel and down the length of the beach. She'd been too distracted by her daydreams to notice the small construction project taking place at the far end. Cameras and sound equipment formed a semi-circle around a makeshift set. Facing the cameras, two platforms hovered side-by-side above a large tank of water.

A banner set up in the background was emblazoned with the name of the game.

"Fact or Fake," Cora read aloud with dread.

Mel clapped her hands and hopped from foot to foot. "This should be fun! Just a little guessing game to see how well you two know each other. Do you want to hear the rules?"

Cora suppressed a shudder. "Please tell me that's not a dunk tank."

"Ding ding ding!" Mel chirped. "Don't worry, it'll just be basic biographical info about each other. We'll go back and forth like a lightning round. As long as you guess correctly..."

But Cora had already tuned out. She didn't need to hear the rules. She'd stopped listening after "basic biographical info."

Something told her she was about to get very, very wet.

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