The Husband Hunt - Kat's Season (The Bachelor Series) (6 page)

 
           “I keep thinking I need to pull out my camera,” Ben said to her as he poured a frosty mug of orange juice, “And then I remember that we’re not allowed any camera’s or phones.”

 
           “We’ll see it all on TV in three months.” She took the mug when he offered it.

 
           “Not all of it. The things I want to remember won’t be what they show on TV.” He clinked mugs and went off to the buffet.

 
           Sam sat down by her, quietly apologizing for leaving her at the back of the line.

 
           “That’s fine. I wasn’t in a hurry.” Kat didn’t care. The bike ride had been a wonderful experience, solitary and peaceful.

 
           The group ate and joked about getting back on the bikes, but they were done with their ride. The rest of road down to sea level was too busy for a line of meandering bikes. “Now, we are going to a wildlife sanctuary where they rescue and rehabilitate injured animals.” Kat had chosen this place, wanting to draw attention to a good cause on Maui.

 
           Everyone piled in the van, thankful to be off the small bike seats, and drove along the volcano’s side, through Makawao, eventually coming to a locked gate. ‘The Ohana Sanctuary for Maui’s Wildlife’ the sign read.

 
           Once inside the gates and out of the van, the group was toured through a facility that cared for injured mongooses, a baby boar, two wild goats, several small deer, squirrels, and two one legged birds as well as an assortment of other birds and small animals. Kat had heard they were going to have to close if they didn’t get more funding. Tony seemed disappointed he wasn’t able to pet something until the caretaker informed him that they tried to keep the animals lives as wild as they could.

 
           “What’s it matter if you don’t think you’ll ever release them again. With one foot or injuries too bad to survive in the wild why not make a pet out of some of them?”

 
           “It’s not our policy,” she said.

 
           Kat smiled sympathetically at the woman as Tony shrugged.

 
           After an hour of taped interviews, Kat took each man aside for a private talk about how they were doing. Of course Tony played hurt that he hadn’t had alone time with her before now and pulled her in for a kiss. When she turned away, she wondered why she didn’t just kiss the man.

 
           “You want to kiss me,” he said. “I know you do, the way you stare at my mouth,” he smirked.

 
           “Maybe I want it to be my idea.” Kat stared hard into those dark eyes. She imagined there would be many battles for supremacy with Tony. Not a lot of budging in a lifetime of arguments. They were just so different, so why couldn’t she just ignore her attraction to him?

 
           “Well, make it your idea because someone is going to interrupt us any minute.” He lowered his chin and gave her a look that made a jolt of electricity shock her core. Wow. This guy was really something. There was no going back now. She leaned forward and kissed his lovely lips lightly. There was no participation on his end, his eyes remained open and when she pulled back, she smirked at him. “You don’t like it when I lead?”

 
           “No.” He put a finger under her chin, tipped her head up and claimed her mouth in a red hot, steamy, sexy kiss. His tongue dove for hers.

 
           When they came up for air, Kat absently glanced at the camera, a big no no, and took a deep breath.

 
           “See?” Tony said. “It’s better when I lead.” He stood, grabbed his jacket and moved off, leaving her breathless and discombobulated.

That night there was a knock on her cabana door, and thinking it was a production assistant, she opened the door wearing an tight tank top and shorts. Before her stood Tony and Sam, hands in pockets, looking like they had a secret. “Hi, Guys, Whats’up?”

 
           “Can we talk for a minute?” Tony asked, and motioned inside the room.

 
          A cameraman followed them in as Sam and Tony moved to the couch area where they all sat. “What’s going on?”

 
           Sam looked at Tony and nodded. “We wanted to warn you that not everyone here has an honest motive. Not everyone is here to find love.”

 
          Tony sat forward. “Sam and I don’t think it’s fair for you to not know what’s going on, but we don’t feel it’s our place to tell you exactly what’s happening.” Tony looked convinced that was all he’d say.

 
           “What makes you think someone isn’t here for the right reason?” She knew who she hoped it wasn’t. There were three or four men she’d hate to think were only on the show for exposure on national TV.

 
           “He says stuff around us.” Sam looked like it pained him to say this. “Not nice stuff. He might even have a girlfriend.” The two men exchanged a glance and Kat stood to look at the producer. Then back to Sam. “Who is it?”

 
           The producer shrugged and Kat turned to Sam again. “Please tell me if you know anything.”

 
           “That’s just it. We think he might still have someone back home but we aren’t 100% sure.”

 
           “Well if you’re not sure, then tell me, and I can ask him.” She needed to know.

 
           Tony stepped forward and touched her arm. “Just be careful and don’t keep anyone around unless you feel genuine feelings from them, Sweetie.”

 
           If Tony hadn’t been telling her this, she’d guess it was him but now he seemed more intimate, approachable. Real. “This is strange, to have you come here to tell me someone isn’t being honest with me, but you can’t tell me who.” Another camera had arrived and both were rolling.

 
           “Just choose wisely,” Sam said.

 
           That was all they’d say. Kat saw them out and closed the door behind them. What the heck? She looked at the producer but Mary and the director were already setting up the shot for Kat’s reaction to her visit from Sam and Tony, with an excited gleam in their eyes. These people didn’t care about Kat or if she ever ended up with the love of her life.

            She tossed and turned in bed all night but rose with a new attitude. She’d go with the flow of the day. Whoever it was that Tony and Sam were talking about, would be flushed out soon enough. Kat’s best friends from San Francisco would fly in that night and interview the remaining men the next day. Jackie and Elizabeth would see through anyone’s bullshit on her behalf.

 
           And today she had a one on one date with Pierce. She’d asked for him specifically to tour the Lahaina art galleries. Afterwards there’d be a picnic lunch up in the pineapple fields of Kapalua.

 
           By the time she finished breakfast in her room, Pierce would’ve read the date card and know they were going to spend the day together. Hopefully he’d be as excited as her. She could hardly wait to stare at him all day, get to know him better and see if the fantasy she had of them living in New York after this could be a reality.

 
           The date started off with the anticipation of a fantastic day. Pierce and Kat set off on their tour, arm in arm, joking that one whole section had been closed on Lahaina’s busiest main street to accommodate their date. “It’s like we’re spoiled royalty,” Pierce said, kissing the back of her hand.

 
           By the last gallery, Kat was astounded with Pierce’s perception and knowledge of art. He had a fine arts degree, he said, and sounded like a man who’d studied for years. “Do you miss creating, being here on the show, without any way to sculpt?”

 
           He smiled, looking off at the ocean to their left. “I do. But I brought a sketch pad and I’m working, which I think is actually very symbiotic to my clay work. I’m loving the sketching. Do you draw?”

 
           “Yes, I have a sketch pad in my room and filled one already since the show started.” Talking art with Pierce made her feel like someone shared the most important part of her life and by the time they reached the pineapple field in Kapalua for the picturesque picnic, Kat was wondering why Pierce hadn’t kissed her yet. They’d certainly spent enough time together, getting to know one another. She wanted him to but all he seemed to do was hold her hand or kiss her hand after she said something funny. She considered pulling her hand to her face at the last minute to substitute the object of his affection.

 
           They sat on a pretty picnic blanket, in the postcard-perfect area of Kapalua, with Ponderosa pines towering over them, and fed each other fresh pineapple, mango and papaya. When Kat giggled that she was dribbling pineapple juice all over her chin, Pierce leaned in. She thought he was going for the kiss, but then stopped himself after he rubbed noses with her.

 
           “You know you can kiss me, Pierce.”

 
           “Not with cameras,” he whispered away from the cameras. “I want our first kiss to be private. Special.”

 
           She’d barely heard him, but the look on his face made her want to drool all over again. Maybe she had something stuck in her teeth and he couldn’t kiss her. Or maybe he wasn’t into her, like she was into him. Pierce hadn’t had the ‘strolling the streets of NY’ fantasy like her. “If we end up together, what do you see our lives like?” It was the big question, but Pierce didn’t flinch.

 
           “Fun, crazy-filled days like this. Too intimate for anyone else to understand, but free, and confined at the same time. Confined to each other. We’ll hole up in my place for about a year and not come out until we can let another person into our circle.” His expression was so intense, Kat almost gasped even though he’d hardly said anything she understood.

 
           Pierce was amazing, and when they parted later that afternoon, Kat was falling hard for the artist from New York. When the cameras arrived to tape her comments about the date, she couldn’t help but say that she was falling for Pierce. She used words like ‘perfect,’ ‘heavenly’, ‘worth waiting for’.

This time it was Ben who asked to speak with Kat. Alone. He wanted the conversation off camera but was told they needed to film. No negotiation. Mary told Kat all this before she met him on the beach after sunset. He was sitting on the sand, staring out at the darkened ocean when she sat down beside him. “Hi Ben. You wanted to see me?” She wanted to kiss his shoulder, touch him, but refrained.

 
           “I feel terrible telling you this, but I’m worried for you, Kat.”

 
           “She could see that the director, Jim was practically salivating to hear what Ben would say. Her attraction was to him was powerful and she had to focus on what he was saying. Trying to not think of how soft his lips were, she entered the conversation. “Why? What’s going on, Ben?”

 
           “One of the guys here, I’m pretty sure has a girlfriend” He took a deep breath and watched the surf roll in to the Maui sandy shore. “I’m worried that you’re going to get hurt.”

 
           “Why do you think this person has a girlfriend?” Who could it be? No one she cared about. This revelation mattered less after her amazing date with Pierce, than it had last night. If Blake or Lance came on the show for business exposure, she’d have them leave. There were several men in the group who had her attention but after today she was filled with Pierce and hadn’t come down from the date yet, regardless of the absence of a kiss.

 
           “He mentioned that he has a relationship that isn’t over, exactly, and that he’s on the show to promote his work.”

 
           Lance or Blake. He had a business. Or Colton. Maybe Sam. That was alright. They were expendable. She’d be sorry to let one of them go but at this point she was having to zero in on husband material anyway, and she wasn’t entirely sure about Colton. Or Blake. It would be a shame about Sam.

 
           “Who is it, Ben? Can you tell me, because I really need to know if someone is making a joke of this. I’m putting my heart on the line here.”

 
           “I know.” He took her hand. “It’s someone you like very much. That’s the hard part.”

 
           And then she knew. It was Pierce. Her heart fell into the pit of her stomach. “Pierce has a girlfriend?” She didn’t want to cry in front of Ben. He was a nice guy and she didn’t want him to see her like this. Especially if he was developing feelings for her, like she had been with him, until Pierce became the only front runner.

 
           Ben nodded. “There’s a woman. He lives with her. She’s an ad executive. They agreed he’d come on the show before some big art show this summer to promote his work.”

 
           Her eyes widened. “You know a lot more than you said!”