Henry stepped forward, closing the gap with her. “Youreallythink gay bashing in downtown San Francisco is a smart decision?” His voice edged cold and sharp. “You really,reallythink that, with all your years of experience in this world?”
“I’m not a bigot. I could give half a shit if you’re gay. Go be gay. Do it now, I’ll watch.” She rolled her eyes and swept a stray white curl away from her forehead. “But fraternizing isn’t the best decision on a competition show. Especially where someone’s already been kicked off for working too closely with one of her competitors. Be a shame to get caught up in something like that.”
Henry snorted. “Not what we’re doing.”
“Hey, if you think everyone’s going to buy that you two are fucking and not helping each other, take the risk. Let’s see how that turns out.”
Tristan’s whole body burned, and all the good stupor from their dinner blazed away with that heat. “You can’t win on your own damn merits? Have to try and throw us under the bus?”
“I’ve been in this business for a quarter of a century. I deserve a break, and I deserve it way more than you young up-and-comers.” She shrugged. “I’ll make this really simple. One of you throws the next round, then we won’t have any problems. I don’t care which one of you it is. Decide between yourselves: draw straws, thumb war, whatever you need to do. Whoever it is gets paid, gets some nice publicity, and I’lldealwith whoever gets to the final with me.” Her eyes narrowed. “Or you can ignore my beneficent offer, refuse to throw the competition at all. Then the producers find out, and if they don’t like what they see, you won’t get a dime. So it’s up to you how much you want to wager on a roll of the dice.”
“Fucking asshole.” Tristan stepped up next to Henry. “I actually kind of liked you. And you turn around and do this?”
“Turn around? Please.” She rolled her eyes. “I knew you two were competition from the start, and I’m here to compete. You think I’ve been sitting with my thumb up my ass? Please. This is just the first real dirt I’ve managed to get on you, and it’s pretty clean dirt. You’re good guys. Don’t let hubris get in your way, boys.”
“So this show isn’t even about competition to you? This isn’t about honor and baking?” Tristan wanted to punch her. A couple more Manhattans, he might have been seriously tempted, but he was still sober enough to know clocking an old lady was in bad taste. “You want to turn us in to the producers for going against the spirit of this competition, but this is how you’ve been playing?”
“I don’twantto do anything. Ball’s in your court. I’m giving you a chance to not go out like Bertha did.”
“Like Bertha did?” Tristan shook his head. “It was your recipe. Did you ...set her up?”
Willa just turned, lips barely curling upward, and walked her smug ass into the hotel.
What was this? Tristan couldn’t quite pull himself together. His thoughts swam and chased each other in fruitless circles.Willa and Bertha. Chiffon cake. Losing the competition. Losing the money. Lucia. Robert. Henry. Willa. Bertha.Willa had to have been the snitch. That was the only way that her comment made sense.
Henry whipped around. “I am calling the producer in the morning and telling him about this.”
“Telling him about what? That Willa threatened to report us? She’ssupposedto. Or should we mention that I gave you that chiffon cake recipe? Is that what you think we should tell them?” Already, Tristan’s mind followed out the lines of probability, tracking the worst-case scenarios, looking for a solution if there was one to be had. Most of them led to this all being for naught. “If anyone goes to McCall, then all of that gets laid bare. And if they decide the possibility of us having cheated is too high, it doesn’t matter if Willa was trying to cheat. We still lose.”
“She all but admitted that she sabotaged Bertha.”
“Plausible deniability. That’s how this works.”
Henry punched the air as though that were going to do anything. “Well, fuck her.”
“If we’d been a little more careful, this wouldn’t have happened. I got too into the moment. I was riding the high. I—”
“Hey.” Henry grabbed him by the shoulders and led him over to the wall of the hotel, his brows knitting. “Tristan. Chill.”
And then Tristan was back in that hall at the award show and everything felt hot. He identified the snap coming a second too late. “Just stop.” He knocked Henry’s hands away.I need space. I can’t breathe.“You know how important this is. I’ve made it clear how scared I’ve been. But you still grabbed my hand under the fucking table?”
“What? Tristan, you need to calm down.”
“Do not tell me to calm down. No.” If he lost his place here, he’d lose all the money from his appearance. He’d lose any chance at the quarter million. He and his sister would be struggling to eat, let alone to sever her legal ties to Robert.
When he was around Henry, he felt like he was flying. But now he’d gone too close to the sun. “We have as long as we want back in Seattle, Henry. Why couldn’t you wait it out?”
“Tristan—”
“I might lose everything. It all got put at risk, and I didn’t even get a say.”
Henry’s lips curled into a sneer. “You’re acting like I don’t have anything on the line here. I have to prove to—” His jaw clamped shut over the end of that sentence. “What about myreputation?What do you have that’s so import—”
His eyes widened and he started into some stuttering defense, but the words were out.
Tristan couldn’t let them go. “Mysister. My apartment. Maybe my job if Carlita doesn’t like the way this plays in public.” How could Henry be acting like this? He knew—he knew everything. Tristan had dared to open up about... everything. He’d laid himself out for Henry, and yet it didn’t seem to mean jack shit.
“I know you have a lot at stake.” Henry’s voice was quieter. “I’m not trying to belittle that.”
