Megan laughed. “Well, thank you. But no, I’m more of a homebody. And school pretty much took most of my savings and time. Med school doesn’t exactly leave space for relaxing on a beach in Bali.”
“I can’t imagine doing what you do,” Elise said, and that was the truth. Operating on little kids was the stuff of nightmares. Their tiny, sick bodies. Their frightened parents. The pressure of holding something so fragile in your hands without breaking it. Elise could barely keep a succulent alive.She also didn’t like kids. Never wanted them. Her nieces were adorable, but thank goodness she could give them back after a visit.
“It’s not easy,” Megan said, and Elise could glimpse the exhaustion beneath the thin layer of bronzer. “But it’s rewarding. I love what I do, which is why I haven’t had any time to date. I know most people make a Tinder profile, and I promise this wasn’t my first choice. But when my colleagues wrote me in for the show, I didn’t think I would get it.”
“But you did, and you decided to seize the moment.”
“Exactly.”
Elise led Megan into what looked like the main living room, which, just like the last room, was aggressively bright. The walls were covered in hand-painted lemon-grove wallpaper, and a sprawling cream boucle sectional sat angled toward the terrace doors. The lacquered olive-green coffee table held a stack of photography books, and above the console table pushed against one wall was another arrangement of lemons, with a trio of vintage Amalfi travel posters hanging above.
Once they’d seen all they needed to see, and Megan had oohed her way through the dining room with its massive marble twelve-seater, Elise led her toward the kitchen.
“You’ll be staying in the villa with the ten contestants,” she said. “We really enjoyed that dynamic in the previous season.”
The double sliding glass doors that opened to the citrus garden suddenly swished apart, and Harper walked in. She moved the pair of Oakleys up to her head, and Elise could see her eyes. Her warm, honey-brown eyes that had once upon a time stared so intently into Elise’s soul she’d gotten the shivers.
Elise was just about to ignore Harper completely and say something about the U-Haul compatibility test they’d cooked up for mid-season, when Harper walked past her and stuck out herhand to Megan. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Harper Angel. I’ll be taking all your photos this season. Glamor, confessionals, date shoots, the works.”
Megan smiled. Her eyes did a quick flick up and down, the kind of once-over you gave when someone was extremely attractive, and Elise felt her stomach drop like a large stone tossed in the Tyrrhenian Sea.
“It’s nice to meet you, Harper Angel,” she said. Wait, were those stars in her eyes? Elise sure as hell hoped not. She did not need her bachelorette to develop a crush on the photographer. Especially not the photographer named Harper Angel.
“Is that your real name?” Megan asked. “I always find it so interesting when people have names that sound like they either belong in a book or a song.”
Elise knew the answer to this. Harper’s real name was actually Diana Harper Llewelyn-Abbott. Double-barreled, aggressively British and impossibly posh. Harper had only started calling herself Harper Angel after that near-fatal fall during a climbing trip in her early twenties. She’d told Elise all about it sitting against one of those petrified trees on a plot of white clay at Deadvlei with a dreamy look in her eye: ‘It felt like I was caught by something that logically shouldn’t have been there.’ Elise had felt euphoric when Harper had confided in her about something so personal. But then again, she’d felt euphoric about most things Harper had said or done.
“What do you think?” Harper asked Megan now. Her head tilted just a touch to the right, and her left incisor caught the light just as she grazed it lightly against her bottom lip.
Great. She was flirting. Which Elise found infuriating and confusing. And who gave a shit if Harper was flirting. As long as she didn’t sleep with the bachelorette. Not that she would, because not only was Harper supposedly straight, she was also married. Wait. Wasn’t she married?
Elise’s gaze snapped down to Harper’s hand. To her very empty ring finger. And then suddenly, Elise’s entire world felt like it came crashing down. Harper Angel was divorced.
Chapter Five
Harper felt like a golden eagle plucked from the jagged cliffs of the Himalayas and dropped unceremoniously onto a limestone-paved driveway in Positano. She was used to tracking Andean condors as they circled canyon rims, or watching a markhor pick its way across a cliff face in northern Pakistan or freezing her tits off in the wind-swept Atacama just to catch the perfect shot of dawn spilling across the salt flats.
Now it was all heels clicking, makeup artists panicking about which lipstick would survive the Mediterranean sun—seriously, who cared—and stylists running around with dresses draped over their arms. Everywhere she looked, there were people rushing, fussing, and calling across each other like a colony of capuchin monkeys scrambling for fruit.
Harper was so far out of her element she didn’t know if she was coming or going. Her lungs ached for the thin, crisp air of the Andes, not the scent of hairspray and lemons and whatever incense was lingering in the foyer.
But she had no right to complain. She wasn’t there against her will. Quite the opposite, actually. Harper had responded to the email that had landed in her spam box like a sign from above. Instead of taking time to heal, or use her newfound free time to do something meaningful like go on a well-deserved holiday—or you know, find herself since the reason she got a divorce was because she had no idea who she was anymore—she’d researchedThe Sapphic Match, came across Elise’s face in an online article and applied for the job at once.
Which she regretted now. Hugely.
Elise didn’t even know who she was. Or at least she pretended she didn’t. Harper wasn’t sure which was worse. Or were they equally humiliating? She pondered which was sadder just as the first stretch limo hissed its brakes. The door opened, and Harper lifted her camera without even thinking. Her thumb rested on the focus ring, her index finger feathered the shutter button, and her body aligned as if she were about to photograph a rare bird in flight.
Amelia Navarro stepped out first. Harper recognized her from the headshot she’d studied on the plane. Not only had she memorized the contestants’ faces, but their bios too. She’d had way too much time to think. And thinking led to over-analyzing her entire life, which would’ve sent her into a spiral right there in her aisle seat if it hadn’t been for the distraction of those contestant files.
Amelia wore a steel-grey gown that caught the setting sun and shimmered like poured mercury. She was thirty-one, tall and toned, which made sense given she was a firefighter.
Monica welcomed her. “Are you ready?”
“Can a person ever be ready to possibly meet the love of their life?” Amelia asked, smiling so candidly that Harper nearly rolled her eyes.
Yuck, she thought. Then,what the hell am I doing here? Then she remembered how Elise had stuck out her hand to greet her earlier, like that same hand hadn’t found itself between Harper’s thighs—twice—and she nearly forgot to snap a few shots.
“Well, I’ll cross my fingers for you,” Monica said, then gestured toward the deep-blue carpet that had been rolled out from the limo door all the way to the stone steps leading up to where Megan waited beneath a relatively flimsy arch of climbing jasmine. A light breeze stirred the tiny white blossoms, sending a few drifting down lazily around the bachelorette, who lookedstunning in a champagne satin gown that flowed to the floor like a waterfall.