Romancing Miss Right by Lizzie Shane

hoped that he didn’t because using him as the
next season’s Mister Perfect would be pure, undiluted ratings
gold.
    The casting team had dug him up out of
nowhere. A school teacher from the Midwest, nominated by the
mothers of several of his students. Went to church. Loved his
parents. Wanted to have kids, but just hadn’t met the right woman
yet.
    The poor bastard hadn’t known what he was
getting himself into, signing up for Romancing Miss Right .
His homespun values and innate chivalry were for real. Completely
uncoached. You couldn’t train that kind of sincerity.
    If only Marcy seemed to like him more.
    She’d been good last night—composed and
elegant when needed, fun and flirty when called for—but those
emotional walls were still an issue. The viewers wanted all the
emotional ups and downs of falling madly, wildly, foolishly in
love. They weren’t going to get that if Marcy was too reserved.
    Miranda scrolled through the footage, pausing
again when she saw a flicker of uncertainty on Marcy’s face. There.
That was human. That was real. But who was she looking at?
    Miranda’s cell phone rang and she reached for
it absently as she pulled up additional angles of the same moment.
“Miranda Pierce.”
    “Why are you still awake?”
    At the sound of that voice, she stopped
seeing the screens in front of her, going blind as her entire being
seemed to lean down the line. Only Bennett Lang could do that to
her. Her former mentor and current lover was the only thing that
could so completely swallow her focus. “Bennett.”
    “Don’t tell me you’re still working.”
    “All right, I won’t tell you.”
    He made a small disapproving sound. “You need
to take care of yourself. Or better yet, let me take care of you.
Come over tonight.”
    “We’re filming tonight.”
    “And your minions can take care of it,” he
argued. “That’s the benefit of being EP. Delegation.”
    “The first few episodes are crucial. They set
the tone for the entire season. I can’t just decide to take a night
off. Not right now. I warned you that for the first couple weeks I
practically live at the mansion.”
    “You’re looking through raw footage right
now, aren’t you?” he accused, proving yet again that he knew her
entirely too well. “You have story producers and editors for a
reason, Miranda. Use them.”
    “They don’t see what I see. This is how I got
where I am. If I don’t stay vigilant, Wallace will give my job to
someone else.”
    “And then you can come work with me at ADS
again.”
    Miranda snorted. “Because that wouldn’t be a
conflict of interest at all.”
    They had met when she was just starting out
as a segment producer on American Dance Star—and she’d left a job
she loved to go to the Marrying Mister Perfect/Romancing Miss Right
franchise when she realized she was having unprofessional feelings
for Bennett. She refused to be that woman who slept her way to the
top. She wasn’t going back on that now.
    “We could work that out,” he argued, ever
persuasive.
    She tensed, annoyed by the same old argument.
“Bennett. I haven’t slept. I’m busy and I’m tired. Do we have to
discuss this now?”
    “I’m sorry. I’ll let you get some sleep,” he
said, though they both knew she wouldn’t be sleeping when she got
off the phone. “First night go well?”
    “Better than I could have dreamed. Though I
may have just jinxed it by saying so.”
    “I thought you didn’t believe in luck.”
    “I don’t.” Her eyes fell back on the monitor
and she frowned. Who was Marcy looking at?
    “I just lost you, didn’t I?” Bennett said,
again with that eerie perception.
    “Sorry. You caught me in the middle of
something.”
    “At least consider taking a night off, all
right? You have months before the first episode airs to make
everything perfect. Let your minions do some of the work for a
change. I want to see you.”
    “I’ll think about it.” When I have
time .
    “I guess that’s all I