Page 36 of Fan Favorite

I t was almost one a.m. by the time Edie Pepper descended the long staircase in her gown and heels and tottered over to the limo where Peter Kennedy was waiting.

Most of production had already packed up and gone—Bennett Charles had been shoved into a van and ferried back to the mansion fifteen minutes ago—and it was just the two of them now, Peter and Edie, facing off under the streetlight.

Peter held back a smile as she evaluated the black blazer he’d shrugged on over his oxford and the livery cap he’d placed at a jaunty angle on his head. He had his line all ready to go.

“Budget cuts,” he said with a grin.

It took her a second, but then she laughed.

Peter swept open the door to the back seat with a chivalrous bow. “M’lady.”

“You’re gonna drive this thing?” Edie peered at him. “Do you even know how to drive?”

“Of course I know how to drive!”

“I’ve only ever seen you ferried around in the back of a Navigator in big sunglasses, like you’re Lindsay Lohan or something.”

“Pepper, you wound me. My sunglasses are appropriately sized. Now get in the car.” He placed a hand on her warm back and ushered her toward the back seat.

“Aren’t you the big, important showrunner?” she protested. “Don’t you have other shit to do?”

He did, in fact, have other shit to do. And there were a million people paid to deal with things like driving contestants around, so Peter was free to deal with the shit he had to do.

But for some reason, while he stood on the sidelines watching Edie on the monitors, he couldn’t stop thinking about the hurt way she’d looked at him just before she fell out of the limo.

Not to mention the pointed anger that had powered that punch to his gut.

And as he’d brooded, watching Bennett hold Edie in his arms, suddenly Peter felt deeply unsettled.

And because Peter didn’t like to sit in a feeling for too long, and because he orchestrated over-the-top gestures for a living, this funny little chauffeur moment was almost instinctual in its conception.

It hadn’t been difficult to come up with.

Or execute. Frankly, it was no big deal.

Just Peter utilizing his talents to make things right between them, totally detached from feeling.

“Here I am, trying to do a nice thing, letting everyone leave early, and you insult me. I’ll have you know I’m an excellent driver.” He prepared to close the door behind her. “As long as we don’t make any right turns, we’ll be fine.”

“Oh no,” she said, struggling to get back out. “No way. If I’m dying tonight, I’ll stare death in the face. I’m sitting up front with you.”

“Fair enough.” Peter trotted around and opened the passenger door.

“Why are you being so nice all of a sudden?” She looked around at the deserted street. “And where are the cameras? Where’s Ted?”

“I’m always nice,” he said, wounded.

“Sure you are, Mr. I-Went-to-Brown-and-Your-Beauty-Isn’t-Intersectional.”

“Still not over that?”

“Not quite.”

“Have I mentioned how lovely you look tonight, Pepper? Everyone thinks so—”

“You’re making it worse. Just get in the car.”

But the way she said it— just get in the car —was like she was amused, and then his own misgivings—like the lingering confusion over why he’d gotten into that limo with her earlier, or why he’d insisted on Bailey for the next date when a decision like that clearly undermined everything they were working toward, or the way Jessa had looked at him when he announced he was going to drive Edie back to the mansion himself—faded away as Edie slid into the front seat and her dress split open, exposing her bare legs.

Peter tried not to stare and instead closed the door behind her, running around to the other side, where he was immediately stabbed to death by the daggers Jessa was glaring at him from the top of the staircase.

He tipped his cap to her and got in the car.

It took Peter a second to locate the ignition (fine, it had been years since he’d driven himself anywhere) and then he spent a stupid amount of time tweaking the mirrors because it felt like something Seth Rogen or John Krasinski would do when a cute girl was watching.

Finally, he turned the key. “Last chance to call an Uber.”

“I don’t even have a phone. You took it, remember?”

“Right,” he said with a shrug. “Stuck with me, then.”

Peter plunged the limo into drive, and they began making their way down the moonlit streets of Beverly Hills.

While he hunched over the steering wheel, an unconvinced Edie flipped down the visor and felt around.

Popped open the glove compartment and rifled through the registration papers, fast-food napkins, and breath mints.

Knocked on the console, as if expecting a secret compartment to reveal itself.

“For real. Where’d you hide the cameras?”

“No cameras,” he said, keeping his hands at ten and two and his eyes on the road.

Now that the limo was in motion, the reality of his romcom-inspired gesture was hitting him.

It would be a big problem if he crashed the limo.

Fuck, he realized somewhat belatedly, eventually he’d have to get on the 405!

“You forget I’m a founding member of the Lady Dicks, Chicago’s premier feminist true crime detective club. I’ve completed enough Hunt a Killer boxes to know everything’s a play. What gives?”

“In fact, I haven’t forgotten the Lady Dicks. Your description of the seven-layer dip is seared into my memory.”

“Don’t be judgy. You’d love a Midwestern potluck. So much cheese.”

“I’m lactose intolerant.”

“You would be.”

He tore his eyes from the road and caught her smirking. “Savage,” he said, shaking his head. They laughed.

“Seriously, Peter,” she said, relaxing against the seat, “what’s going on?

You drive me home and I reveal my deepest, darkest secrets in some sort of hidden camera footage?

And then you’re free to go to the Chateau Marmont and smoke a doobie with Leonardo DiCaprio or whatever you Hollywood types do after work? ”

He raised his brows. “‘Smoke a doobie?’ I didn’t know you had that in you.”

She smacked him in the arm.

“Careful, I’m driving!” They reached a stoplight and he turned to her. “Is it so hard to believe that I just wanted to do something nice for you?”

“Only you would categorize ‘nice’ as putting my life at risk when you clearly don’t know how to drive.” They stared at each other for a moment before Edie ripped the chauffeur cap from his head. “You can’t fool me, Peter,” she said, inspecting the cap for electronics. “Really? No cameras?”

“Really. No cameras.”

“Well, in that case,” she said, placing the cap on her head, “do you mind if I unzip this dress? I cannot fucking breathe.”

“Whatever you need to do, my friend.”

Peter watched through the corner of his eye as Edie edged the zipper down her back. When the light turned green, he turned his focus back to the road. Edie relaxed against the seat and closed her eyes with a sort of dreamy look on her face. The chauffeur cap slid down her forehead.

He cleared his throat. “You hungry?”

Her eyes popped open. “Oh my god, I’m starving. Why don’t you people let a girl eat? It’s very rude to put a plate of food in front of a person and then be like, talk about your feelings, but do not, no matter what, touch this chicken piccata.”

“You’ll thank me later when there’s not a gif of you chomping into a cheeseburger all over the internet.”

“For the right cheeseburger, it’d be worth it.”

“There’s one of those Taco Bells with the margaritas not too far from here. What do you think? Yo quiero Nachos Bell Grande? ”

She was delighted by his reference to the Taco Bell ads of the late nineties. “That’s my cat’s name,” she said, surprised. “Nacho Bell Grande.”

“I know that’s your cat’s name, Pepper. That’s why I suggested it. I do, in fact, listen when you talk.”

She looked at him and he could feel the energy shifting from lighthearted truce into something more complex.

“Tell me the truth,” she said finally, her brow furrowed as much as her new Botox would allow.

“After the whole volleyball thing—why’d you ignore me for three days and make me feel like you were mad at me, and then show up right before my one-on-one to make me feel shitty about a makeover that you supposedly wanted? ”

“Edie. I’m the showrunner. I don’t— I can’t —produce individual contestants—”

“Oh, I know. You’ve mentioned the showrunner thing many times.

It’s very impressive.” She flopped back in her seat, annoyed.

“Except for some reason you were around a million times before, egging me on, giving me speeches about fighting for love, and then when something terrible happened, and you could’ve actually helped me, you let it be all my fault. ”

“Edie, c’mon.” Without thinking he took one hand off the wheel and placed it on her leg, intending a sort of brotherly pat, but finding instead her thigh hot and bare and smooth.

Suddenly Peter became aware of himself touching her, knowing he should not be touching her, except it felt surprisingly great to be touching her, and quickly he pulled his hand away.

His heart was beating fast, and he was overcome by the need for the situation to be resolved, so he rocketed the limo over a curb and into a CVS parking lot.

“Look, Edie, what I was trying to tell you before, you’re not like the other girls—”

“This again? Peter! I get it! You’ve already made the ‘Edie isn’t as good as the other girls’ thing abundantly clear!”

“Will you just listen for a second!” he yelled.

She looked at him, wide-eyed.

Why the fuck was he yelling? Why did everything feel so fraught this season? What was he even doing here, driving around in the show’s prop limo in the middle of the night with a contestant when he should be at home in bed reading or fucking Siobhan? She stared at him, waiting for him to speak.