A person stepped into the little room, and the ice machine began to rumble to life. Henry arced backward for just a moment, and mouthed, Wes.
“Shit,” I said.
Henry’s hand swept up, pressing his finger to my lips.
I took his wrist and pulled his hand down, stretching up on my toes so that our lips were within grazing distance.
His fingers dug into my waist, and he sank even closer to me somehow, my back pressed flat against the wall.
Our mouths hovered, breath hot, as Henry’s hands drifted upward, grazing the band of my lace bralette. I gasped at the feeling of his touch so close and his lips crashed into mine, silencing me.
His mouth was urgent and tasted like hazelnut. All I wanted was to drag him into my room and then to wake up beside him and ask him all the questions my brain can’t stop asking.
And now, just hours later, standing on this runway, I can still feel the weight of his body against me and his hands traveling up my torso.
After I went back to my room, I slept for an hour and a half and woke up with my heart racing. Something happened last night between us, and suddenly, when I picture my future, I picture Henry there with me.
I can imagine us. Sleeping in late on Saturday mornings. Eating ramen together in the wee hours of the night. Going to little run-down hotels just so we can stay as close to the beach as possible. All I want is time with him. Just a little more time.
Henry calls my name, and then Sara Claire, and before long Gretchen and Valerie are the last girls standing, both of whom are sent home. Gretchen gives the producers the ugly-cry departure they’ve been waiting for while Valerie is stoic and doesn’t attempt to give Henry a hug goodbye.
Once they’re gone, Chad claps Henry on the back. “Should we tell them?” he asks.
Henry smiles, the wrinkles around his eyes revealing the little bit of concealer Ash must have put on him when he showed up this morning with bags under his eyes from a sleepless night. “Jenny, Addison, Sara Claire, Stacy, Chloe, and Cindy.” His voice hitches a little on my name, and my stomach explodes into a chorus of butterflies. “I think it’s time we take this international. I hope you’ve got your passports, because we’re going to the villas.”
Like the helicopter landing pad at the château, the villas in Punta Mita, Mexico, are a Before Midnight staple. Despite the fact that we all know it’s coming, it’s no effort to let out a shriek of surprise. A few years back, I remember Erica trying to drop the villas for a luxury train trip through Europe, but the logistics and cost were a nightmare. And as incredible as that sounds, I think that’s the kind of experience I want to save for after all this is said and done and it’s just Henry and me. And hopefully a hundred grand in cash.
Like in our last flight, there’s plenty of room to spread out and Henry is kept in first class. But as I board the plane, I hold my hand out slightly, hoping that he might catch it when I walk past. Playing coy, Henry doesn’t even flinch, but just ahead of me Zeke drops a bag of equipment as he’s trying to wedge it into an overhead bin and causes a traffic jam just long enough for Henry to hook his pinkie around mine and kiss it gently.
I pull my hand away as discreetly as possible, and as I glance over my shoulder, Addison is frowning right at me.
When we land in Puerto Vallarta, we’re rushed through customs and split into a caravan of vans and SUVs, which take us along the coast to Punta Mita. The sprawling skyscraper resorts of Puerto Vallarta begin to fall away in favor of dense jungle that sometimes gives way to the sparkling blue ocean. The only time I’ve ever gone to a place like this was when Erica took all of us to Cabo for our first Christmas without Dad. Erica spent the whole week sleeping on the beach while the three of us skipped around the resort until Anna and Drew ran off with some older boys they’d been flirting with. I ended up rejoining Erica, who felt a little bad for me and ordered me enough margarita swirls that soon enough I was asleep on the beach too.
The villas are a chic and modern cluster of efficiency apartments grouped along the beach with one main house at the center and an infinity pool that stretches the entire length of the property.
The smiling staff dressed in all white greets us with fresh cucumber- and-lime water.
“I could get used to this,” Sara Claire says.
Stacy chuckles quietly. “Yeah, eliminate me all you want, Henry, but I plan on haunting this place from now into eternity.”
I swat at her. “He’s not eliminating you.” Even though, actually, I do hope he does.
“I haven’t had a one-on-one yet. I’m just here for background noise at this point.”
Sara Claire and I look at each other, waiting for the other to comfort Stacy, but we both know that nothing about that would be genuine.
In New York, it felt like the crew was racing against the inevitable as they tried to hide any and all technology and media from us. But here, everyone is so relaxed—even Wes seems at ease—and with how secluded we are, I can see why. Of course, the televisions have been removed from our rooms, but in these gorgeous villas they don’t seem to leave a gaping hole like they did in our NYC hotel.
Each room has an enclosed outdoor shower, soaking tub, and intricate macramé hammock. Inside, the bed is fitted with white linens and set into a low, dark wood platform frame with a huge canopy overhead and a sheer white fabric draped over the top. Honestly, it feels like we’re all on a polyamorous honeymoon.
Inside my room, I push the huge glass doors aside and the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks is a lullaby so potent that I nearly fall asleep on my feet. A ways down in front of the main house, a huge outdoor dining table stretches across the deck nestled in front of a peaceful sandy alcove leading into the translucent blue water.
“Hi, neighbor!” Sara Claire calls, waving a card in her hand. “Guess I’m first up for the solo dates!”
“Knock ’em dead!” I call back, uncertainty spiked with jealousy gnawing at my insides. “Not all the way dead, though. Just, like, temporarily unconscious.”
That night, Sara Claire and Henry are swept off somewhere for a private romantic dinner with Wes and a bare-bones crew. I get the feeling that this is an attempt from the production staff to make the villa dates as intimate as possible.
This morning, after bagels and the vending machine make-out session, when Henry and I said goodbye, I nearly just blurted out, Choose me. We could go along with this whole charade and I would be a good contestant and wait it out until the very end if he could just tell me here and now that, in the end, he would choose me. But I couldn’t seem to get the words out. I couldn’t manage to expose that much of myself and risk him rejecting me. But most of all, I didn’t want to spoil the absolute gift that last night turned out to be. I wanted to freeze that moment like one of the hotel souvenir shop snow globes so that anytime I was feeling sad or unsure, I could just shake the globe and see us squeezed into that booth with our dim sum and bingo cards.
Stacy, Addison, Chloe, Beck, the rest of the crew, and I all gather on the deck of the main house for an epic buffet. It’s the best food we’ve had since the start of the show—tamales, flautas, gorditas, street tacos, every veggie you can imagine from fresh pico to grilled cactus, and rows of fresh fruit carved in the shape of flowers.