Her green eyes were flicking about, thinking. “He does.”
“Right. So, it would be terrible if word got around that he beats his wife,” I said. “He belongs in jail anyway for doing that.” I turned to Alina, looked her in the eye and said, “Do you have pictures?”
“What kind of pictures?” she asked.
“You know what kind of pictures.”
“Well… yes, I do,” she admitted sheepishly. “But they’re of us, together.”
“Together how?”
“On a bed. On dates together, us kissing.”
“Are bruises visible on her?” I asked.
Alina nodded.
“Would you be willing to turn that in to the cops or something?” I asked.
“What?! No! If the cops come after him, he’ll take it out on her…”
“There’s got to be a way to do this. We’ve got to put him away; that’ll solve a lot of the problems here,” I reasoned. “Is there any way we can… get him arrested?”
Alina leaned back, thinking. “Well, there is one thing…”
I sat up, attuned to the undoubtedly juicy gossip that was about to come out of her mouth.
“Something about defamation… Rachel mentioned something about it. Her husband was sued for defamation once and lost; that’s why he agreed to let her do season 2 of this show. They’re out of money.”
“We can use that,” I said, thinking. “If he’s already seen as someone unreliable, then that automatically takes credibility from him. No one will believe him if he doesn’t have evidence anymore.”
“Well, it’s not like we can just get rid of it,” she said.
“Does Rachel know about all of this — all of the dirt he gathers on people? Does she know where it’s kept?” I stared at her and raised my eyebrow, waiting for her to put it together.
Alina stiffened, then smiled. “I think she does!”
“Great. Then all you have to do is convince her to destroy it.”
“She’d never do that; she’s too scared of him,” she said, staring off into the distance. “Plus, she just left with him. It’s clear where her loyalties lie.”
“Just because she’s scared doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you,” I reasoned. Then suddenly I thought of Leo and that kiss; how he was afraid to come out of the closet. “Sometimes people choose fear over love,” I quoted, thinking of Hazel.
Alina softened, but she was still quiet. Then finally she asked, “What do you know about love?”
I hesitated, but then knew what I had to do to win her trust back. Plunging my hand into my pocket, I pulled out the crumped up pages.
Alina took one and unfurled it. “Charlie… what is this?”
“It’s everything I wanted — remember our conversation when we first got here, the one about heartmates? I was trying to track down mine. I stupidly thought that he had to be one of these guys here on the set…” I said, sweeping my hand over my face.
“These are… wow, I’d love to meet someone who had all of this,” she said, looking through all of the qualities outlined in different pens. “What are the colors for?”
“They represent the guys. I was trying to link these traits to the guys. But none of this matters anymore; they all turned out to be scoundrels.”
“What do you mean?” Alina asked, smoothing out another balled up wad of paper and reading.
“Reese did something illegal,” I said, puffing out my chest. “And all of the guys are just… they’re just okay with it!”
“Oh, you mean that thing about him standing up for his family?” she asked, her green eyes boring into mine.
“Well, when you put it like that, it doesn’t tell the whole story—”
“Charlie, when are you going to learn that life isn’t all black and white? It’s not just good and bad — there’s lots of gray area too.”
“I don’t want a lecture,” I snapped, snatching one of my pages from her. To avoid her eyes, I looked down at my stupid writing. The first quality I’d listed on this page was “forgiving.”
I stiffened.
“It wasn’t intended to be a lecture,” Alina said gently. “When did you get so caught up on upholding rules, anyway?”
My shoulders sagged as I thought. Finally, I arrived at the reason. “Rules have been the only thing that have ever protected me,” I admitted.
“Protected from what?” She asked patiently.
“From— from wrongdoers! If anyone can just avert rules whenever they feel like it, people end up getting hurt!” I said, tears beading in the corners of my eyes.
“I guess that’s true,” Alina said. “But some rules are just dumb. Can we agree on that?”
“Every rule and law exists for a reason,” I maintained.
“What if the reason it exists is stupid?” she asked. “It used to be illegal for gays to get married. Remember?”
“…yes,” I admitted.
She raised one of her black eyebrows at me.
“Well, okay, fine, lots of laws are stupid. But most laws are there to protect people.”
“You’re so stubborn, Charlie,” Alina exasperated. “What happens when the laws don’t protect people?”
I thought about the high school me — how I was putting faith in the system to discipline my bully, and they did. But the retaliation I got was far from worth it. It just led to more teasing and destroying my already shaky reputation.
“Haven’t you ever broken or bent a rule to protect someone you cared about?” she asked hopefully. “I did. I’ve been doing this the whole time.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“With Rachel. It’s cheating if I sleep with her, right? It’s adultery if I have a relationship with her. But I couldn’t just leave her alone with that asshole… I fell in love with her. And I’d do anything to protect her.”
I turned to her with wide eyes. “You’re really in love with her?”
Alina paused, then looked down and whispered, “Yes.”
“Do you think she’s in love with you too?” I asked.
“I think so. She says she is,” Alina said, the shadow of doubt crossing her face.
“You should ask her to destroy the evidence, then,” I reasoned. “She’s the only one who can at this point.”
Alina scrunched up her face. “I thought you
