Page 30 of Fan Favorite

ASPEN: Who is that? Who is he talking to?

THE LIVING ROOM DOORS OPEN DRAMATICALLY. A SILHOUETTE APPEARS.

EDIE: Hi, ladies!

SMASH CUTS OF THE GIRLS GOING CRAZY

IMANI: Who the hell are you?

ZO: She thinks she’s going to date Bennett.

MCKAYLA: What the . no. no.

PARKER: I’d like to speak to my lawyer.

MARISOL: We can’t add any more girls! We’re supposed to belosinggirls!

ADAM FOX: Ladies, let’s just calm down…

BAI: You think you can just come out of nowhere and date Bennett? You don’t even know Bennett!

EDIE: I mean, yeah, I do. He was my high school boyfriend.

SOUNDS OF SCREAMING / GLASS BREAKING.

RED WINE SLOWLY DRIPPING DOWN THE STAIRS.

MONTAGE OF GIRLS SOBBING.

BENNETT STORMING DOWN THE HALLWAY/ SHOVING THE CAMERA

BENNETT: Get that camera out of my face.

FADE TO BLACK

1:00:00 ADAM FOX: All that and more, tonight onThe Key.

11

Bennett Charles was no longer in love.

In fact, as he stood in the dining room, sweating his ass off in front of an army of hostile bachelorettes arranged across a three-tiered riser, Bennett Charles had never been less in love in his entire life. Unless love was an anxious stomach expelling protein farts at a totally unreasonable pace. An hour ago, these girls had been kissing him and using words likeadoreandsmittenandwet, and it’d felt like the last time he’d summited Kilimanjaro—like standing on top of the world, all the possibilities endless because there you were, doing something most people could never do, alive. But now these very same girls were glaring at him like they might rip his arm off and beat him in the dick with it. And there, in the back row, was Edie Pepper. All Bennett could think about was escape.

How in the hell was he going to get off this show without becoming the most hated man in America? The tabloids haddestroyedWyatt Cash. The entireKeyuniverse turned against him—former contestants gathered to dissect the story onpodcasts, gave quotes to magazines, and posted savage memes across their social media platforms.

Exactly what these girls would do to him.

Bennett scratched the back of his neck wildly, like a dog with a sudden itch, before remembering he was on camera. He dropped his hand so quickly it smacked into the side of the faux marble pedestal where thirteen oversized gold keys were displayed in diagonal rows. The pedestal rocked and a single key slid off and fell to the rug. Bennett watched it settle next to his shoe and was once again forced to contend with his skinny ankles that stuck out between the intentionally too-short gray suit pants that Wardrobe had chosen for him, and the shiny loafers with no socks that were not on brand for him at all. Hiking boots. Over-the-ankle hiking boots. That was Bennett Charles.

Bennett stared at the Key to My Heart on the floor, paralyzed by the weight of his sudden rejection and the imminent exposure of Bennett Charles vis-à-vis Charlie Bennett. How was any of this his fault? He didn’t invite Edie here—he wouldneverinvite Edie here—yet the girls’ collective rage was aimed directly at him.

“I cancel you! You’re canceled!” McKayla, the bartender from Tucson, slurred from the front row. She removed her shoe and threw it across the dining room, where it rebounded off a tripod before a harried production assistant crawled under the cameras’ sight lines to retrieve it. McKayla wobbled on her remaining heel and jabbed her finger at the production team. “Canceled!”

That’s the other thing the girls were furious about—the abruptly canceled cocktail party. Bennett glared at Peter, who was standing just off camera with his arms crossed over his chest, that same smug look on his face. What a dick. Obviously, he’d been the one to cancel the cocktail party. Another thingthat wasn’t Bennett’s fault! Bennett kept trying to refuse things. Refuse to do the key ceremony, refuse to be filmed talking to Edie, refuse to do interviews, refuse to be Peter’s puppet.

While Jessa had lined the girls up on the risers, Bennett had taken back some control and cornered Peter in the kitchen. “You know what I’m going to do when this is all over, Pete?” he’d seethed while Peter leaned against the refrigerator like he didn’t have a care in the world. “I’m gonna find your ex-girlfriend, and after I give her the ride of her life, I’m gonna tell her what a pathetic shithead you are.”

“Like I told you, she came to us. We didn’t go looking for her.”

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