‘UnREAL’ Co-Creator Sarah Gertrude Shapiro Previews Season 2

Lifetime’s dark drama about life behind the lens of a
reality dating competition — “UnREAL” — returns for Season 2
on Monday night.

Last season ended on a cliffhanger, when Rachel’s ex-boyfriend, Jeremy, turned up on
her mom’s doorstep, and told her that her daughter needed help. The new season, however, picks up six months later.

“You’re not going to get flashbacks, but… there’s more
story coming from that,” co-creator Sarah Gertrude Shapiro told Access
Hollywood. “There’s more to be had from that story, so we’re not flashing
back, but there’s still stuff going on in the present.”

PHOTOS: ‘UnREAL’ — Scenes From Season 2

As the season begins, Rachel (Shiri Appleby) is trying to forget about everything that happened with last year’s suitor, Adam (Freddie Stroma), and the relationship with him that Quinn (Constance Zimmer) tanked, by throwing herself into partying with her pal/frenemy/boss in the run up to the next installment of “Everlasting.”

“In the six months… between Season 1 and Season 2, Rachel basically has realized that she’s stuck in this job. She’s totally stuck, she doesn’t have anywhere else to go and if she’s stuck, she’s going to make the best of it, so she has gotten Quinn to give her a promotion, she’s gotten money for the first time, she’s bought a bunch of new clothes and she’s come up with this idea to have the first black suitor, which is making her really proud of herself,” Shapiro said. “She feels really excited that she’s doing this groundbreaking, historical thing, and Quinn I think is just really glad that she didn’t lose Rachel, so she’s sort of trying to give Rachel what she wants and they’re both partying and drinking.”

READ: ‘UnREAL’ Renewed For Season 3

Rachel’s other ex, Jeremy (Josh Kelly), is around too, and not dealing with things very well.

“I think Jeremy’s really in a dark place and he doesn’t believe in love anymore because he was in love with Rachel and she totally screwed him over,” Shapiro said. “And I think that he feels like he did what he had to do. He went to her mom and now he’s done with her, and she’s basically dead to him, but he’s not going to let her ruin his life and his life is on the show. So he’s just like, ‘I’m not going to quit my job just because you broke up with me.’ I think he’s torturing Rachel a little bit too.”

Chet (Craig Bierko) also returns, and although it’s not immediately clear, he still has feelings for Quinn.

“Chet is back to torture Quinn because he’s still just desperately in love with her and I think that that is really what the season becomes about for him, is how to be a man and how to be a man that Quinn would want to be with, and it doesn’t go very well,” she said.

WATCH: Josh Kelly On ‘UnREAL’: Will Adam Cromwell Return For Season 2?

With a new suitor – Darius (B.J. Britt) – looking for love on “Everlasting,” it means Jay (Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman) is back behind the camera, but he’ll find it difficult to produce the same way he did in Season 1.

“I think that having a black suitor is making him — he’s excited about it, but he’s also really uncomfortable with some of the ways that Rachel is dealing with it and… also the fact that Rachel’s taking so much credit for it and not really including him in the process,” Shapiro said of Jay’s Season 2 story arc. “So there’s a lot of tension between Rachel and Jay this season about how Rachel is dealing with the first black suitor and… what you see pretty soon is that Jay is just feeling like everybody is getting promoted, everybody’s rising in the ranks [while] he is basically staying where he is.”

Things didn’t work out for Rachel and Adam in Season 1, but he will make an appearance in “UnREAL’s” new season.

“Our plot is that he sort of went back home and wasn’t able to reenter his old life the way that he wanted to, and so he went off sort of on a soul-seeking mission and realized that he’s not really over Rachel, and he is trying to find himself and figure out his life and I think he really regrets how he left things,” Shapiro said of Adam’s return.

“UnREAL” Season 2 premieres Monday at 10/9c on Lifetime.

— Jolie Lash