Page 34 of Made Over by Meredith

“Really?” I asked, tossing my hand out toward her, and she barely spared me a glance.

“Thanks for breakfast, but I’ve got a lot to do.”

I blew out a long breath, struggling to find something—anything—to say. I waited, watching her in silence, and she eventually lifted her gaze, allowing me to view the hurt in her eyes. “Go on a third date with her. Close the deal.”

I rolled my eyes. If this was a test, I didn’t care about passing. I didn’t care about taking it. As far as I was concerned, class was over.

“When you’re tired of hiding, you know where to find me,” I said and let myself out.

Chapter 10

Meredith

It’d been two weeks of hiding. And, yeah, I was woman enough to admit it. I was hiding.

But what the hell did Aiden expect? Him to fuck me into next week and suddenly I’d roll over and play in love?

No. That’s not how it worked.

That’s now how I worked.

He may have thought he knew me, but he didn’t. Because if he did, he’d know we weren’t good together. He was just like everyone else. He thought he wanted one thing, when really he wanted another.

I mean, shit, we only started hanging out because he needed help getting his dream girl. The one with the cute little cow sweater and quirky smile. Who was an artist…or whatever.

He didn’t want the brash teacher who’d been told on more than one occasion that the size of her boobs would be a problem for the boys in school. Men thought they wanted me, but once they got me, they decided I was the wrong type. Too loud, too smart, too dumb, too blonde, too whatever.

And I couldn’t handle that with Aiden.

I couldn’t bear to not be enough or too much for him.

So, yes, I was fucking hiding. Because it was easier that way.

“You’re seriously not going to come?” Jimmy asked, as he slung his arm around Claire, while the three of us headed out of school for the weekend.

I shook my head.

“But we need you.”

I snorted. “You don’t need me. You have sports and random pop culture facts covered and Claire has the actual hard questions. You don’t need me.”

“Come on,” he whined. “It’s the start of the tournament.”

Jimmy had signed up for this trivia tournament weeks ago. It was being held at some new restaurant, a way of getting people in the door. And because there was a prize, hehadto enter.

“Five hundred dollars, Mere. Five. Hundred,” he said, over enunciating each syllable as he opened the passenger side door of the car for Claire.

Ugh. Gag me.

I raised my brow pointedly. “You’d think you would’ve learned your lesson with signing teams up for contests without checking with everyone else.”

Jimmy and Claire had only started dating because he’d signed them up for a radio contest for couples without telling Claire. Because they weren’t a couple.

Lo, they pretended so good they became a couple.

But he hadn’t quit his competitive streak.

Claire wrapped her fingers around my wrist. “Come out tonight and keep me company.”

---