Page 65 of The Enemy of My Enemy Is… My Fake Boyfriend?

"I'm not one-hundred percent sure how those rumors took hold," Ethan said with a sigh. "But I can make a good guess as to who started them."

Feeling his eyes on me, I dared turn my head again. "Who?"

He raised a brow at me. "Do you really have to ask?"

Holy heck. Chase. Of course he meant Chase. I'd blindly believed my ex whenever he'd talked shit about Ethan, those beliefs taking root so deeply that even though I now knew Chase was a jerk, the not-so-great images of Ethan had lingered like some insidious, hidden shadow.

I was beginning to realize that this hatred between the two went way beyond just a simple work rivalry, and I wondered what had started it all those years ago.

"Why do you guys hate each other so much anyway? Did it start in boarding school?"

Ethan was silent for so long, I didn't think he'd answer. And then when a flight attendant brought us more to drink, interrupting the little flow of conversation we'd had, I doubted he'd even remember what I'd asked.

Minutes later, once she'd disappeared, I stole a glance at Ethan, who was lying back in his seat, eyes closed, hands loosely gripping the armrests like he was trying his best not to white-knuckle it.

In my hangover agony, I'd forgotten his flying issues. He was quite good at hiding it, something that didn't surprise me. Ethan for sure saw it as a weakness and probably didn't tell many people about it in the first place. But I knew. His fake girlfriend.

"It was a bunch of things actually," he suddenly said. "A girl, a teacher playing favorites at our boarding school, friends being competitive, a club I got into that he didn't. And then it spiraled. Spiraled into something much worse, so much so there's not a soul on this planet that I hate more. And that's saying something."

His words gave me chills. Or it was my nausea. Hard to tell. "What happened?" I whispered.

The plane hit some turbulence, making me groan at the awful roller coaster sensation in my stomach. If I'd have looked in the mirror at that moment, I was pretty sure I'd be green.

A barf bag was handed to me. By Ethan of course.

I got it ready, doing my best to breathe steadily while I glanced over at him. How was he faring through this?

He stared straight ahead, hands now clamped tightly on the large armrests. "You okay,darling?" he asked without looking at me.

His tone almost made me laugh. Almost. But I did smile. And then more turbulence rocked us, the seat belt sign lighting up.

"Sorry, folks," the captain said over the intercom. "Looks like we're in for a bumpy ride. Just try to sit back and relax, and I'll get us through it as quickly as I can."

"Sit back and relax. Sure. No problem," Ethan muttered. "The things I fucking do for my beautiful girlfriend," he added.

And this time, I did laugh. And maybe got a little flushed at the compliment he probably didn't even mean.

By the time the turbulence ended, with quiet curses coming from across the aisle on occasion, our previous topic of conversation had pretty much been forgotten. The moment had passed, and I didn't want to bring it up again. Not yet anyway.

Maybe with one of us trying to keep the contents of their stomach down and the other most likely vowing never to fly again, it wasn't the best time or place to have such a conversation anyway. So I let it go.

Instead, nausea calm for the moment, I checked my phone again for any rogue images, or God forbid videos, of our little boat ride.

"I promise you…" Ethan said. "There are no pictures out there."

Ignoring him, I kept searching and came up empty, thank goodness.

"That tablecloth was really long too. No one saw anything," he reassured me.

"Okay." He was probably right, but I wouldn't rest easy about it for a long while.

"Aria..." he said, drawing my attention to his very serious face.

"Yeah?"

I watched the muscles of his throat work as he swallowed. "I'm really sorry about last night."

"Sorry?"

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