Page 49 of The Romance Rivalry

“What do you mean?” He takes a step forward toward me.

I hold my hand out to stop him from coming any closer. I briefly wonder if his internal temperature runs warm, because any time I come in contact with his body, I seem to heat up. And right now, my hand, currently touching his chest, is on fire.

“What’s with all of this?” I ask, flailing my other hand around in his general vicinity.

“I mean, if we’re gonna do it, we should try and at least be convincing, don’t you think?”

“Do what?” I ask.

“Fake date,” he says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

I try to quickly rewind the events and conversations of the night before to make sure there isn’t something I missed that would enlighten me on what he’s talking about.

Nothing.

I stare at him.

He stares back, but his eyes are dancing.

“Wait, this is your big plan that will get everyone off our backs?” I ask.

Like clockwork, those damn dimples appear. I know he uses them whenever he thinks he’s about to get his way. Or needs to convince me to let him.

“Yup. Look, you had this plan to find a boyfriend so youcould get the haters off your back and convince SKCupid that you’re the romance expert, right? Well, why go through all the trouble of dating a bunch of randoms when you can just date me? It’s quicker, and you like me.”

I guffaw. As if.

“One, fake dating is not the same as dating. And two, the plan is to fall in love. Period. Everything else is just icing on the cake.”

Aiden stares at me as if he doesn’t see the problem.

Why doesn’t he see the problem?

“You said you trusted me,” he says. “We’ll go on our Live, show everyone we’re dating, and get them off our backs. You get your online peace of mind back and SKCupid makes a decision based on who’s best suited for the role, not based on assumptions from random comments.”

“Okay, I can see what you’re saying, but then explain to me what we’re doing here, now, not in front of our computer on a live stream.”

“This is practice.” He rubs his hands together, the cocky smirk lifting the right side of his mouth.

“I didn’t agree to practice,” I say.

“You want to be convincing, don’t you? We can’t just go online and wing it,” he says.

I mean, I guess it makes sense. But this all feels like a lot. Over the top.

“Look, it’s only a week until our Live. Might as well spendit preparing, getting used to being around each other a lot, practicing now so we can really put on a good show later.”

He looks suspiciously like he’s enjoying this.

“Okay, fine,” I cave. “But don’t be annoying about it.”

He slings his arm around my shoulders and directs me toward the door to class. “Now, when have I ever been annoying?”

And as we make our way down the center aisle to our seats, Aiden says, loudly, “Thank god we made it to class on time, baby. Almost missed it being distracted by you.”

My jaw is on the ground.

I’m going to kill him.

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