Page 84 of Celebrities Don't Date Bookworms

“Why the heck would you want a breathing blanket?”

“To emulate a relationship, Neil!” His voice became higher with every word like he was trying to fake being upset.

“Uh-huh.” The floor creaked as someone walked across the room, and I had a sinking feeling that it wasn’t Hudson.

“Neil!” Hudson snapped, but that didn’t stop him. My vision was flooded with light as the blanket was ripped completely off of me. I blinked as I waited for my eyes to adjust, then looked up at the grinning face of Neil Hadley above me.

“Well, well, well…” He said. “What do we have here?”

nineteen

“Hi, Neil,”I squeaked out.

He smirked and shook his head. “Luca owes me five bucks.”

“You knew about this?” Hudson asked. He crawled onto the bed and held a hand out to help me up, which I took gratefully. My legs screamed in protest as I unfurled them and stood.

“We had a feeling you two were together,” Neil said. He tapped into his pocket where his phone was sticking out. “We had a bet on how long it would take for one of you to admit it. I had no idea Megan was Eggo, though. You are, right?”

I was tempted to play it off and pretend that I had no idea what he was talking about, but I decided against it. For one thing, it would probably just cause bigger issues down the road. For another, my location had already given me away. That was my own fault—I totally forgot that I had that setting on.

“Surprise,” I said weakly.

“Neil?” Jude’s voice called from down the hall.

“In here!” Neil called back. He was almost laughing. “You’ll never believe this!”

“Neil,” Hudson hissed.

“What?” Neil asked. “He’s going to find out anyway.”

“Find out what?” Jude asked as he appeared in the doorway. Neil turned to him with a wide smile and stepped aside so Jude had an unobstructed view of me. Jude raised his eyebrows. “Huh. Well, hello Megan.”

“Hey,” I said awkwardly, holding the word for longer than necessary.

Jude pulled out his phone and looked at it for a long few seconds. “Wow, the location on here is scarily accurate.”

“How long have you known?” Hudson asked.

Jude looked up. “About what? You and Megan getting together or her being Eggo?”

“Both.”

Jude sighed as he thought. “I’ve suspected that you two were getting a little closer than friends for a little over a week now. And I only put the Eggo thing together a minute ago.” He looked at me. “You know, if you didn’t have your location on, we might have never found out.”

“And what a shame that would be,” I murmured. It was a little sarcastic, but I didn’t totally mean it—I could already feel the stress coming off me at the idea of not having to hide my identity anymore. Of course, it was instead being replaced by the stress that theymight not want me around now that they knew who I was, but I was trying not to think about that too hard.

“So, I’m confused,” Jude said. “How long have you guys known each other’s real identities?”

Hudson and I shared a glance.

“That's a long story,” I said.

“And not one I want to tell twice,” Hudson said. “So we should wait for Finn and Zach to get home.”

“Zach’s in the basement,” Jude said. “And Finn’s almost home from his run.”

“While we wait,” I said, seeing my chance. “I have a question for you, Jude.”

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