Page 70 of The Fake Dating Plan

My heart rate increased. Oh no. I grabbed his phone without even asking. My hands shook as I saw what was on the phone. No. No. No.

“I think you’re being a little melodramatic about this.”

“Melodramatic! Do you know the things they’ll say about us? About me!” I had to remove my phone from my ear to save them from an eardrum burst. She wasn’t taking this well at all.

“The picture means nothing.”

“Of course, you’d say that. You aren’t the one who would be painted as a whore who sold her body for a business deal!”

I had to concede to that. Our relationship being out meant trouble. I didn’t know how much yet, but it would be something.

“We could deny it.”

“They captured us standing by my apartment building with me giving you heart eyes.” I pulled up the picture on my laptop. She was right. I was standing outside, and she was looking at me as if she was hungry and I was her only meal. If they had captured the next moment, it would have been her making a face at me after I suggested she come over to my place. That photo wouldn’t have sold what this one was selling now.

I Googled my name. She was right. The blog and entertainment news sites were already posting about us. The headline on one was, “Stop the count! Axel is taken!” unimaginative. Below was that one picture. Another one said, “The king of luxury and the princess of diamonds!” that was classy—barring the fact that Emilia didn’t have diamonds in her jewelry collection—but still the same picture of us. I wondered how much money the person who took it was making.

“I’m over.”

“It means nothing. Imagine if they caught us kissing.”

“You’re not helping.”

“Sorry. I’ll fix this. Don’t worry about it.” I will lessen the damage. Although, there was no way of controlling public perception. Plus, I couldn’t pull off what I had done in Spain. There had been only one news site reporting it, so it was easy to nip in the bud. This, however, had spread on Social Media like wildfire. Heck, we were trending on one site. “It might blow over in a few days,” I said, “Or hours. News moves fast nowadays. Especially rumors.”

“What should we do?” She sounded calmer now.

“Deny it. Like I said, there isn’t much to the picture. It will blow over, trust me.”

“I hope you’re right.”

When the call ends, I hit the phone on my desk and buzz my assistant. “Can you please call in The Public Relations Manager?”

“Yes sir,” she said. A few minutes later, an elegant woman in her early forties waltzed in on impossibly high stilettos.

“Do I have to guess why I’ve been invited to the top floor?”

“Jennifer. I like your no bullshit straight to the issue style.”

“Mincing words wastes time.”

“I agree. About this news going on regarding Emilia Harris and me.”

“Are you two dating?”

“No.”

“Good. Because if you were, it would make things complicated.”

“Complicated?”

“Conflict of interest. The lawyers and the ethics committee have a better understanding of that than I, but you might need to rope them in if you two were dating, but you said you’re not.” Ethics committee? This had the potential to blow up in my face more than in Emilia’s. I hadn’t thought about ethics committees and conflicts of interest. It was difficult to focus on anything other than her where she was concerned.

“What do you suggest?”

“If nothing happened like, you said—”

“Which is true.”

---