“You want my opinion? The guy likes you. With a capital L. Maybe he was jealous when he saw your ex.”
Something unwelcome settled into my chest. Something that felt like a pang. I knew Axel’s reputation with women. He never stayed with anyone, never committed, which was a fact Knox once warned me about when he saw us eye-flirting. Opening the idea that he might like me risked not only professional devastation—because, hello, he’d probably find some way to use it against me and it’d ruin my brand—but also, I wouldn’t survive that kind of personal destruction of his rejection.
My heart had already been through too much.
I took another long sip of my wine, welcoming the increasing fuzziness to my muscles.
“It doesn’t matter why he’s being this rude,” I decided. “I guess I could’ve handled that. But him sabotaging my chance with Mathew?” I hadn’t told Faith about my confusing feelings for Mathew because here was the headline: Axel’s behavior probably burned a real bridge for a fake relationship. “I want to hit him back where it hurts.”
My eyes went wide at my own words.
“Sorry,” I said quickly. “I assure you, I’m not normally a vindictive person. I’m usually the one telling people to turn the other cheek and be the bigger person. I’m basically a walking Hallmark card most days.”
Faith waved her hand dismissively. “I’m big on revenge. People say to take the high road and all that, but that is totally overrated. It feels so much better to just get revenge.”
The casual way she said it made me laugh. There was something so refreshingly straightforward about her philosophy. “I’ve never really thought to do that. My revenge game is tragically underdeveloped.”
“You should try it out. Trust me, it feels amazing.” She leaned forward, her voice dropping conspiratorially. “One time, I was in a foster family that had this older brother who was a total assclown. I get the wholeangry at being in the foster care situationthing, but he decided to make me his personal target. He used to do things like smash my lunch so it was all crushed by the time I wanted to eat it. Or steal the laces from my shoes. Anything to cause chaos. And before you ask, no, it was not a crush thing,” she added firmly. “The guy just used me as a punching bag for his anger.”
The casual way she dismissed what sounded like genuine bullying made me wonder what other worse things she’d experienced that made this seem minor in comparison.
“What did you do?” I asked, curious now.
Faith took a deliberate sip of wine and leaned forward with a smirk that could only be described as deliciously devious.
“So, the guy was a major jock, right? And at that point, he was in baseball season. He had this super-expensive bat that he worked all summer to save up for. The thing was shiny black, very manly.” She rolled her eyes. “That particular weekend, he had a baseball tournament coming up. I went to a garage sale and found a hot-pink bat. I painted Hello Kitty all over it, and just before he left for the tournament, I replaced his manly black bat with the hot-pink Hello Kitty masterpiece.”
I chuckled, the image forming vividly in my mind. “He didn’t notice?”
“Had one of those gym bags that was so big, it was hidden until it was too late.”
I laughed.
“It was the only bat he had to use the entire tournament,” Faith said, a satisfied gleam in her eye. “The coaches wouldn’t let him borrow one because they said he needed to learn responsibility. His face was the exact color of the bat by the end of the weekend.”
“Okay, you really are fun.” I raised my glass in a toast.
“I have my moments.” She clinked her glass against mine. “You should do something like that to Axel.”
“It’s tempting,” I admitted, the wine making the idea seem less outrageous by the second. “He either needs to talk to me about whatever I did to offend him or move on. Torturing me for the rest of my life isn’t acceptable. There’s a statute of limitations on grudges, and a decade definitely exceeds it.”
“You might be stuck with him, but he’s also stuck with you,” Faith pointed out. “Trust me. Pull a prank on him or something. It’ll make you feel so much better. Bonus points if it hits him in his Achilles’ heel.”
“His Achilles’ heel is his business. As angry as I am, I would never hit him there.” Even in my wine-soaked state, I knew some lines shouldn’t be crossed.
“No, this has to be more fun. What else is his weak spot?”
I shrugged, sighing dramatically. “I have no idea.” God, Faith came up with a Hello Kitty bat, and I couldn’t think of one thing to make him mad. “Heisupset that he can’t date at least. So, I have that small victory, I guess.”
She snapped her fingers, her eyes lighting up like she’d just had an epiphany. “That’s it.”
“What’s it?”
“He’s not allowed to date, right? The whole time you guys are fake together or whatever?”
“Yeah?” I tilted my head, curious where she was going with this.
“And from what you’ve described, this is a guy that doesn’t go two days without a date.”
