“Aaron.” My face pressed into his shirt, which muffled my voice. “I want this bullshit to go away. That is what I want.”
He hummed in response. His athletic body relaxed beneath me. It began in his shoulders, his grip on me lessening as relief spread through him. “Were you afraid I was going to say no?”
“Yes. No. Either way you answered killed a little part of me. You don’t know what you’re agreeing to, Gabs.”
“Gabs?” I wrinkled my nose. “I haven’t heard that one in a hot minute. Where did that name come from, anyway?”
“Freshman year. We took a Twitter poll to see who talked more. You insisted I did, but the results said otherwise. You’re gabby. Gabs.” One side of his mouth turned up, the first smile I had seen on his handsome face. I forgot what playboy, hot-as-hell Aaron used to look like. This Aaron? He frowned and glowered everywhere. I missed my playboy.
“Ah, shit. I forgot about that.” I shrugged his arms off me. “I call bullshit, by the way. You had hella more followers than me.”
“Everyone knows who you are. You were Twitter-famous for a while,” he replied with a smug smirk.
“God, you have a great smile.” I meant to compliment him, not do the opposite. His lips went flat, all humor erased from his face. “Stop looking so forlorn. Jesus. We always have fun together.”
“We should talk about the six months.” He straightened. He chose to look at my closet door rather than my face. “Let’s go over some ground rules.”
“Ground rules? Come on, man.” I punched a pillow, annoyed at him. “I think it’s self-explanatory. We act normal behind closed doors, but out there in the scary world, we hold hands and shit.”
“Essentially, yes. Hand holding, staged kissing, events and pictures.” He met my eyes, all serious and dark. “You can’t go on any dates or hook-up with anyone. The entire time. If it got out, the whole thing could blow up.”
“I get it.” I gulped.Six. Months. Thank God I have the rabbit.
“You can’t put the arrangement into words anywhere. Did you already tell Callie?”
“Yes. She said she would’ve agreed to it, too. We care about you. We want to help.” His eyes softened when he flicked his gaze in the direction of Callie’s room. I sighed, stuck between smacking him or hugging him again. He reminded me of a damn puppy. “Plus, Ronnie, this will be good for me. To clean upmyact for six months.”
“Okay. She’ll keep it quiet.” He completely ignored myclean upcomment. “The guys, they won’t say anything either.” He ran his hand over the back of his neck for quite some time. “We have to go on dates.”
“I love food. Shouldn’t be a problem. Hell, I deleted my dating apps. I’m done with dating for a while anyway since last weekend.” I twisted the end of my hair, refusing to look at him. “What are you so worried about?”
“It won’t be real.”
Each word felt like ice in my chest. I knew it wouldn’t be real, but him solidifying it hurt. Like, I would forget it was an act. He didn’t do feelings. I had my own shit to deal with. It would be a monumental disaster. I chewed on my lip again. I’d need to buy more Chapstick at this rate. “Yeah, I got that. It’s a fake relationship. Don’t worry, I won’t forget the situation.”
“Good. I don’t want to hurt you. You’re important to me.” He slammed each syllable between his teeth. An unwelcome, unfamiliar emotion began in my chest at his words.
“You won’t hurt me,” I replied with as much confidence I could muster. “Stop worrying about me, Ronnie. Focus on keeping your scholarship. The rest is just details.”
“I’ll try.” He sighed, squeezing my knee for a second. “Thank you.”
“When do we start?” I meant it as a joke, but those dark eyes twitched.
“Tomorrow. I’m posting we are making it official. Everyone on the team can assume we’ve been seeing each other the whole time we’ve been friends. Tomorrow it’ll be on my social media, hopefully yours, too.”
“Yeah. I’ll make it official.” I held up my phone and added a heart emoji next to his name. “Look. We are legit as fuck.”
He let out a small laugh, standing up. “You seem to be handling it better than I am.”
“It’s easy when it’s for you,” I replied, my words visibly comforting him. He nodded, opening my door, but paused.
“I have one more condition for you.” He grimaced, avoiding my eyes.
“I’m listening,” I replied, my nerves on edge. We had already discussed a hell of a lot of rules and stipulations.
“My familycannotknow about the ruse, no matter what happens.” Those steely eyes bored into me, daring me to look away. I didn’t. “It would destroy them.”
“Okay.”
