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“So you keep saying.”
“Anyway…” I brushed off where she was trying to steer the conversation.
I knew that Kayla wanted to know exactly what had happened between Joseph and me, but I didn’t want to tell her. She would make excuses for his behavior, like reminding me that he had been drunk and wasn’t normally such an ass.
But he had been so rude. Insensitive. And unkind. Even if he was hammered, that was no reason to say the things he had to me.
“You said his mom would be a hard sell. What’s she like?”
Kayla whistled before leaning back against the chair. “She’s smart. Observant. Is aware of far more than she lets on. You can’t let your guard down around her. Even if you don’t see her, she will be watching.”
“Damn, Kayla,” I groaned, second-guessing my decision after hearing all of that.
“Don’t get cold feet now.”
“I’m just not that good of a liar, and you know it.”
She whipped up a hand and held out one finger. “That’s not true. You lie to people all the time in your line of work.”
“Hey,” I argued.
“I just meant that you mislead. Give people a little hope when there might not be any. Tell them you did all you could when maybe you didn’t. Or maybe there wasn’t anything that could be done. You make people feel what you need them to in order to be okay with whatever happened to their loved one.”
I wanted to fight with her, but she wasn’t wrong. Maybe I was a better deceiver than I gave myself credit for. “Fair point.”
“And for the record, you haven’t even asked.” Kayla folder her arms across her chest and waited for me to fall for her baited trap.
“Asked what?” I asked, giving her what she wanted.
“How much money he’s going to pay you for being his fake girlfriend.” Her face looked like she held the greatest secret in all the world.
“Don’t say it like that. It makes me sound like a prostitute.” I stuck my tongue out like I’d eaten something rotten.
“Well, this prostitute is getting two hundred thousand.” Her eyes widened as she waited for my reaction.
I coughed and choked out the word, “Pesos?”
Kayla laughed. “Dollars, you idiot.”
I was in a little over a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of school debt. “All to make his mom go away and leave him alone?”
“No. All of this to make his mom happy,” she clarified. “He’s a good guy, Sutton. You’ll see,” she said.
I really wanted to believe her.
But I didn’t.
FIRST—NO, SECOND IMPRESSIONS
JOSEPH
“She agreed,” Kayla said with a shit-eating grin on her smug face.
Shit.The evil troll had actually said yes. That brought up a whole new set of considerations.
“We need a contract. I want everything in writing,” I blurted out, and Kayla’s grin turned into a grimace.
“I want to argue with you right now because it’s my best friend we’re talking about, but a contract would be the smart thing to do.”
