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Maybe my plan wasn’t going to work after all. Maybe he…
Maybe he just plaincouldn’tfeel that way toward me.
The knot in my stomach began to shift and move, swirling up a healthy dose of nausea.
But oh God. What if I couldn’t tempt Luke to fall in love with me? What if I’d been working so hard all these years…for nothing?
And that was the moment that he decided to walk in.
All the air evacuated my lungs, and I thought I was going to pass out.
With his arm casually draped over the shoulders of another girl, I could only gape in disbelief as I took her in. Amber Galveston had been two years older than me in school. And about fifty pounds heavier.
I mean, what the hell was Luke doing here with not only adatebut a date who was bigger than I’d ever been? I’d worked and sweated and wept for threeyearsto lose all these pounds for him. Because he’d only dated skinny girls before.
This just…
It didn’t compute in my brain.
But my size had never been an issue. It had just been mepersonallyhe didn’t want.Iwasn’t good enough.
The weight of reality settled hard on my shoulders.
Luke didn’t want me; he’dneverwanted me.
Hewouldnever want me. I’d worked so hard all those years for nothing.
As I stood there, staring at the two of them together, he leaned in toward Amber, pausing his face right next to hers so he could say something to make her smile. And things inside me broke as they’d never broken before.
I’m saying, my heart freaking shattered into dust particles as I stood there gaping at them. And it left me utterly lost, trying to figure out how to keep surviving from that point on.
But my world was crumbling, and I couldn’t seem to stop falling apart on the inside, not even when he looked up and saw me.
He blinked and jerked to a stop, pausing Amber with him so he could gape at me with his mouth falling open. “Chloe?” he finally asked as if to make sure it was me. Then he lifted his eyebrows in surprise. “How the hell did you get Pick to let you leave the house inthatthing?”
I swallowed down the knot in my throat and managed to say something about how Daddy hadn’t even seen the dress.
“Well, that makes more sense,” he answered with a snort before leaning his face over to lightly bump the side of his head into Amber’s. “Hey, do you remember Chloe Ryan from school?”
“Ithinkso,” Amber answered, her gaze degrading and rude as she ran it over me. “She looks vaguely familiar, anyway.”
“We had art together,” I told her lamely.
“That’s right,” she answered. Then, she lifted an eyebrow and brutally told me, “Bulimia’s not healthy, you know.”
My mouth dropped open. “Excuseme?”
Amber turned to Luke, bluntly ignoring me. “Hey, I’m going to go get a heaping pile of nachos loaded with cheese and bacon over there. You want any?”
He grinned. “Sure. Thanks.” Then he swatted her on the ass as she walked away.
He was still leering after her with obvious lust when I completely lost my shit. “You…asshole,” I growled. And I threw the cup I was holding full of icy cold water right in his face.
With a gasp, he lifted his arms and bellowed, “What thefuck!”
When he turned to gape at me, his gaze growing livid, I spat, “Thanks a lot fornotdefending me.”
“Defending you fromwhat?” he roared, wiping ice off his shoulders and then beads of water from his face.
