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“I’m not,” Blake says with a laugh. “But do you remember back in high school, when Pam Williams had that rumor spread about her being the girl who gave all of junior high herpes?”
I raise my brows, wondering why Blake would bring up something that happened almost a decade ago. “Sure,” I say, trying to recall the shoddy details of the event. Pam had been the most popular girl in school at the time and the girl literally every boy wanted to date. Until Ken Wilson, her latest ex, started to tell everyone about her having herpes. Within weeks, she became a pariah.
“How does Pam’s horrible reputation help me exactly?” I ask. “Did you sleep with her or something?”
“Yeah, I wish.” Blake had not come into himself, looks or height-wise, until he was well past nineteen. So, he had been almost as overlooked as his sister when she joined us at the school two years later.
Britney. A frisson in my belly stirs.
Gone are the days when all I felt for her was amused nonchalance.
But now, I think of that last massage she gave me. The look in her eyes when she saw me naked. I can’t help fisting my cock in the shower when I imagine how her skin would feel like warm velvet under the tips of my fingers. How I’d comb my hand through her thick mass of hair, sliding between my fingers like silk.
But these are merely entertaining, passing thoughts. I’m determined not to cross that line. Though it has been nicehaving the sweet image to replay over and over in a week that has been otherwise filled with disaster.
“Don’t you remember?” Blake says, sounding way more excited than I would prefer. “She didn’t have a horrible reputation throughout our time in school because—”
“She eventually started dating Tommy,” I finish, remembering that aspect of the story. After the rumor broke, Pam had disappeared for a few weeks. She came back swinging, dating the nerdiest person in our class. Tommy was the perfect boyfriend. He delivered flowers every morning and asked her out to prom in the grandest way possible. Gradually, people stopped making fun of Pam and started envying her. I even thought that there was no way the herpes story could be true. If it were, Tommy, who had the strictest parents known to mankind, would never have dated her.
“You see?” Blake continues. “She got caught in a scandal, and she changed her whole narrative. She stopped being the girl who jumped from guy to guy and became the one who settled for a sweet boy. Everyone forgot about the herpes rumor.”
“Oh.” Finally, I’m understanding what Blake is trying to get at. “So, you mean that I should . . .?”
My voice trails off as I consider the magnitude of what he’s saying.
“Hell, no.” I rise to my feet. “You want me to find some prim and proper girl and proclaim myself to the press as a reformed bad boy?”
Blake shrugs. “It’s either that or random drug tests for the rest of your career.”
I let out a groan.
“It won’t be as bad,” he says. “It could be pretend. PR relationships happen all the time. You’ve just got to sell it long enough for no one to care about Janice anymore.”
“And where,” I ask him, still not believing he considersthis is a good idea, “do you think I’m going to find a buttoned-up girl willing to fake date me with no benefit to herself at all?”
It’s a crazy plan.
But the moment my words leave my mouth, I lock eyes with Blake, and I can tell we’re both thinking the same.
The demure, innocent woman who would turn any stink into a flowery scent.
This just got interesting.
CHAPTER 4
BRITNEY
I’ve got to admit, I’ve never left a hockey match in such high spirits before.
It had nothing to do with the game itself. Sure, it was the opening of the season for the Philly Flyers, and they’d won with a wide margin. Good for them.
But what I did enjoy were the number of boos that Alex got every time the puck was with him. I heard chants of “asshole,” “dick,” “druggie,” and so many others.
Another player would have been embarrassed enough to quit. But not Alex. He managed to assist about half of the goals for the match. But I was close enough to the rink to see the grimace underneath his helmet, to notice how tightly he held his stick.
He was completely and totally pissed.
And that made me feel so much better about my own life.
