Page 17

He nodded, seeming happy enough with my response. Despite his warm smile, I didn’t feel convinced he was all that happy though. There was something in his eyes that told me he was still angry and, despite his words, he still held the competition against me.

I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. At lunch, Hayley couldn’t stop glancing at Jake. Meanwhile, Jake couldn’t keep his eyes off Cole, who was at the other end of the table.

“I feel like I’m watching Bruce Banner and I'm just waiting for him to Hulk out,” Hayley murmured, nodding in Jake’s direction.

“He’s not that bad,” I replied.

“Madi, there’s like a massive throbbing vein on his forehead,” she said. “I really don’t like him when he’s angry, and he’s this close to turning green.” She pinched her fingers together, indicating that she thought he was about an inch away from losing it.

“He’s not going to turn green!”

She shrugged. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

I glanced over my shoulder at Jake. He’d barely said a word at lunch, and Hayley was right. There was a rather large looking vein throbbing on his forehead.

“He told me he would be okay with it for a week,” I said, turning back to face Hayley.

“Well, it probably doesn’t help that Cole has spent the entire lunch break looking at you,” she replied.

My eyes jerked in Cole’s direction, and again I found that Hayley was right. He was watching me and he grinned when our eyes met. I glared at him in return before focusing back on Hayley.

“This is going to be the longest week of my life,” I said. “Is he still looking at me?”

Hayley laughed. “Yep. He looks really pleased with himself too.”

I squinted my eyes shut and blew out a long breath. “Why do you think he’s so fixated on ruining my life?” I asked, opening my eyes once more.

“Dramatic much?” Haley asked, making me smile.

“Yeah, maybe a little,” I conceded. I let out a sigh. “I just want this week to be over with already.”

She patted my arm. “It’ll be over before you know it,” she said.

I hoped she was right about that as well.

* * *

Hayley wasn’t right.The week dragged by so slowly I began to worry I’d been caught up in some kind of time loop. No matter how much I wished the competition would be over and done with, it seemed to trail me everywhere. We hadn’t even started filming, but people were already chatting to me about it in the corridor and wishing me luck. It was like they had forgotten Jake even existed and that he was my boyfriend.

Jake, on the other hand, was starting to act like he’d forgotten that I existed. Aside from driving me to and from school each day, we barely spent any time together, and he hardly said a word to me when we did. I knew he was upset, but he’d taken it to a whole new level. By the time Friday evening rolled around, I was beginning to wonder if there would even be a relationship left for me to save once the competition was over.

Hayley came to my house beforehand to help me get ready for the first group date. Not that I wanted to put any effort in. I could only imagine how Jake would react if he thought I’d tried to dress up for Cole.

“You have to wear this,” Hayley said, coming out of my closet with a short black dress in her hand. Mom was always buying me clothes and putting them in my room for me. The dress Hayley was holding definitely wasn’t something I’d picked out.

“That dress would barely cover my ass,” I replied.

“Exactly.” Hayley’s eyes lit up at the thought.

“Not going to happen,” I said.

Hayley let out a frustrated huff before returning to my closet in search of something else.

“You have so much cute stuff in here,” she called out to me. “How come you never wear any of it?”

“Because I’m pretty sure my mom only put it in there to try and pimp me out.”

Hayley laughed and her head appeared in the doorway. “Why would she want to pimp you out?”