Dating You / Hating You

by Christina Lauren

  I’m just reaching for the phone to ring Jess and confess, to ask if she’ll help me switch it all back, when a call comes in that I’ve been waiting for.

  Forty-five minutes of actress flattering later, a knock sounds at my door.

  “Come in,” I say, eyes still on my computer screen as the bottom of the door whispers across the carpet.

  “Hey, did you see that email about the aud—holy hell!” Jess gasps, and I look up to meet her wide eyes.

  “What? What?”

  She shakes her head, a hand coming over her mouth. “Evie, oh my God. I’ll be right back.”

  She rushes out of the room, returning a moment later with Daryl at her heels and closing the door behind them.

  “What’s going on?” I ask. “Why are you two looking at me like that?”

  Daryl can barely keep it together. “What did you do, Garfield?”

  “I—what?” I reach for the compact I keep in the bottom drawer, and I immediately see it. My hands, mostly my palms and up to my wrists, are orange. “Oh my God.”

  “You look like a construction cone,” Daryl says, and she finally loses it, barely managing to add, “You’re making me crave buffalo wings.”

  “Oh my God, would you shut it?” In fumbling with the mirror, I manage to nearly hurl it across the room.

  My face is orange, too. Not just orange but shimmery. I look like a sparkly Circus Peanut.

  Daryl moves to stand next to me. “What did you use?”

  “I didn’t—!”

  I stop, reaching for the lotion bottle I used earlier.

  No.

  Unscrewing the cap, I bring it up to my nose and sniff.

  No.

  Instead of the subtle vanilla scent I’m used to, I now notice a faint chemical smell.

  “Nooooo,” I growl, my voice low and savage. “I’m going to kill him.”

  “He put sunless tanner in your lotion bottle?” Daryl whispers, sounding horrified . . . but also a little impressed.

  Jess runs out and runs right back in again. Coming around the desk, she kneels on the floor next to me, pulling a makeup wipe from a little plastic package. “I’m now afraid for him.” She reaches for my arm and starts to scrub. “Okay, a lot of it is coming off. It’s just bronzer.”

  Daryl laughs. “Give it eight hours.”

  “Oh, Evie, what happened ?” a deep, mocking voice says, and we all look up to see a smiling Carter leaning against the doorframe. Jess practically falls backward in her attempt to flee.

  “You did this!”

  “You want to start pointing fingers, Chef Decaf?”

  I giggle in spite of myself. “Pardon?”

  Pushing off the doorway, he steps closer. Daryl and Jess, wisely, clear the room. “I ran home at lunch to make some of my own coffee, because the cups here just weren’t cutting it. But sure enough, the ones at home are decaf, too. In the grocery store parking lot I couldn’t remember where I parked my car and nearly got arrested trying to get into a different silver Audi.”

  I feel a surge of pride rush through my blood. “You did?”

  He grins, shaking his head at me. “I did. Not cool.”

  Holding out an arm for him to inspect, I say, “You don’t get to come in here and play the victim card, sir.”

  “I wouldn’t dare.” He steps closer, so close that I can feel the warmth of his skin against mine. The playfully contentious mood slips away and I can practically feel the sweep of his attention as he moves his gaze briefly to my lips.

  As if he might kiss me again.

  No way. I think we both know that that won’t ever happen.

  “I liked you,” he whispers.

  An ache worms itself between my ribs when he says this, and my response comes out more raw than I’d planned: “I liked you, too.”

  He stares at me, unblinking. “Evie—”

  “I’m just glad I figured out who you really are before we got in too deep.”

  • • •

  From deep in a pile of bubbles in Steph’s bathtub I address everyone and my innermost core at once. “I’m going to bury him.”

  We’re all here, crowded into Michael and Steph’s small bathroom: Daryl, Amelia, Jess, Steph, and, of course, me. Naked and slightly less orange.

  “That’s great, honey,” Daryl says, handing me another loofah around the shower curtain. “Just not tonight.”

  “You have to admit that was pretty fucking clever,” Amelia says. “To figure out how to use your lotion fetish against you?”

  I look sullenly at the murky water around me. Makeup kept most of the bronzer from absorbing into my face, and it washed off pretty easily. But my palms and elbows absorbed more of the color, and both remain a faded, sickly shade of orange.

  “It’s not a fetish. More of a nervous tic. And he didn’t figure anything out, I told him about the lotion thing. He took something I shared and used it against me. Dirty traitor.”

  “Yeah, let’s not let that halo slip too far there, Evie. You did strike first,” Amelia reminds me. “His decaffeinated self walked into a wall in front of my office.”

  I peek my head around the shower curtain. “He did?” I say gleefully, wishing I’d been there to see it.

  My smile straightens as she stares at me with a single stern eyebrow raised.

  “Come on,” I whine, breaking under the pressure, “it was coffee. I struck first with coffee. Besides, he pulled Dan Printz away from me, swapped out the Vanity Fair photographer for his brother without consulting me, and ditched our joint meeting with the chatty retreat coordinator. I wanted him to know I wasn’t going to roll over.”

  “So all he did was up the stakes,” Amelia says calmly. “And if I know anything about you, you’re already plotting retaliation.”

  “You’re damn right I am. Jess?” I say. “I’m going to need you to do some unsavory things.”

  She looks over at me from where she’s sitting on the bathroom counter. “Am I going to be doing anything illegal?”

  “Ummmm . . . not sure yet.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Will you at least take the fall if I get busted?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I’d like to go on record as saying I think this is a bad idea, but fine, I’m in.”

  “You know, as Carter’s friend, I feel I should step in here,” Steph says.

  I tilt my head. “Perhaps you’d like to see the inside of your bathtub?”

  She holds her hands up to stop me from moving. “No, no. Not necessary.” She looks over her shoulder toward the sound of the doorbell. “I’ll be right back.”

  Slipping back behind the curtain, I pick up the bar of soap and lather the loofah again. “The shoot is next week—and he may have won this battle, but I’m winning the war.”

  “Before I forget,” Jess says, “I was originally coming into your office today to ask if you’d seen the email from Accounting. They’re doing an audit and I need copies of all your expense reports.”

  “Audit?” Daryl repeats.

  “Yeah,” Jess says, “it has something to do with the private equity firm that backed P&D in the merge. I guess outside money means a closer eye on things. They want everyone’s records, even mine.”

  “Just reconciling the books post-merge,” Amelia says. “Pretty normal stuff.”

  Footsteps carry down the hall and I peek out again to see Steph walking back into the bathroom with Daryl’s assistant, Eric, right behind her.

  “What are you doing?” I shout, clutching the shower curtain to my chest.

  “I have my eyes closed,” Eric says. “I needed to drop off these contracts for Daryl.”

  And as if to illustrate that he really does have his eyes closed, he runs into the doorjamb.

  “Right here,” Daryl says, maneuvering her way over to him. “Thanks for coming all the way out here, Eric.”

  “What are you all doing, anyway?” Eric peeks one eye open to glance around the room. “Secret meeting . . . in a bathroo
m?” He squeezes his eyes closed again when he catches sight of me in the tub, and offers me a small wave. “Oh hi, Ms. Abbey.”

  “Plotting revenge against one of your own,” Daryl tells him with the cap of a pen between her teeth. She turns him, holding the papers up against his rather broad, muscled back so she can use him as a makeshift table. “You might be wondering why Evie is sitting in a nest of orange bubbles.”

  “I mean,” he says quietly, “the question had crossed my mind, but Ms. Baker from HR is here so I figured this is a don’t ask, don’t tell situation.”

  Amelia nods. “Good instinct.”

  “Someone put bronzer in the lotion on Evie’s desk,” Daryl says, and Eric is unable to hold in a single, loud burst of laughter. In a whisper, Daryl adds, “Carter did it.”

  Amelia slides her hand down her face.

  “Daryl—don’t reveal names to the civilian,” I say, a little loudly.

  “Relax,” she says. “Eric is cool. Hell, he might even have some ideas.” She turns him back around, handing him the stack of signed papers. “You might be pretty terrible with phones but you’re a genius with computers.” She smiles winningly up at him. “No offense.”

  “Could you create a program that automatically reconciles our expenses with invoices?” Jess quips drily from her perch on the counter.

  Daryl waves her off. “Boring, Jess. We’re talking sabotage.”

  He shrugs. “I could be Team Estrogen. What do you need? I could wipe Carter’s credit score. Create a warrant for his arrest?”

  My stomach gives a surprising lurch. “I don’t actually want him to go to prison.”

  “I could hack into his email?” Eric suggests. “Maybe rearrange his calendar?”

  My interest is momentarily piqued. “You can do all that?”

  We’re treated to a sexy little lift of his chin. “Sure. I can do pretty much anything.”

  A roomful of women watches Eric when he says this, absolutely taking his word for it.

  Finally, Amelia covers her ears. “No way this won’t end badly.”

  “She’s right,” I say. “I appreciate it, but I’m going to have to keep it more zany hijinks and less criminal mastermind.”

  Steph throws one of Morgan’s ducky washcloths in my direction, and the group files out of the bathroom, leaving me to finish up and ponder revenge alone. Climbing out onto the bath mat, I look up, and through the steam on the mirror, I see something hanging on the door behind me.

  Carter’s suit.

  I smile at my reflection. Zany hijinks it is. He does call me Evil, after all.

  If I’m going to the dark side anyway, I might as well do it right.

  chapter sixteen

  carter

  It’s been two days and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about what Evie said to me.

  “You’re doing it again, aren’t you?”

  I lie: “No.”

  Michael Christopher looks up at me from across the table at Creme de la Crepe. “Yes, you are.” He nods to Jonah. “Doesn’t he always do this?”

  Jonah nods.

  I look between them. “What do I always do?”

  “Obsess over something someone might have said, or the possibility that—heaven forbid—someone might not like you. You’ve been like this your entire life. Maybe that’s why you’ve escalated this thing with Evie. She doesn’t like you and so you make sure it’s because of something you’ve done, rather than the possibility she might not like you as a person.”

  Ow. That hits me right where it hurts. “No, she was pretty clear: she used to like me, but was glad to find out who I really am before we got too involved. Essentially: I’m a prick.”

  “You’re not a prick,” Michael says, and waves a spoon in front of Morgan, trying to divert her attention away from basically every other moving thing in the restaurant. “You’re just dumb.”

  “Don’t lie to him, MC. He’s a total prick,” Jonah says, and I glare at him. Aside from a few texts to set things up for the photo shoot, Jonah and I haven’t really talked since I found out about his little money situation. I invited him to join us for breakfast so I could go over the details for Friday and reiterate how important it is that he not fuck this up. So far all he’s done is stare at his phone and make wisecracks at my expense.

  It’s nauseating to think how much I have riding on my brother here. Brad thinks I brought him in because I have some sort of master plan, which means that if Jonah screws up and the shoot is any flavor of diva, there’s no way Brad won’t find out. There would be no coming back from that. The new contract will be Evie’s and I’ll be on a plane back to my parents’ house.

  “He’s not a prick,” Steph says to Jonah. Apparently she caught this last bit from him as she was returning from the bathroom. “Why would you say that?” It’s heartwarming to see both MC and Steph sticking up for me, but let’s be real, I deserve at least some shit for the other day with Evie.

  “You’ve been quiet today,” I say to her. “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah, just . . . you know. Work,” she says, repeatedly stabbing her ice water with a straw.

  She seems off, but when I look at what she’s eating, who could blame her? Her husband is shoveling down the Oh La La—an enormous plate of waffles smothered in Nutella, strawberries, bananas, and mango—and she’s having egg whites with sautéed spinach before she heads to yoga. Yoga. As if that’s not bad enough, she’ll essentially be doing it on an empty stomach.

  I think I’m only now realizing how hard it must be to be a woman. Too thin or not thin enough. Do your job flawlessly, but don’t show up any of the men. Speak up, but don’t be bitchy. Smile. And then you have people like Brad totally playing into it.

  I rub my finger along the side of my water glass, watching the condensation drip onto the napkin underneath it. I’m feeling like a dick for playing into it myself.

  “Do you ever have one of those moments when something seems like a good idea, and then you realize later that you are in fact a total fucking moron?”

  Michael doesn’t miss a beat. “Every day.”

  Jonah looks up from his phone again, as if the topic of my failures is the only conversation worthy of his attention. “What did you do?”

  I jab of piece of sausage with my fork. “Nothing. Never mind.”

  “Come on,” he says. “In case you haven’t noticed, my life is in the toilet right now. I’m a total fucking moron, give me something here.”

  His honesty catches me off guard. “It’s just a series of really stupid things that snowballed,” I tell them, “and now I’m legitimately afraid to go to work on Monday.”

  Steph coughs.

  “Okay . . .” Jonah says.

  “Let’s see, where to start,” I say. “I guess we could go with when our boss knocked Evie’s breakfast into the trash because he’s a sexist dick, and I just sat there and watched. Or when I let her sit through a meeting with two of her shirt buttons undone. Two very important buttons,” I clarify.

  “She didn’t tell me about that,” Steph says, and her expression is a little terrifying.

  “How were the tits?” Jonah asks, bringing it all back to the important issues. “Nice?”

  Before I can reach across and smack him, Steph does it, then turns to Michael. “Did you know about all this?”

  “I . . . heard that . . . something . . . untoward had occurred,” he says, choosing his words carefully. “I told him it was wrong. Very wrong.” He gives me a stern expression that says he’ll murder me in my sleep if I so much as hint at the truth.

  Steph groans. “I knew about Jonah and the weird Dan Printz situation, and that you’d flaked out on the meeting with the retreat coordinator.”

  “I—”

  “All of that is professional stuff between the two of you. But playing into Brad’s sexism? That makes me angry at you, Carter. It’s hard enough for a woman to be taken seriously in this business and seen as a person with a brain and not an obje
ct. Men get passes for acting like it’s 1960 and every woman in the office is their secretary. Evie will have to be smarter, faster, and better at her job than you are, for possibly less money and a whole lot less recognition, all while appearing totally grateful for it.”

  I want to crawl under the table.

  “That’s exactly what I told him,” Michael says, nodding feverishly. “That it undermines her credibility. Didn’t I tell you that, Carter? If I had a shame bell I would follow him around. Very disappointed in you.”

  “I felt trapped,” I say. “If I said something, would she have been more embarrassed? Plus she would know I was looking at her boobs.”

  “Which you were, I’m sure,” Steph says.

  “Well, yeah. Because they’re great.”

  She reaches across and smacks me this time.

  “I don’t see the problem,” Jonah says. “None of this sounds bad so far.”

  “That’s not very reassuring,” I say, and then look back at Steph. “Like I said, it escalated. I don’t even know how it happened. One minute I was in line at the store getting caffeinated K-Cups for the office, and the next I look over and see this giant display of bronzer. To summarize, I’m pretty sure I’m going to end up in a ditch somewhere.”

  “Wait—is this the girl from the party?” Jonah asks around a mouthful of potatoes. My potatoes. “The one you couldn’t close the deal with?”

  I toss him an icy glance. “Why are you even here?”

  “You asked me to come, dickbag. You wanted to lecture me about this stupid shoot. You do understand this is what I do, right?” He straightens—a sign he’s getting riled up. “You think I’ve made it this far because I need you to show me how to do my job?”

  Annoyance flares in my chest, but I do my best to push it down. I reacted almost exactly the same way when Evie told me it was time to move on Dan.

  “Just remember, I made sure they could work with your schedule and the new shoot time is eleven,” I tell him. “We’re doing makeup at eight thirty. Be there at nine. Don’t be late. And no attitude, either. I put my neck out for you on this. Not to mention Evie’s.”

  “Fucking hell, I’ll be there, Carter.” My brother shoves his phone into his pocket and stands. “Why are you such a dick all the time?”