The Stand-In Boyfriend (Grove Valley High #1)(60)

“I need to tell you something.”

I nod, glancing around the room. Jessie’s still not here. I take the cup she holds out to me and take a sip. There’s definitely way more alcohol than necessary in there, but right now I don’t care. Everything is amazing right now.

“Well, last night Mark was hanging out here with Chase, Aaron, and the rest of those guys.”

“Yeah,” I reply. Chase wanted to go out for dinner and a movie, but I was way too worked up about the game to be in anyone’s company. I was actually in bed by eight o’clock, desperate to get a full night’s sleep, not that it did me any good—I was way too stressed to sleep. When I told him I was just going to stay in and wanted to be on my own, he said he was going to have some friends over for video games and pizza.

“So his sister showed up with a bunch of her friends after a couple of hours and they were all hanging out together.”

I frown at the look on Sophie’s face. She doesn’t look impressed.

“So?”

“So…they’re college girls? Hot college girls.”

I roll my eyes. “Mark likes you Sophie—a lot. He always has. He did when you first started dating and he still does despite you hooking up with that college guy. It’s you who keeps running hot and cold on him, not the other way around.”

She shakes her head. “You’re not getting it. I know Mark isn’t going to be with anyone else, but he said there was this one girl who was all over Chase—hanging on his every word, following him around everywhere, touching his arm, all that kinda stuff—making it very obvious she’d be down for a hook-up.”

A pang of jealousy hits me straight in the stomach, and it shocks me. Since when do I care about Chase and other girls?

“What happened?” I ask slowly.

Sophie shakes her head. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. He told her he had an awesome girlfriend and he wasn’t interested, even though she was offering it up on a silver platter.”

Relief unfolds in my stomach. I shouldn’t be relieved that he didn’t want to hook up with an older girl, and I definitely shouldn’t be jealous about someone else liking him. Chase and I are fake, and I want Jessie. I still want Jessie, but I don’t like what Sophie just told me. I really don’t like it.

“Mark told me because he was saying how whipped Chase is and how into you he is. I haven’t told him you’re both faking it. He has no clue about that, but he said Chase is hooked.”

I swallow. “I mean…he probably didn’t want to look like a dick in front of the guys by cheating on me. Most of them think we’re the real deal. It doesn’t mean anything.”

She scoffs. “He turned down a hot, older college girl for you, Livy.”

My eyes drift behind her to where Chase is chatting with Aaron and Brendon. He glances up and grins at me. My stomach flips, and it makes me want to be sick. No. No. I don’t want to know what that means. I don’t want to think about the fact that I’m jealous that some girl was hitting on him, and I definitely don’t want to think about what it means that he didn’t even consider her. I try to dismiss it and pretend it’s just because he didn’t want to lose face and have his friends think he’d cheat, but I know that’s not true.

“What…um…it’s not—”

She raises an eyebrow, a smirk on her face. “Are you sure he’s still faking?”

I’m saved from answering by Tia and Hallie appearing beside us. They start to dissect the game, discussing every pass and goal in great detail, and it helps to relax me. I don’t want to think about Chase and a college girl and what his rejection of her might mean. I want to think about what I know: soccer and my friends and Jessie. I want to stick to what I know, to what makes me comfortable, and that means Jessie.

I glance around the party and see that he still hasn’t showed up.

“Have you seen Jessie?” I ask Sophie as Tia and Hallie drift off and get another drink.

She glances around, surprised, like she hadn’t noticed he wasn’t here. “I don’t know. He should be here. I texted to tell him where we were.”

“We kissed,” I tell her.

Her eyes bug out so much I start to laugh. “What the hell?” she demands. “Why are you only just now telling me this? When did this happen?”

“Calm down. It wasn’t a kiss kiss or anything. He just grabbed me after the game, hugged me, and then kissed me. I don’t think either of us were expecting it.”

“No tongue?” she asks.

My face burns, which makes her snicker. “No,” I manage to mutter. If there’s no tongue, Sophie doesn’t even count it as a kiss.

“Oh my God though—this is big!”

“I know.”

“Are you going to tell Chase?”

I shrug. “I don’t know.” Especially after what she just told me. I don’t know exactly what my status is with Chase as the moment. “Do you think I should? Should I let him know our plan is finally working?” I ask, just because it’s easier to stick with the original plan of making Jessie jealous and putting Abigail off than actually thinking about how our relationship might have changed.

She stares at me for a minute, opens her mouth like she’s going to say something, but then snaps it shut again.