Page 56 of The Billionaire Mismatch

“No,” I say. And it’s true. We didn’t have sex. Not exactly…

“Okay good. Because that would just be throwing the ball in his court,” she says, and I hear another honk. “Boston drivers are literally fucking insane.”

“Sadie,” I say as I moisturize my face. A little mascara and lip gloss and I’m going to have to call it good. “How long are we going to keep this up?” I ask. “We’ve been on four dates, and I feel like we’re losing sight of the initial purpose.”

“We lost sight of the initial purpose the night you slept with him,” she says flatly. “But it’s okay because I forgive you. We aren’t just going to break his ego. Now we are going to break his heart.”

“Did he really hurt you that badly?” I ask, and Sadie gasps.

“You’re joking, right? Olivia…I was in love with him. And he led me on. And then he fired me. He fired me, Livv. For believing he cared about me.”

“I know, I know…” I agree, covering my face with my hands. “Okay. He hurt you, and he deserves to be held accountable for that. But we need an endpoint here. Because right now I am following his lead and it’s just heading for what feels like monogamy,” I say, and Sadie just laughs.

“Monogamy? Olivia. This is Luca Laurent. He’s not monogamous. He’s never been monogamous. It’s not his MO. No, if he is still stringing you along, he must have a plan. A motive. A scheme…” She trails off before gasping loud enough to make me jump, and I nearly fall over as I tug a pair of panties on.

“What?” I ask.

“OMG! That asshole!” she says.

“What!?”

“Olivia…he knows.”

“Knows what?” I ask as I dig through my laundry for a bra. I am going to be so late. And then I’m never going to hear the end of it.

“He knows that you know me.”

“How?” I ask.

“Seriously. You don’t think he’s looked you up on social media? No, that is exactly what happened. He looked you up and saw me. Or he came to his senses and looked me up after he fired me and saw you. Either way, he saw us. He saw us together, and he figured it out, and he knows we’re playing him. That tricky asshole.”

“Sadie,” I say as I throw on a band t-shirt and some shorts. There are definitely perks to running a podcast where being visible is optional. “I feel like you’re reading too heavily into this.”

“And I feel like you are too naïve to see what’s really going on,” she says. “Livv. He’s onto us. It’s why he’s taken you on four dates and only slept with you once. Because after he slept with you, he figured out who you are and now…he’s trying to beat us at our own game.”

“I thought we were trying to beat him at his own game,” I say as I grab my keys and purse.

“Exactly,” she says. And my head is spinning.

“Look. Sadie, I love you. And we can talk about it later. But I am so late for work right now, and I really need coffee and–”

“Go, go,” she insists. “And in the meantime, I am writing up a new agenda.”

A new agenda. Just what we need.

I drive like a bat out of hell to work and throw the car in park. We don’t have an episode today, but we do have to write up the notes for the next one. And Kiersten has a second job as a bartender, so we are on a bit of a timeframe.

Still, I’m never going to survive any of this without coffee, so I grab my usual latte before heading up to the studio.

“I am starting to regret ever agreeing to go along with this,” I say as soon as I walk in the door. My hope is that if I start talking before they do, I’ll have a head start in the conversation that is most likely going to be similar to the one I just had with Sadie.

“I thought it was your idea,” Henry says.

“It was…sort of,” I say as I toss my bag on the floor and plop down in my seat, latte in hand. “But it’s gone too far.”

“Let me guess, you slept with him again,” Kiersten says.

“No,” I answer, ripping open my straw and shoving it in the cup. “I did not sleep with him. I slept with him, but I didn’t sleep with him.”