Falling Out of Hate with You (The Hate-Love Duet 1)

Well, that gets Savage’s attention. He jolts to standing and barks, “There’s no way I’m paying Laila a dime of my salary. I was willing to support her crazy idea, as a favor to her, as long as it didn’t affect me, but—"

I jump up, matching Savage’s angry body language. “As a favor to me, my ass. You did it to save yourself! If anyone is doing a favor here, it’s me doing one for you!”

“Bullshit,” he grits out. “You know you’ve got me between a rock and a hard place, and you’re shamelessly exploiting me.”

“Exploiting you?” I retort. “You’re the one who breached his morality clause, not me. You’re the one who needs a fake girlfriend to ‘redeem’ your stupid fuckboy ass this season. You’d already be fired right now, if it weren’t for me and the world’s bizarre obsession with us being a couple.”

Savage scoffs. “Gee, Laila. I wonder how the world got obsessed with that idea? Could it be you purposely fanned the flames of that rumor on Sylvia, for your own benefit?”

“I did not!” I shout. “I tried to put the fire out on Sylvia! I literally denied we’re a couple!”

His tone dripping with sarcasm, Savage says, “Yeah, and you did it sooo convincingly.” He rolls his eyes. “Ninety percent of all human communication is nonverbal, Laila. And guess what your nonverbal communication screamed on Sylvia? ‘Hell, yes, we’re totally fucking!’”

I gasp like this is news to me, even though countless friends texted me after that interview to razz me about that very thing. But good friends can tease me about that—not assholes I hate! Assholes who texted me their room number, begging me to show up so they could finally taste me, so they could “eat me from every angle,” and then, minutes later, brought yet another groupie to their room.

“People were already obsessed with us being a couple before my interview,” I insist. “That’s why Sylvia brought up your name. And you should be grateful she did, because that interview going viral is what convinced Nadine to hire you as Hugh’s replacement in the first place. Right, Nadine?”

“No comment.”

“So let me get this straight,” Savage says. “You shamelessly used me as click-bait on Sylvia to further your own career, and you want me to thank you for doing it?”

“Oh, you mean, kinda like how you used my name as click-bait last night, with that Instagrammer?”

Savage pulls a face like I’ve just barfed straight into his mouth. “I didn’t even mention your name to that Instagrammer last night! I said I needed to ‘lay low’ because of the show.”

“Sure, Jan,” I say, invoking a famous meme from The Brady Bunch.

Savage says, “If you think a single word of what that Instagrammer said was true, then you’re either crazy or projecting, or both.”

“Projecting what?”

“Your obsession with me onto me!”

I roll my entire head, not only my eyes. “Oh, please. I haven’t given you a moment’s thought since the tour ended.”

“Sure, Jan,” he says, throwing my comment back to me.

“Was last night some kind of a staged set-up?” I ask.

Savage’s features contort with disdain. “You’re asking if I conspired with a random Instagrammer I’d just met at a party to post a crazy story about you and me . . . for publicity?”

It sounds even crazier when he says it back to me. But I persist. “Maybe. You had to know she’s got a huge following.”

“I didn’t, actually.”

“And you also had to know she constantly posts about her infatuation with you. She’s practically president of your fan club! So, I don’t think it’s crazy to assume you knew she’d post about her interaction with you, however insignificant—see exhibits one through a million on Twitter—and you decided to give her something to post about. Something you knew would go viral.”

Savage shakes his head. “You know you sound like a deranged lunatic right now, right?”

He’s right. I do. I’m a stone-cold nutter. But I don’t care. I’m a runaway train. “It’s not any crazier than believing you told her you had to ‘lay low’ and she heard ‘Laila.” Come on, Savage. We both know you said my name. And you knew, with all the publicity we’ve had lately—we’re a freaking meme, dude!—that mentioning my name would be like throwing a lit match onto a puddle of gasoline!”

“I didn’t say your name, for the love of fuck!” he roars, absolutely beside himself with frustration. “Thanks to your stupid interview on Sylvia, she assumed we must be fucking—just like everyone else assumes it! Do you have any idea how many friends texted me after seeing that interview? They were like, ‘Dude, if you two aren’t already having sex, then buy yourself a huge box of condoms, pronto, because Laila’s gonna show up on your doorstep any day now, demanding to fuck you for a solid week straight!’?”