Trouble with the Fake Boyfriend (Rock Bottom #3) - Holly Renee Page 0,38

Liam’s mom said.

Not when the way I woke up plastered to Liam this morning kept playing in my head like a loop. It wasn’t just me either. He was holding me against him like I was meant to be there, and it felt like I was.

But I was tired and confused, and I didn’t have a clue how I even got to his room in the first place. The last thing I remembered was playing twenty-one questions on the back deck while I sat in Liam’s lap.

Liam’s lap, where I must have fallen asleep like he was my personal bed. Oh God. He was probably so ready to get me off him that he carried me up those stairs. With a hurt shoulder that he should have been more concerned about than me.

I slipped out of his bed before he woke up, and somehow I managed to avoid him before his mom and I left the house.

I told his mom that he was probably just tired from the game the night before. I told myself that he was probably just avoiding me as much as I was avoiding him.

“What do you think of this one?” Sarah held up a pretty maroon dress that looked far too frumpy for a woman like her.

“It’s pretty.” I shifted through the dresses in front of me. “But this one would look amazing.” I held up a silver dress that had just the slightest amount of shimmer and the perfect cut for her body.

Her eyes got as big as saucers as she looked at it.

“I don’t think I can pull that off.” She tucked the maroon dress in the curve of her arm, but kept looking at the dress I held up with interest.

“Just try it on.” I loaded it on the pile I had for myself. “If you don’t like it, we can put it back.”

“You’re right.” She nodded and kept going through the racks. “Are you excited about the wedding?”

“Yeah,” I lied. It wasn’t so much that I wasn’t excited about going to the wedding. The wedding would be fine. But it also meant the end of this. This charade between Liam and I would be over, and our life and our relationship would go back to normal.

I wasn’t sure how to feel about that.

I didn’t know how I would handle it.

Because I wouldn’t be the same after this. No matter how hard I tried to keep my head on straight or my heart on lock, I knew I wasn’t strong enough to withstand him.

No matter how easily he would return to normal when we got home, I would be affected.

But I was a pro at hiding my feelings, and this would be no different. I could smile at Liam at work and I could joke when he brought another girl around and pretend like I wasn’t going insane with jealousy.

I knew I could.

“I’m going to be sad when you all leave.” Sarah led us to the dressing room, and I closed the door to my stall as she kept talking. “Of course, I’m going to miss Liam, but I’m going to miss you too.”

I hated her words.

I hated that she was so perfect and caring and made me comfortable without even trying.

I hated that we were hurting her for no good reason.

The urge to tell her the truth was on the tip of my tongue, but I could never do that to Liam. Regardless of where we ended up after this, he trusted me, and I wouldn’t betray that trust even if that meant I was going to hurt his mama when this all ended.

Because she would be hurt.

She had so much false hope and dreams, and it was all our fault.

“I’ll miss you too.” I was being completely honest. I wouldn’t tell Liam this, but I fell in love with Sarah that first moment I met her in her kitchen. She was so vastly different from my own mother, and even though I didn’t actually miss my own mom, I did miss the idea of what she should have been.

Sarah was that.

She had me laughing over flour and biscuit dough, and she made it easy to fall into the role I was brought here to play.

Liam had so much of her in him. Even if he tried to hide it most of the time.

“When Jim and I come to visit Liam, maybe the two of us can plan something with just the two of us. A spa day or another shopping