Page 31 of Changed By You
My toiletry bag is stacked on top of a tall pile of Farrah’s luggage. I pick it up and say, “Speaking of showers, I need to take one. Did you finish your workout?”
She gets up. “I did a forty-five-minute one since I have that meeting at nine. I guess I should go get ready, too.”
“Do you want breakfast before the meeting?”
“I’ll take a protein shake and two egg whites.”
“Okay, I’ll have it ready fifteen minutes before the meeting.”
I wait for her to walk out of the room, but she stays beside the bed, crossing her arms and scrunching her face in thought. “What do you think about last night?”
“Last night? You mean the keratin treatment I did on your hair? I think it looks good.”
I have an hour to take a shower, dry my hair and get ready, make Farrah’s breakfast and hopefully squeeze in a call to my parents. But she’s not in any hurry to go.
“No,Dalton. The hot tub. Am I making the right choice? JP is taller than him. And a quarterback boyfriend is the ultimate, you know?”
“I think a good person you love being with is the ultimate.”
She rolls her eyes. “They both seem like good guys. You know what I’m saying. Pulling JP Covington would get me a lot more visibility.”
“You already have tons of visibility on your own.”
Why am I making the case for her tonotchoose JP? I’m just being honest because that’s my default. But if she ends up with Dalton and I have to scout out the restaurants they go to for dates and take the sheets off her bed after he stays the night with her, that will be really hard.
“I want tall kids, though.”
Farrah and I have had some great times together. She’s a weird mixture of inconsiderate and generous. But sometimes I want to scream at her. This is one of those times.
“I guess, go with JP then,” I say, exasperated.
“Dalton smells better, though. And I can tell he’s amazing in bed.”
I furrow my brow. “How can you tell that?”
“Just by the way he moves. And his confidence. And his body, obviously. I pay attention during yoga. He could do me in any position imaginable.”
A white-hot bolt of jealousy shoots through me. The thought of them in bed together is too much. I have no right to be this jealous, but I am.
“We need to get moving,” I say, swallowing my feelings.
“Okay, you’re right.”
I open the door, my gaze going straight to the wood tray on the floor.Shit.I forgot.
Every day that I’ve skipped sunrise yoga, Dalton has left me a breakfast tray. Yesterday’s had a note from him that said,Miss seeing you flip off the sky. Feel better soon.
It made me smile.
“At least they bring you breakfast,” Farrah says breezily, stepping around the tray. “Since this room is basically a prison cell, it’s the least they can do.”
My heart rate slows as she walks down the hallway. I dodged a bullet. If she had asked me who brought the tray, I probably would have panicked.
I take the tray into my room and set it on the bed. There’s a red rose in a little vase, a note tucked beneath it. When I peek beneath the silver dome over the plate, I see a decadent cheese omelet, just like the ones he brought the first three days. There’s also a bowl of berries and two pieces of bacon.
I’m going to devour this. It’s so much better than what I usually get for breakfast here, which is whatever’s left after the contestants and crew have ransacked the buffet. I’m too busy making Farrah’s food and prepping her waters in the morning to get to breakfast when it’s served.
I take out the note, carefully unfolding it.
