Chapter Seven
Flynn Foley’s New Girlfriend: “She’s the love of my life,” Foley says.
Aubrey stared at the headline on TMZ’s website, shock coursing through her at seeing the words in bold black-and-white on one of the most popular gossip sites in the country. She thought she could handle this, but clearly it was going to take some getting used to.
She’d never been called the love of anyone’s life. Let alone a guy she’d barely spent time with, who she was now involved with in a publicity relationship.
The article on the site had a picture of the them leaving the Hawks facility earlier today, right after they’d had their second meeting with Harvey on how to handle this mess they’d gotten themselves into. In the photo, they were hand in hand, with matching, giant smiles on their faces. Anyone who’d seen them would have thought they’d looked happy and madly in love.
Crazy, how easy it was to fake something.
For the past hour, from the moment she’d gotten home, she’d been scouring the web, looking for ar
ticles about the two of them, which were easy to find. It was all the media seemed able to write about. Talk about a slow-news day. Their names and faces were plastered everywhere, much to her growing fascination. She’d always been on the other side of the publicity spectrum. The one who drummed up interest, never the one who everyone was interested in.
It was a trip.
Like a good little publicist, she got comfortable on her bed and created Google alerts so she’d be notified when anything regarding her and Flynn together popped up on the web. After going through a bunch, she sent on the better, more positive articles to Harvey-the-jerk. She kept the nasty, spiteful little articles to herself, though it would take nothing for Harvey to dig those up, too.
Flynn claimed not to read much of his own press, which she could hardly believe, but whatever. If he wanted to remain clueless as to what they were saying about him, about her and Flynn together, then so be it. She, on the other hand, wanted to know everything.
Both the good and the bad.
Her cell rang, and she grabbed it from her bedside table to check who was calling. It was her mom. Crap. Her heart sinking into her toes, she offered a tentative, “Hello,” hoping against hope her mom had decided to crawl under a rock the past few days and knew nothing about her and Flynn.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” her mother screeched the moment Aubrey answered. “You’re in love with Flynn Foley? I knew working with those football players would mess with your head, sweetheart, but now you’ve gone off the deep end and fallen in love with one? Are you crazy?”
“Mom.” Her mother still ranted. Even though she’d been divorced from Aubrey’s father for years, since Aubrey was thirteen, she still had negative feelings toward the male sex. Thank God, Aubrey was an only child and had no male siblings. They would’ve been done for, what with the man hater Sharon Cooper had turned into.
“And to think I tried my best to raise you right. Don’t you know football players are nothing but a bunch of cheating Lotharios who enjoy nothing more than getting women all twisted over them?”
“Mom, jeez. Let me explain myself.” Aubrey sighed and let her mother continue on for a few more minutes. She may as well get it all out of her system first, then Aubrey could explain what was happening.
There was no way she’d tell her mom the truth. She already thought Aubrey was crazy enough for being in a so-called relationship with Flynn. If she knew it was fake? She’d probably end up telling everyone. The very last thing they wanted.
“Are you done?” Aubrey asked when her mom finally paused, seemingly to catch her breath. “Can I have a turn and tell you what’s going on?”
“I don’t know. Are you going to feed me a bunch of bullshit over how much he loves you and you think he’s going to take care of you for the rest of your life? Because he won’t, sweetie. He’ll find someone else eventually and leave you to figure out the hard stuff on your own,” her mom said.
Aubrey closed her eyes and leaned back against the headboard. Her mom was so negative. She projected all of her earlier experiences with Aubrey’s dad on everything. She had no faith Aubrey could find a good guy for herself because, hey, they all sucked. Every last one of them.
“Listen. Be quiet for a minute,” Aubrey said when she got her chance. “I’m seeing Flynn Foley, yes, but it’s nothing too outrageous. He’s a nice guy. We have fun together. That’s it.”
“The segment I saw on Entertainment Tonight said the two of you were hot and heavy and that there’s even talk of marriage.”
Well, that was taking it a little too far. They’d “come out” publicly and confirmed they were together, and now there was talk of marriage? “Don’t believe everything you see or hear, Mom. Take it from your publicist daughter.”
“So you’re not engaged to this boy?”
“Of course not! We’ve only just started dating.”
“And you didn’t take his virginity? I can’t even believe I just asked you that question. Don’t answer it,” her mom said hurriedly.
The virgin thing hung in everyone’s mind. It drove Aubrey freaking nuts. What she’d first thought might be kind of fun, to mold and teach a man exactly what she wanted in the bedroom, had turned into this crazy joke of a situation, where the public deemed her the virgin stealer.
“Trust me. I won’t answer it. What happens between Flynn and me is no one’s business,” Aubrey said.
“Honey, I hate to point this out, but your relationship with this player—and I’m not just talking football—has turned into everyone’s business, real quick.”