Page 2 of The Love Dare
[Gravel crunches in the background.]
Keith: Ah, right on schedule.
Tyler: What’s on schedule? What is that? Is someone coming?
Keith: I believe your last limo has arrived.
CHAPTER ONE
winnie
12 YEARS BEFORE FILMING
Apparently,I draw the line at kissing frogs.
Shock racks through Winnie Rusu’s system. If you’d asked her thirty seconds ago, she would’ve puckered up in a heartbeat. For a frog. For a beast with a killer library. For an overly polished charmer with a foot fetish. Heck, even a penniless grifter with a stolen identity didn’t sound too bad if it meant true love.
But that was before she felt the press of cool, slimy skin against her lips. Before she opened her eyes to find the limp, hollow carcass of a dissected bullfrog smashed against her face.
I should have seen this coming.
The moment Davy Moore told her Liam Reyes—theLiam Reyes, the most gorgeous, most popular, most amazing boy in their seventh-grade class—wanted to meet her behind the Texas live oak by the soccer field, she should have known something was up. On some level, if she’s being honest, she did. But it wasLiam. Surely, any embarrassment was worth the risk if there was even the slightest chance he might actually be there waiting. And he was! He was there, standing with his hands in the front pocket of his football hoodie, one foot propped against the wide trunk, just as Davy said. When she walked up, palms sweating,fingers shaking, heart giving the drum section from their local award-winning marching band a run for its money, he gave her that twisted grin that had made her weak in the knees ever since the first time she saw it during third-grade recess. So when he told her to close her eyes, what else was she supposed to do? Say no? Ignore him? Leave? Or hope that just this once, everything was exactly as it seemed?
Optimismhasalways been her downfall.
And now, a dead frog is my first kiss.
If that isn’t a metaphor for something…
Winnie jumps back and spits the bitter taste from her lips, but it’s too late. The damage is done. Liam’s laughter hits her first, prompting a bolt of burning humiliation so ripe it brings a buzzing to her ears. Then she registers the approval-seeking look he tosses over his shoulder. She knows what she’ll find when she slides her gaze sideways, but morbid curiosity leaves her doing it anyway. Grace Carmichael and her cronies watch giddily from about a dozen yards away.
Of course.
It always comes back to Grace. Every taunt. Every cruel act. Every cut. Winnie still has no idea what she’s ever done to deserve it. So what if she would rather eat a lunchbox full of cabbage rolls than buy a sandwich from the cafeteria? Her mom makes the best sarmales on this side of the Atlantic. And who cares if she prefers to cover her wrists with the handmade beaded bracelets her cousins from Romania send her every year instead of the typical silver and gold of her classmates? Is it really such a sin to prefer staying home with her favorite fictional sleuth on a Friday night to attending the local high school’s football game of the week? Yes, she wears glasses. Yes, she has somewhat untamable black hair. Yes, her real name is unfortunately Uldwyna. And yes, she spends far too much time drawing colorful tattoos across her thighs when she’s supposedto be paying attention in class. But being different isn’t a crime. Except of course at the Wentworth Christian Academy of Dallas, where apparently it is. For girls, anyway. Her stupidly tall, athletic, and annoying older brother has never gotten bullied a day in his life.
Which I’m clearly not bitter about at all.
The moment Winnie meets Grace’s eyes, her archnemesis’s evil plot becomes clear. Grace is skinny, blonde, a cheerleader, and the daughter of an oil tycoon, so naturally she’s the most popular girl in their grade. Liam is clearly in love with her. She clearly knows it. And the second Mr. Gutiérrez put that dissection tray on Grace’s desk, everything must’ve clicked. Winnie’s just mad she didn’t put it together sooner, especially when she notices Liam is holding up his phone, making it clear her mortification has been immortalized for the whole school to witness.
Her feet start moving before her brain even registers it.
In a move she’s sure will haunt her for the rest of her life, she doesn’t say anything, doesn’t stand up for herself, doesn’t speak one of the approximately nine hundred and seventy-three million comebacks she’s sure she’ll come up with in the days and weeks and years ahead.
She runs.
Like a coward.
Like a doormat.
Like a fool, forgetting in her own mounting horror that predators only salivate at the sight of their prey’s backside.
I will not cry. I will not cry.
But she can’t even do that. Fat tears trickle down her cheeks as she races across the freshly mowed grass toward salvation behind the thick brick walls of the gym. She drops her head back, as if gravity alone can stop the flood from coursing down her cheeks. The sky is so blue it must be mocking her. She closes hereyes and forces air into her lungs, one shuddering breath at a time.
“Hey, Little Rusu!”
Winnie stiffens at the sound of his voice.As if today hasn’t been humiliating enough, now Ty has to see me like this, too. Great. Just freaking great.
