Claiming Callie: Part one

by Rion, Paige

  “I’m gonna do a whole lot more than call the paper.”

  “Stop!” Callie spreads her arms out. “You need to stop. For the first time, I can understand and appreciate your anger because this,” she says, nodding to the paper in her hand, “pretty much takes the cake, but you can’t fix this. You can’t just jump in and save me. I need to fight my own battles.” She can feel the ache in the back of her throat now, the sting of tears in her eyes, but she can’t be weak now. There’s too much to do.

  “This is my battle too!” Dean yells. “He’s doing this because of me.”

  Callie crosses her arms. “What are you talking about?”

  “We have this…kind of rivalry going. We’ve never liked each other and we’ve sort of started this competitive thing on and off the court. The other day, we were playing ball and I won a bet. For money. Not long after that, he happened to hear Emmett and me talking. I think he heard me mention you and Jinny, how you’re best friends and how I…” Dean and Jinny exchange a look Callie can’t read. “I think he may have heard me telling Emmett how much I hated this thing you’re doing. It was later that day I found out he called you and asked you out.”

  “Wait a minute,” Callie says. “Let me get this straight. Jason never had a crush on me? This was all for some sort of vendetta against you? That doesn’t even make sense. Why would going out with me, paying me for a date, and trying to get me to sleep with him, get back at you?”

  The tension melts away from Dean’s face and he shrugs, his cheeks turning pink. “I don’t know. He might have heard me mention that you were like a sister to me. I think he figured since I hated him so much that I’d be pissed if you went out, then further pissed if you actually took him up on his disgusting offer and slept with him… And he’s not used to girls turning him down, so when you threw wine in his face and rejected him, then I bashed his face in at practice, I think—”

  “That’s what made him publish this story. To get back at both of us,” Callie finishes for him.

  “Yes.” Dean’s lips press into a tight line.

  Unsure what to think, Callie, pushes the news aside. She tightens her grip on the trash bag and sticks the newspaper she stills holds into it.

  It doesn’t matter how this all started. Does it? The outcome, the reality of the situation, is still the same. The point is that it’s happening. And Jinny and I need to stop it. We need to do whatever we can. There’s no point in mulling over the ‘why’ of it. Not now.

  For the first time since she received that call minutes ago, the aching anxiety fades. Callie’s head clears, and her resolve strengthens. She stands up taller, her arms rigid at her side as her whole body tenses, ready for action.

  “Okay. You want to help?” she asks Dean.

  He nods.

  “You call the newspaper. Inform them of the article. Jinny and I have a feeling Jason somehow slipped this through. Let them know the story is unequivocally false and that we’ll sue for libel if they don’t immediately print a retraction and ensure it gets in the hands of every student on campus, while they also immediately remove all papers with the old story. In the meantime, Jinny and I are going on our own to collect all the papers we can find.”

  “But—” Dean steps forward.

  “No buts,” Jinny interrupts. “You’re not going near Jason again. Look at where it got you and Callie in the first place. Stay here and make the call.”

  Dean slouches and shoves his hands in his pockets. “Fine.”

  “Good.” Callie turns to Jinny. “Let’s get started.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  CALLIE

  Three weeks later…

  Callie stares at the contents of her closet with longing. Last week, immediately following damage control on the whole prostitution story, she went shopping. Big mistake. Though the cute new shoes and jacket, not to mention the super-cute Vivienne Westwood dress she bought, helped soothe her soul, she spent all the money she had left from the escorting gigs she completed prior to her date with Jason, and then some. Seeing as how she wore them only days after her purchase, returning them isn’t an option.

  She exhales a long breath and sinks to the floor. She picks up a silver Gucci clutch and hugs it to her chest. “I suppose this is my penance,” she says to no one but the beloved possessions surrounding her.

  Penance for being a moron! Even if I sell all of my belongings, will it make enough money? How much does secondhand stuff like this even go for on eBay?

  She bites her lip.

  I’ll be eating nothing but ramen noodles and generic mac and cheese for the rest of the year.

  No, Callie. You’re just trying to talk yourself out of this. There’s no use. You’re selling everything. All of it. Because that’s how much the job at GGF means to you.

  She sets the clutch back down and grabs her Post-its and notepad. Time to get started.

  She writes “#1” and a starting bid down on the hot pink Post-it, sticks it to the clutch, then places the clutch in the giant cardboard box next to her and records it on her notepad next to the number-one slot. After she finishes pricing most of the contents in her closet, she’ll start listing them on eBay.

  A pair of Louis Vuittons she bought after her parents’ death are clutched in her grasp and halfway to the box when she hears a knock on the door. Saved by the bell.

  She smiles, but the smile vanishes instantly.

  Yeah, saved for like five minutes, then those gorgeous babies are going in the box.

  Whoever’s at the door knocks again, this time louder and faster. “Hold on,” she calls as she gets up and makes her way out into the living room. She swings the door open and starts to close it again the second she sees the person standing in front of it.

  But Dean slams one huge mitt on it, and the door flies open with a bang. “Wait,” he says.

  Callie rolls her eyes and steps away from the door. She knows Dean well enough to know that he’s not to be deterred. Whatever he wants, he won’t leave without it.

  Dean closes the door behind him while Callie heads to the kitchen, where she grabs a bottle of wine.

  Exactly what I need to get through purging my things. Something to numb the pain. Who needs shoes when you have wine?

  Dean steps toward her. “Listen, I know you’re mad at me, and I don’t blame you. This whole—God, you don’t need to drink. Is that what you’ve been doing all week? Hiding away in here drinking?”

  Callie does a double eye roll. Seriously? God, he’s been unbelievably audacious lately.

  “First of all,” Dean continues, “even though I’m to blame for Jason using you to get me back, you’re still the one who did the whole crazy escort thing in the first place. I told you it was a horrible idea—”

  “Stop. Just. Stop.” Callie says as she pours herself a glass of wine. “Number one, I’m not mad at you. Well, maybe a tinge, but I also realize this is my fault too. All of it. I realize the magnitude of my idiocy. Okay?”

  Dean starts to speak, but she stops him with a shake of the finger. “Uh-uh. Listen. Number two. I haven’t been drinking myself into a stupor. God, I can have one glass of wine, maybe two, or even three because it helps ease the sting of what I’m doing today. Hold it!” She points a finger at him when she sees he’s ready to argue. “I haven’t been avoiding you these last couple weeks. I’ve been avoiding everyone and everything, which I think is par for the course since a couple thousand students, maybe more, just read an article about me being a prostitute. Retraction or not, I think that’s reason enough to hide my face for a bit.”

  Dean’s shoulders relax, and the tense lines around his mouth fade away. He moves toward her. “So you’re not mad at me, then? For real?”

  “For real. I just needed some time to…I don’t know…to process everything. To figure out my next move. I still have so much debt to pay down, and I think my escort days have come to a disastrous end.”

  “Sorry,” he says.

  Callie chuckles and punches
him in the arm. “No, you’re not.”

  The corner of his mouth lifts. “Okay, maybe not. But I am sorry about your situation.”

  Callie takes another sip of wine. “Yeah. Me too. I’ve just started going through all my stuff. I guess it’s time to auction everything off and see how much I can come up with. It’s a start, anyway.” She glances back to her room and her open closet. “Jinny went to Todd’s. I think she knew I needed time to mourn.” Callie laughs. “But I don’t think I want to be alone. It’s too quiet…you wanna stay?” She turns back to Dean. “Maybe it’ll be easier with you here. I won’t be able to change my mind.”

  Something flickers in Dean’s eyes before it disappears. He takes a step toward her, his hands reaching out, but stops.

  Callie frowns up at him. It looks like there’s something he wants to say but can’t.

  “Actually, I’d like to stay, but I came because I have a proposition for you.”

  Callie snorts. “Don’t you think I’ve had enough of those?”

  Dean grimaces. “Not like that. It’s more of an idea.” He stares down at his hands. “I have a way you might be able to make some money to pay off your debt. And you’d be doing me a favor.”

  Callie raises a brow, wondering what Dean could possibly have in mind that would help both of them. “Okay. I’m open. Shoot.”

  Dean glances up from his hands and runs them through his already rumpled locks, mumbling something like, “I thought this would be a lot easier.”

  Her scalp prickles while she waits. Exactly how bad is this proposal? I can’t take it.

  “Just spit it out,” she says, a little harsher than intended.

  “Okay, well…I thought that…” He trails off, his gaze moving from her to something in the distance.

  She shifts her weight. Come on!

  “Okay, I’m just gonna say it. Just come out with it,” he says. Sweat beads his forehead and his cheeks flush.

  Callie’s never seen Dean quite like this.

  Unless you count the time he had that stomach bug his first day of college. He looked pretty bad then… Kinda like now…

  “Just come out with it. That’s the best way. It can’t be that bad,” she says.

  “Right. It’s not.” His words come out in a rush. “That bad, I mean. I thought… Well, I thought maybe that you could pretend to be my girlfriend for the rest of the semester. I’ll pay you.”

  Or not.

  Holy crap! Did he just propose what I think he did? He wants me to pretend to be his girlfriend?

  She shakes her head, unsure whether she heard him right. “Wait a minute. I think I misheard. You want me to what?”

  Dean stands up straighter and puts his hands on his hips. “I’ll pay you to pretend to be my girlfriend.”

  Oh, God. I didn’t mishear him.

  Her gaze moves to the floor as a flurry of thoughts fire off in her head. “B-but why? How and why does that benefit you?”

  “Remember that girl I dated a while back? Maya? She’s dating some jag-off, and I want to win her back. But she’ll barely even speak to me. She’s totally the jealous type, though, and I think that if I had a girlfriend, one she thinks is serious, she’d get jealous and I could spark her interest.”

  Callie wrinkles her nose. “The one with the nose piercing? I didn’t know you were still into her. But you could get a girlfriend with no problem. Why not get a real one? Maybe you’ll meet someone you really like. And I never liked Maya anyway, so if you’re still hung up on her, then it’d be nice to see you fall for someone else.”

  “True. I could do that. But that would take time. And I don’t have time, because I think she’s really into this other dude. Plus, this can benefit you, too. And I’m not talking about financially, although I’ll pay you enough that it would be worth it.”

  I seriously doubt that.

  Callie narrows her eyes and crosses her arms. “How? How would this help me?”

  “You feel like your reputation has been ruined with this whole escort business, right? With the article?”

  Callie nods and he continues. “Well, this can be a way to further refute all that. We can come out as a couple. We can say that we’ve been dating awhile but kept it a secret because you didn’t want Jinny, your best friend, to find out…” Dean begins to pace in front of her, his words coming fast, his eyes bright. “You were worried about what she’d think, so you withheld the information. But we’re really serious, and I don’t know…I know someone on the paper. Maybe we can get them to print a story about college sweethearts or something. But no matter what, the people who know you, people in your classes, professors, the people who you want to know that the whole story really was false will believe it even more when we come out.”

  “Come out?”

  Dean stops pacing to face her. “Yeah. You know, once we finally announce our relationship. How crazy we are about each other.”

  Whoa. Callie tips her wineglass and downs the contents of her glass.

  “Well?” he asks, when she says nothing.

  She stares at him, blinking, and her mind shifts to an image of a ten-year-old Dean, holding a handful of night crawlers chasing her and Jinny around the yard. She thinks about the time they caught him peeking under the shirt of Jinny’s Barbie. And the time they made him play house and he was the family dog. Or when Callie was convinced she wanted to be a beautician and carefully applied a face-full of makeup and did Dean’s hair just to discover it wasn’t her passion.

  Callie sips her wine and resists the urge to grab the whole bottle and start chugging.

  “That’s a lot to take in,” she says. But inside, she’s screaming all kinds of incomprehensible things. “How is that any different than what I was doing before? I mean, isn’t it kind of the same deal, just on a grander scale?”

  “No. This is different.”

  Callie crosses her arms. “How so?”

  “Because we’d just be two friends doing each other a favor.”

  “But you’d be paying me,” she points out.

  He shakes his head. “Just another favor. I want to help you. I told you before I’d lend you the money. But this way, I’d be compensating you for the inconvenience of being unable to date anyone else.”

  “I can’t date anyone else?”

  Dean shifts his weight and stares at his feet when he says, “Well, for us to look as serious as we say, you can’t be seen with any other guys. It has to be like it’s for real. We’ll have to be seen together…you know…looking like a couple and stuff.”

  Whaaat?

  Well, duh. What did you think, Callie? That you’d just tell people you were dating and they’d just believe it, sight unseen?

  Dean glances up at her before he reaches a hand into the back pocket of his khakis and pulls out a check.

  Holy flashbacks! At least it’s not in a white envelope.

  He hands it to her and she glances down at it. It’s a check, written out to her, for $6500.00. Her eyes pop open, and she blinks at it for a few moments before she lifts her gaze. “How do you have this much money?”

  “I have some funds set aside—”

  “I can’t take this,” she says and thrusts the check toward him, but he pushes her hand away.

  “I want you to take it whether you agree to this”—he waves his hand—“whole deal or not. It’s yours. No strings attached. As a friend, I want you to take it. You can pay me back once you have that hotshot job. I know it might not be enough, but I figured that maybe you could just sell some of your stuff, instead of all of it. That, and if you cut back on your spending, you might be able to wrangle up a full ten thousand dollars with the check.”

  “But I…” She swallows hard, unsure of what to say. To say she is stunned speechless would be the understatement of the century.

  “If you need some time to decide—” He shoves his hands in his pockets and his eyes search hers.

  “No.” Callie glances down at the check again, then back into Dea
n’s eyes.

  He must be pretty desperate if he’s coming to me for this.

  But pretend to be Dean’s girlfriend? Go out with him? Hold his hand and…other stuff. What other stuff would be involved? Could I even do this? He’s like my brother! And I can’t imagine what Jinny would say. And—God—would Mr. and Mrs. Michaels find out?

  No, of course not. Why would they need to know? This is just to convince one girl and the student body.

  Her head spins, but the same questions remain. Could she do this? And did she even want to?

  She glances up at him again, into eyes that sparkle with something unfamiliar—hope, desperation? Did he really want this Maya person so bad?

  A lifetime of friendship with Jinny flashes through her head, and it’s not lost on her that Dean has been there for her throughout the years every bit as much as she has. He held her while she sobbed after her parents’ accident. He spoke at their funeral when she couldn’t. He helped her change flat tires, move into her apartment with Jinny, and redo her closet. He’s held her hand through heartbreak and scary movies. This man before her has been every bit as much a best friend to her as Jinny. And he trusts her with this favor. This request. He has never asked anything of her before, but how many times has she called on him? Maybe this whole time, she’s been far too selfish. And suddenly, she knows her answer.

  She knows what she’ll do.

  “Okay. I’ll do it.”

  More Claiming Callie!

  Part two is now available!

  He's the man of her dreams. She just doesn't know it yet.

  Dean Michaels has nothing to lose, and after all these years, he's finally hatched a plan to win the heart of his long-time crush Callie Cartwright.

  Operation Get the Girl is on. For however long it takes, Callie will pretend to be his girlfriend in an effort to make his ex jealous and win back her affections. What she doesn't know is that Dean only has eyes for her, and his plan is simply a ploy to win her heart.