Chapter 41: Wicked Challenge

"It is wonderful to see you. I’m sure that my father has…spoken to your father…" Janine said as a frosty smile reappeared on her lips and she flickered her eyes in my direction.

"About that, I would like to apologize for the misunderstanding. You see, I already have a girlfriend. Let me introduce her to you, this is Malissa, my girlfriend," Josh said as he proudly put an arm around my shoulder, pulling me close to his body.

Oh my…did he just introduce me using my real name? This is going to get ugly. I planted a smile onto my face and tried to look as happy as I could no matter how much I wanted to run away on the inside.

Janine looked at me in clear shock at the words that she had just heard.

"A misunderstanding? I’m not sure what you’re referring to," Janine said, her voice cunningly cold.

"My father made a mistake. He probably didn’t know that I’ve been dating Malissa and so he made that proposal to your father," Josh said apologetically.

"Your father and mine agreed for us to be engaged for the sake of our businesses. Surely, you won’t let such an insignificant thing like your relationship with that dear girl ruin everything, right?" Janine said as her sharp gaze fell on me.

Great. Just like her words, her gaze is making me feel like an ’insignificant thing’. How rude can this woman be?!

No wonder Josh doesn’t want to marry her. No one on this planet should marry her!

I kept my mouth shut just as I was told and just sat next to Josh. Hayden continued to be withdrawn and sat there in silence throughout the ordeal so far.

"I’m really in love with Malissa," Josh said passionately.

He’s such a good actor, honestly. If I didn’t know that he was faking it, I think I could have believed him. However, I knew that Janine would not back down that easily. Her mind seemed super made up to marry him.

"Really? You know, the last time I checked you were single and fooling around all over the place. Is this girl really your girlfriend?" Janine asked challengingly.

"Your sources are probably inaccurate then. I’ve been dating Malissa for a while now," Josh replied, unfazed.

"Hey, Malissa. You’ve been so silent. Tell me, when is Josh’s birthday? His favorite food? His favorite color? His favorite holiday destination?" Janine asked me, her eyes wide and aggressive.

I couldn’t believe it. She’s really asking these questions to test me just as Josh had predicted. I racked my brain for the information from that little cheat sheet that Josh had me memorize. Slowly but correctly, I gave her the answers to all her questions.

"We’ve really been dating for a while now. I’m sorry for the misunderstanding as well," I said in a small voice after I had answered her questions.

Janine looked at me with narrowed eyes as if still not believing our lies. I started wondering what we needed to do to get her to believe us so that we can finally go home.

"Kiss her, Josh," Janine said with an evil grin.

What did she just say?

"Excuse me?" I squeaked.

"I said, kiss. This should be nothing if you’re really dating, right?" Janine said, her narrowed eyes watched us.

My body froze at this unexpected turn of events. What do we do now? We’re not really going to kiss, right? I definitely had a problem with kissing a stranger.

"Umm…" I began saying.

"Of course," Josh said agreeably.

I turned to him with my eyes wide opened in shock. He’s playing along? What about me?

"Come here, baby…" Josh said in a sweet and seductive voice as his arm wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer to his body.

He really intends to kiss me. What now? If I push him away, then we’ll be found out but…it’s not like I want him to kiss me either.

Unsure of what to do, I glanced in panic over at Hayden. He’s not just going to sit there like nothing is happening, right?

Josh is pulling me closer to him now as his face is coming closer…

We’re going to end of kissing at this rate…

"You all have to stop this non-sense," Hayden spoke up loudly for the first time as banged his hand on the table and got up from his seat.

Everyone froze and turned to look at Hayden, shocked at his sudden outburst.

"What do you mean, Hayden? Stay out of this," Janine snapped.

"Seriously, who in their right mind would want a crazy woman like you as their wife? Hmm…Janine?" Hayden snapped back.

"How dare you speak to me like that?" Janine shouted.

"I can talk to you however I want. If you don’t like it, you can go crying back to your dad," Hayden said with a shrug.

"What?" Janine said in shock.

"You act so smart but you’re so brainless. You see, it doesn’t matter if Malissa is really Josh’s girlfriend or not. What matters is that he clearly doesn’t want to marry you. Business gain or no business gain," Hayden said, acting very fed up with this whole thing.

"Josh is going to marry me because our fathers agreed to it," Janine said stubbornly.

"Well, that’s your problem because Josh never agreed to it. You could always marry Josh’s dad though. Last I heard, he’s single. Easier to get business gains too," Hayden suggested.

"Janine. Hayden is right. Even without Malissa in the picture, I still wouldn’t marry you. I’m not ready to get married to anyone…" Josh said as he also got up from his seat.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

I watched silently as Janine seemed to boil with anger, her entire face turning bright red. I was quite certain that Janine was used to getting her way.

"I think you should just leave for today," Hayden said emotionlessly as he gestured towards the door with his hand.

"This isn’t over yet. I’m going to make sure that you and your father regrets this!" Janine shouted before grabbing her purse and headed for the door.

--To be continued…