How to Fake Date Your Grumpy Boss (How to Rom-com #1)

by Camilla Evergreen

As a wee Floridian bookworm who’d rather curl up in bed all day, my legs are basically broken.

ephebophile.”

since I don’t have social media outside of Goodreads and knew next to nothing about his reputation.

It’s a classic case of being the smartest person in the room and being irritable because you’re surrounded by idiots.

He let me use his body as an impact mat—which was only slightly softer than hitting concrete because he obviously has a fitness instructor who is doing their god-given job.

What I have been doing for the past two days is something that we are not going to call moping. Because that would be rude and inaccurate. Moping denotes a level of laziness that I simply do not present when I am depressed.

The Great Disaster threw me into a nervous reading slump, so books haven’t been giving me the reprieve I need. Simply put, merely scanning words is insufficient. I require the energy-burning therapy of typing.

I’m not obligated to clarify assumptions. I really don’t feel like digging back into how the best, most hopeful moment of my life turned abruptly into the worst because I have a chronic case of being unable to stay on my own two feet. It’s humiliating.

My parents made sure that my interaction with the opposite sex was inconsequential or nonexistent.

And someone sort of seemed to find me appealing. And maybe I kind of found him appealing, too. In a shaggy and sweet way.

I am also willing to consider that the older guy was ready to shamelessly enjoy my underwear up until hearing that it was basically illegal.

askance,

Every single thing I have done that steps outside their defined expectations is something I have fought for. It’s something that I have had to want more than the never-ending disappointment in their voice and eyes.

I realize that he should not be allowed to smile. It’s too beautiful. Too…seductive.

Book trope our way out.

If there’s one thing you should know about your fake girlfriend, Levi, it’s that I love words. Poetry. Stories. Articles. Even advertisements. I can write entire novels in days. I did it in a weekend once. Just about broke my hands. So

Studies show that the female core temperature is higher than the male’s; romance novels beg to differ. ~~~

Because fiction and fantasy are wastes of time. The world’s most unhappy accident.

I respect them so much it’s been really hard to discover who I am for fear of being someone they don’t want me to be.

My heart flutters, because those are the kinds of words I’ve wanted to hear ever since I learned how to smuggle fiction novels past the parental security program on my computer.

My fingers fit against his, perfectly, like they belong there, and I must be delusional or have a head full of book romance—just like my parents warned me would happen if I entertained fiction—because don’t all hands kind of fit together?

Talking bookish to me isn’t going to end well.”

since the books that ‘don’t have plot’ actually do have plot? Plot is just a series of events. If things are happening and stuff is progressing, there is a plot.

My judgment is clouded because I’ve never been in a relationship before, and this already feels like the kind I’d desperately want to have.

coitus.”

lain.”

conjugating?”

Being treated like I know what I’m doing is so nice. It doesn’t help that nasty desire to hug him, though. He probably needs a hug. Who is supposed to hug a grown man, when his parents are absent and dude friends don’t really embrace?

peter

Levi Danner is a lot of things, but I don’t think he’s a liar. His honesty comes blunt and careless, quick and often painful. I know. I’ve seen it.

I’m sheltered, and it’s not love. I don’t know what love is. The only place I’ve known

Perfection isn’t sufficient because perfection isn’t fully defined.

The chains of their expectations hold me down at the bottom of an ocean. I can’t even feel the beating waves.

I was seventeen, so I’m not going to say it’s bad writing, but it absolutely is the dreamy chaos of a love-struck innocent. I fell hard

connected so strongly with the main character, it felt like someone else understood me without my ever even meeting them.”

“I love to write. And I don’t just want to write about what is. I don’t even just want to write about what could be. There isn’t a single moment I can remember where words haven’t fascinated me. I love them. And I want to paint pictures with them. And I want those pictures to make people smile. I want those pictures to encourage people to be kind.

In a world as vast as fiction, there will always be a story that draws a connection between souls. We just need to be brave enough to find it, open the book, and turn the first page.