I don’t know how we keep doing it, unchoreographed and unplanned. It’s probably adrenaline, I tell myself. All the thoughts fly right out my head, though, when I run straight for Colt, still in his button-down and trousers and that tie of his, and I jump right into his arms. He catches me effortlessly, and I try not to focus on the fact that our bodies are flush against one another right now, or that I’m hanging onto him for dear life, laughing as he spins me around before setting me down gently.

‘No kiss this time, New Haven?’

‘It’s not real, remember?’ He smirks, but something in that stupid smirk is absolutely real. Something is certainly simmering, and it’s not just the adrenaline.

‘As if.’ I return his smirk. ‘I’m sure you wish it was.’

MAY! What? May, shut up!

Colt raises an eyebrow. ‘You’re the one holding onto me like this.’

No way. He doesn’t get to turn it around on me. I move to drop my hands like I just touched a hot pot, but some strange force of nature keeps me from doing so. The CJ Bradley effect. Do I want to punch him? Do I want to kiss him? Why can’t I make a decision? ‘Don’t let it fool you.’

‘Hey, there’s nothing wrong with going the extra mile to sell it.’ Maybe Colt is playing nonchalant, but the flush of his cheeks betrays him. When we put the game plan together those weeks ago, we’d laid the law down. This was all business.

In the pit of my stomach, I know we’ve been well beyond all business for a while now.

‘Oh, I know we need to sell it, trust me.’

‘Sure ’bout that?’ He gives me that stupid billion-watt smile of his, the one that pulls you straight to him like a magnet. ‘We just gonna stand here?’

‘Absolutely not.’

I don’t know if it’s because I want to prove him wrong, or because I’m starting to find myself drawn further into his orbit than I’d like to confess, but this time, when we kiss, it’s not like the last. Our bodies melt into one another, my pulse thumping in time with his. His fingers tangle themselves up in the strands of hair sticking out the sides of my ponytail. The smell of his cologne and the taste of coffee on his lips are impossible to ignore, no matter how much I tell myself this is for everyone but us, no matter how much I try to focus on the rising screams of the crowd. I grip him tight like I’ve got a point to make. And honestly, maybe I do.