‘I better go and get some coffee to help me turn on enough charm for today. Excuse me,’ Jake said, looking away from me to Liv and Tessa, before striding off as quickly as he had appeared.

‘Well, the day’s got off to a great start,’ I muttered when he’d left. ‘Me and my big mouth.’

‘You weren’t saying anything that wasn’t true,’ Liv said consolingly. ‘Your work is cut out for you.’

‘I know but I was trying to make us into a team to get through this conference, and I think I’ve blown it,’ I said, the hurt look on Jake’s face haunting me.

‘You can fix it,’ Tessa said.

Liv nodded in agreement.

I picked up my coffee cup and drained it, hoping they were right.

9

I found Jake in the lounge area of the hotel, reading something on his phone. I paused before approaching, feeling nervous all over again to talk to him after what had happened at breakfast. I didn’t think I’d ever had so many awkward interactions with a man before. To say I felt flustered was an understatement. If this was a man I was interested in, I would have run away by now as fast as my legs could carry me but Jake was stuck with me and I was stuck with him.

Pushing my shoulders back, I started off again and walked over, sitting down in the armchair opposite him, a small table dividing us. ‘I’m sorry you overheard what I said,’ I greeted without preamble. ‘But you know this conference is make or break.’

Jake’s eyes lifted from his phone to meet mine. ‘You don’t need to keep reminding me,’ he said coolly.

I raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh, so it’s my fault that we are on damage control?’ I snapped, my patience evaporating. What was it about this man that got my back up so much?

He slouched in his chair like he didn’t have a care in the world, which only annoyed me further. ‘You’ve made it very clear, Freya: this is all my fault. So, instead of telling me again how useless I am, how about we go over what to say in this podcast so we can do “damage control” as you so eloquently put it?’ He went heavy on the sarcasm, even going as far as to do air quotes around the words ‘damage control’.

I exhaled long and hard then looked away from those piercing eyes of his. ‘Yes, let’s do that,’ I replied finally, with false brightness. I pulled out my phone. ‘They sent over the questions in advance so I’ll ask, you answer and we can tweak as needed…’