But that didn’t stop the whole HeSaidSheSaid battle from escalating to full-on combat. Public combat.
It started when both Stiletto’s and Oxford’s online teams put links to the new website on their respective home pages.
Harmless enough. Until a couple of the local newspapers picked up the back-and-forth of HeSaidSheSaid as well, touting it as a battle of the sexes, blog-style.
A week later it was on one of the morning talk shows. Is all fair in love and war? Manhattan’s sexiest dating experts find out.
Now everybody had something to say about who had the upper hand on whom.
The results changed daily.
The past three weeks had been an endless blur of employees on both sides conspiring to get Jake and Grace into the same elevator at the same time.
From there, every word was observed. Every look was analyzed.
And it all went up on the website.
Even the bosses were in on it. For their part, Cassidy and Camille were constantly insisting that Jake and Grace take lunch breaks together, and then they’d send a staff photographer to catch the whole thing in action.
Most recently, it had been an unassuming lunch at a taco truck that had sent the cyberworld into a tizzy. Whatever did it mean that Grace gave her extra guacamole to Jake? Was that a point in his favor since he was able to sweet-talk her out of the best part of a taco? Or a point in her favor, because a smart woman knew that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach?
Camille had even asked if the two of them had any email correspondence that they’d be able to share on the website. In the end, Grace and Jake had capitulated. Now all of their electronic communication went up there too.
For her part, Grace was mostly loving the whole process. At least she was loving it today.
That morning’s latest poll results indicated that 64 percent of voters thought Jake was more smitten with her than she with him, and 59 percent thought that she knew men better than he knew women.
Even though they hadn’t yet completed the original assignment of five dates followed by a recap, Grace was well on her way to accomplishing her mission: showing the world that she wasn’t ever going to be blindsided by a man again.
In weaker moments, when she forgot that Greg wasn’t dead to her, she liked to imagine her ex reading it. Maybe even regretting that he’d let her go.
But in the quiet evenings, when the website updates had ceased for the day and there were no more interactions between her and Jake to be analyzed until the following day, she felt … a little hollow.
She and Jake hadn’t been alone—not truly alone—since that night in the cab.
The sexual awareness still simmered between them, but ever since their text message exchange that night, there’d been a slight wariness as well. As though it was a path that neither wanted to go down even as they desperately did.
See, this was why relationships were bad news. They turned rational adults into game-playing teens.
And that was the real kicker. She wanted him. She liked him, even. But she didn’t trust him.
Ever since that first date when she’d have bet her favorite pair of Jimmy Choos that he was honestly into her, and then he’d told the world that it had been a carefully manufactured “moment” designed to reel her in, she’d known she couldn’t trust him.
She knew that.
And yet, every damned night, she was tempted to call him.
Of course, 2.0 was pissed, but 2.0 apparently had forgotten what a good kisser Jake was.
Grace hadn’t forgotten. Not even a little bit.
And wouldn’t the HeSaidSheSaid readers like to find out that little tidbit!
This entire thing had devolved into a circus in which they didn’t even have to worry about analyzing the other person, because the rest of the world was doing the analysis for them.
Grace kept reminding herself that she should be thrilled. Camille had made a big show in the weekly staff meeting about how it was the most groundbreaking Stiletto undertaking since
“Of course your stylist is in on it. This is like the new reality TV,” Emma said.
“Jake’s not going to notice that I got a half-inch trim. None of you noticed.”
“You have to at least show up,” Riley called after her. “Women are in the lead!”
“Whatever,” Grace muttered, walking right past the restroom. She needed to get out of here. And thanks to her friends’ intel, she knew exactly where she wouldn’t be going. No Lucky’s burger for her.
She paused as she headed toward the elevator. Too bad Riley hadn’t been more specific about the time of Jake’s lunch break. Did she risk taking the elevator and running into one of the Oxford guys who would push her toward Lucky’s to accomplish whatever obscure mating challenge they’d dreamed up for the day?