Love Match Read online

  Before coming to the Academy, Maya never thought of ways “to change the story.” This wasn’t exactly the kind of education she’d expected to receive at the school. But it was certainly useful—especially if Maya kept winding up on the Wall.

  She had to tell Jordan. No one else was closer to Nicole. The agent could always pretend that she noticed some of the same things Maya had. Nicole had to be showing all kinds of signs that someone with Jordan’s experience would be able to flag.

  As the answer came to Maya, Jordan conveniently did as well. A warm blast of air announced the café door opening again. The agent came in and made a beeline for Maya, ignoring her body language. Since it was Nicole’s pose to begin with, Maya suspected that Jordan had a lot of practice with it.

  Maya had always been a “rip off the Band-Aid” kind of girl. As soon as she invited Jordan to sit with her, she got right to the point. “I need to talk to you about Nicole.”

  “I suspected you might,” Jordan said, surprising Maya. “I realize you two aren’t best friends, but you’re both professionals now. You won’t be the first clients I’ve had who didn’t get along. This is business, Maya, not high school.”

  “No,” Maya said. “It’s not that.” Although that subject also bothered her. It was kind of weird for Jordan to say something like that while they sat in the middle of a high school. Sure, it was a high school with manicured grounds, Olympic-style training facilities, and a mall’s worth of shops and cafés, but a high school nonetheless.

  “You have nothing to worry about,” Jordan insisted. “I don’t play favorites. And I don’t pit my clients against one another. You and Nicole are two completely different personalities. I will set you up with opportunities befitting those personalities.”

  That was certainly nice to hear, but seriously, if Jordan wasn’t going to let her get a word in edgewise, Maya might have to go with another agent. She needed someone she could work with, not someone who would steamroll over her.

  “But I’m not here to discuss Nicole,” Jordan said.

  “But—”

  “I have an offer for you.” Jordan continued to steamroll away. “Well, not an offer per se, but a potential offer. You’ve heard about Esteban’s new line of designer sportswear, right?”

  “Um … no.” Maya had heard of Esteban, of course. He designed half the dresses on the Oscars’ red carpet. But Maya didn’t follow fashion news enough to know what he was currently working on.

  “Oh, well, it has been kind of hush-hush,” Jordan said. “Anyway, the ad agency working with Esteban is in need of a fresh-faced sporting model for the ad campaign. Your name came up when I was speaking with my contact this morning. I suspect it had something to do with that piece on the Wall. Good placement, by the way. Did you do that?”

  “Did I do what?”

  “Tip off the photogs that you’d be at that club with Travis?”

  “No.” Maya didn’t even know how to get in touch with a “photog.”

  Jordan slapped a hand down on the table. “Great! That means you’re happening organically. Love that. Esteban will, too. He’s a little on the eccentric side, but you won’t meet him till later. First there’s the go-see.”

  “Go-see?”

  Jordan picked up her phone and started texting. Maya hated when people did that. “They just want to take a look at you. Maybe get a few test shots. Go to this address tomorrow after class. They’re expecting you at four.”

  Maya’s cell phone buzzed in her purse. She didn’t normally check her texts in the middle of a conversation, but she had a feeling that buzz had something to do with the address Jordan had mentioned.

  She was right. Jordan had texted her. But how had the agent gotten her phone number?

  Jordan was out of her seat before Maya could even formulate a full question. “Sorry about the hit and run, but I’m working a deal for … Well, I can’t tell you.” She giggled like she’d already said too much. It was awkward and completely fake, but Maya appreciated the attempt.

  “I know I just threw a lot at you,” Jordan said, “but I wouldn’t do that if I didn’t think you could handle it. And don’t feel like you have to go with me just because I found this opportunity for you. Consider it a gift in contemplation of a future relationship. If you decide you’d be a better fit with another agent, just remember to thank me at the SNC Awards show when you’re voted player of the year. Talk more later.”

  “Bye,” Maya said to the empty spot that Jordan had already left behind.

  Chapter 8

  Maya tried to get into her homework, but she couldn’t concentrate. Her mind was still reeling from her conversation with Jordan, and Cleo couldn’t get off the topic either.

  “It’s probably part of her pitch,” Cleo said as she painted her nails alternately black and gray. “She comes in, drops off a huge opportunity, then disappears before you can think or ask a question. As long as she keeps moving, she keeps you on your toes.”

  “Like a shark,” Maya said. “They have to keep moving or they die.”

  “Probably,” Cleo agreed. “Just watch out she doesn’t get you in her teeth.”

  “You think she could be out to get me? Like Nicole put her up to this?”

  “No,” Cleo said. “She’s a sports agent. She knows a good deal when she sees one. You, my friend, are a good deal. At least you are this week. She’s got the inside track because she knows you. A few more articles on the Wall and another tournament will bring her competition out of the woodwork.”

  “The Skyborne Cup is still a while away. She’s not going to hold out that long.” Maya had signed up for the tournament first thing Monday morning. If Donata Zajacova said she should be there, that was enough for Maya.

  “No, she’s going to force a decision before that,” Cleo said. “In the meantime, she’s giving you a freebie. That doesn’t happen, like, ever. Take it. See how it goes.”

  “Yeah, but if I book the shoot, I’ll feel like I owe her,” Maya said. “Like I have to sign with her.”

  Cleo shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. If you’re chosen as the face of Esteban’s new sportswear line, that will get your name out there faster than the cup. You could start fielding offers as early as next week.”

  Maya didn’t even want to think about that. She’d been working on her tennis game since she was seven. That kind of success she was ready for. This other side to the business was completely foreign to her. She definitely needed someone with more experience on her side. But was Jordan Cromwell that person?

  Maya still needed to catch up on her homework, but as soon as she woke her laptop she somehow found herself on the Internet. She wanted to know more about Jordan. All she had on the woman so far was her relationship with Nicole, and that wasn’t a good indicator of anything.

  Maya typed Jordan’s name into a Google search and hit the mother lode. Jordan was even bigger than Maya suspected. Only two of the hits on the first page were tied to Nicole. Jordan represented athletes across all sports.

  The majority of Jordan’s clients were female sports figures. Maya liked that. Women didn’t generally make the same kind of money as men in sports, so it was nice to know someone as successful as Jordan was still focused on female clients. At the same time, Maya was concerned that she’d be competing with Jordan’s other clients for the same jobs.

  Jordan was just one part of a large sports agency. She’d be Maya’s point person, but she also oversaw a team of agents that specialized in different fields. Jordan was the ultimate deal maker, but the junior agents did the legwork. There were agents for modeling gigs, sneaker endorsements, and even reality shows. They’d set the clients up and Jordan would knock them out of the park.

  It felt a bit like a conveyor belt to Maya. She’d be just another product at a big agency like that. What she gained in the power of a team, she would lose in the personal touch. That mattered to her.

  After pages and pages of searches, Maya was even more confused than she’d been when s
he started. This was the real world. She had to make a decision that could impact the rest of her life. And then she had to finish her chemistry homework.

  But first, she typed her own name into the Google search.

  Google roulette was a dangerous pastime. Maya started this game when her first picture went up on the Wall a couple of weeks back. She never knew when she’d come across a link that she’d rather not see. Like that girl on Twitter a few weeks ago who had a crush on Jake Reed and was writing horrible things about Maya.

  “Hart” wasn’t exactly a unique last name. It was kind of disappointing the first few times she played it to find that so many other Maya Harts came up before her.

  It wasn’t like that anymore.

  Every Maya Hart on the first page of the search was her. There were articles about her match against Dona, photos of her at the press conference, and, of course, a ton of stuff about her and Travis at 360. Most of it was nice. Some of it was not. One thing in particular was really, really bad.

  “Ummm.”

  Cleo looked up from her nails. “Um, what?”

  Maya wanted to say “Um, nothing,” but that wouldn’t be fair to Cleo. She had to know. “Grant Adams is writing about you again.”

  Cleo looked wary. “What more could he possibly have to write about me? Savannah was days ago.”

  “Not Savannah. A little closer. A lot more recent.”

  “What?” The springs on Cleo’s bed were still squeaking when she reached Maya and elbowed her out of the way to read the article. This one had very little to do with golf and everything to do with that one picture on the Wall with Cleo in the background.

  “Party girl? He’s calling me a party girl? I don’t even go to parties unless you and Renee drag me there.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Maya said. If people hadn’t been taking pictures of her, no one would have even known Cleo was out at the club.

  “I’m not sorry. I’m mad. This bozo thinks he can get away with this?” Cleo’s fingers tapped across the keyboard. Even in her anger, she was careful not to get nail polish on the keys.

  “Cleo, what are you doing?”

  “Telling him what I think about some old man picking on a teenage girl.”

  “Cleo, stop. You can’t do that.”

  Her fingers never slowed. Maya read the comment as Cleo wrote. It was actually a pretty good takedown. The wording was calm and reasoned, no matter how emotional Cleo’s fast fingers made it seem. But Cleo getting involved was going to turn it into a big deal.

  “Cleo!”

  “Too late.” She posted the comment. “Don’t worry. It’s anonymous.”

  Maya confirmed that the comment had gone up with “Anonymous” as the writer, but she still wasn’t so sure it was a great idea. These things had a way of spiraling out of control. In the seconds since Cleo posted, there was already one response to Cleo’s comment.

  Maya had to grab Cleo to keep her from writing back, smearing nail polish all over both their hands.

  Maya tried to keep her mind on chemistry, but her computer somehow kept flipping back to Cleo’s article. Cleo’s single comment had started a flame war with people agreeing with and attacking Grant Adams for going after a teenage girl. Thankfully, Cleo had stayed out of it since posting her initial comment. She was back on her bed fixing her nails. But Maya was pretty sure the article had an impact on Cleo, since she’d been working on the same finger for the past ten minutes.

  Pounding on their dorm room door made them both jump. It was loud and intense—the kind of banging that usually meant the building was on fire or some other catastrophe had happened.

  “Maya! Cleo! Let me in!” Renee pleaded.

  Maya flew to the door and opened it, panicked that something major had happened. She was surprised to see Renee casually leaning against the doorframe, as if she hadn’t just been trying to break down their door. “Hey. How’s it going?”

  Maya shared a confused look with Cleo. “Fine. And you?”

  Renee slipped into the room. “Oh, you know. Nothing exciting. Thought I’d stop by and say hi.”

  Cleo rolled her eyes. “Slumming it in the dorms twice in one week? Nice try. What’s wrong?”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be on a date with Diego?” Maya asked. She hadn’t been surprised that either of her friends had moved that fast, but it was a shock that the evening had ended so early. It was barely nine.

  Renee was unusually quiet.

  “That bad?” Cleo sat beside Renee on Maya’s bed, blowing on her fingernails to dry them faster.

  “It was the worst date I’ve ever been on. And I’ve gone on a lot of dates.”

  Maya sat on the other side of Renee. “Tell.”

  Renee sighed. “Okay, so Diego’s new to the city, right? I told him I was going to take him out on the town and show him the sights. I used my dad’s name to get us into Violetta—I mean, Dad’s got to be useful for something and that is like the hottest new restaurant in the city. It started out fine, but that banter thing we had going on at the club the other night wasn’t there. Seriously, by the appetizer we were pretty much sitting in silence.

  “So, I figured Italian isn’t his thing,” she continued. “We hit up that fancy chocolatier, Dulce, next for dessert. I mean, what guy says no to dessert? But I guess he’s on some strict diet or something because he didn’t touch the huge slice of caramel chocolate cake we got. And, you know I wasn’t eating it either, so it sat there between us while we stared at it. Then he took me home and didn’t even want to come in. And Nicole was totally out for the night. I don’t know what I did wrong. I mean, me? At a loss for words with a guy? What’s that about?”

  Maya shared a look with Cleo behind Renee’s back. Maya knew exactly what was wrong. “Sounds like you might have been trying too hard,” she suggested. “Travis did the same thing on our first date. Diego’s not used to fine dining and chocolatiers.”

  “Trying too hard? I wasn’t trying anything. That’s a typical date for me. Okay, I did pay, but that’s only because it was my idea.”

  “And it was on your parents’ cards,” Cleo suggested.

  “Exactly.”

  Maya shared another glance with Cleo behind Renee’s back. “Renee, you know what kind of background Diego comes from, right?”

  “Oh, I get that,” Renee said. “I can deal with a guy who’s weird about me paying. I can usually play that stuff off. But no guy has ever ended the night with me before. I’m the one who tells him when it’s over. And that’s not even the worst part.”

  Maya was officially confused. “What is?”

  Renee let out another deep sigh. She wasn’t often a drama queen, but her royal act was in overdrive. “I care!”

  “Okay?” Maya and Cleo said in unison.

  “I don’t usually care,” Renee said. “I’ve had bad dates before. And, okay, this was like the worst of the worst. But usually I just chalk it up to the guy and move on. Girls, I’m not moving on. I want to know what I did wrong. I want to fix it. I want to go out with him again even though I might come out of a second date looking even more pathetic.”

  The final look Maya shared with Cleo behind Renee’s back had them both smiling. They didn’t enjoy taking pleasure in their friend’s pain, but it was kind of nice to see the most confident one of their trio with a slight crack in her cool demeanor.

  “That’s not a bad thing,” Maya said. “It means you like him.”

  “Like, you like him, like him,” Cleo added.

  “You like him a lot,” Maya continued in a sing-songy voice.

  “Oh my God,” Renee said. “I think I do.”

  Chapter 9

  Maya was no stranger to pain. In the years she’d been playing tennis she suffered through blisters, strains, sprains, and more serious injuries earned from her time on the court. None of that pain compared to the agony of wearing a pair of Ottaviano shoes. They were the most uncomfortable footwear she’d ever encountered, including the walking brace she
had to wear for a month in seventh grade.

  Maya sat in the empty lobby of the Creative Core Ad Agency dressed entirely in borrowed clothes. She had developed such a pattern of borrowing Renee’s clothes that she considered offering to pay rent.

  Renee had great taste and was much more knowledgeable about this world. Maya had wanted to dress in Esteban from head to toe, but Renee stopped her. The famous designer’s labels filled Renee’s closet, but she wouldn’t let her friend take any of it. “Too obvious,” she’d said.

  Once Renee was done with her, Maya was outfitted in a Michael Kors dress, a Cartier Tank watch, a Chanel bag, and those hideously uncomfortable but ultimately gorgeous heels. Only then did Renee reach back into her closet and top off the look with an Esteban scarf that complemented the outfit perfectly. The one outfit cost more than Maya’s wardrobe budget for the whole year, but she looked good sitting in that lobby. If only someone other than the receptionist would see her in it.

  Maya had been waiting for an hour with no sign she was going to be seen anytime soon. She’d be annoyed, but she was too busy trying not to throw up.

  They’d never keep Nicole King waiting this long, she told herself. Nicole would never put up with it. She’d have been gone long ago.

  Maya considered getting up and walking out. Since she was effectively a nobody, there was no chance she’d book the job, but it would send a message. Maya Hart doesn’t wait for anyone.

  She’d never do something like that, but it was fun to imagine. The shadow that suddenly fell over her told her she didn’t need to think about it anymore. She put on her brightest smile and raised her head.