The Winner Takes It All (Love in L.A. Book 3) by Audrey Harte

tonight, and he’s going to be here to pick me up any minute now.”
    “You have a date?” Annie repeated, giving a thrilled little squeal. “Oh yay! And no worries at all. Sorry to interrupt you while you’re getting ready for your hot date. I can mope to you another time.”
    “Thank you and try not to worry too much. You and Casey are both under a lot of pressure right now, and I’m sure that has to be stressful.”
    “Yeah, I know. Okay, well get going and finish getting ready. I hope you have a fabulous time, and I want to hear all about this new guy when you have time.”
    “You mean when you have time! You’re the one off in New York competing for a five million dollar Vegas contract.”
    Annie laughed. “Okay, well I’ll call you when I have a chance.”
    “Sounds good. Love you, talk to you soon.”
    “Love you, have fun!”
    Annie sat there for several long minutes, staring at the door to her room, wishing that any moment, she would hear Casey knocking and asking for forgiveness and telling her he couldn’t sleep without her next to him. She hated the knot in her stomach that seemed to be growing by the minute. The more she reflected on the evening’s events, the angrier she became. What Alex said was true. She and Casey were both under a lot of pressure, and it was a stressful situation to be in. But she still didn’t think that was a good enough excuse for him to be angry with her for having dinner with a friend, even if it was a friend who pretty clearly wanted in her pants, whether she was in a relationship or not.
    Once Casey had finally explained the reason for his animosity towards Trey, it made sense, but she didn’t really understand why he hadn’t just been honest with her about the whole situation from the beginning. It’s not like she’d expected him to never have had a serious relationship before her. That was just silly. Sure, she wouldn’t really want him to talk incessantly about an ex, but just admitting that he’d had a girlfriend before wouldn’t have bothered her in the slightest. How could it? She’d been in other relationships before him.
    So because he hadn’t chosen to just be honest and trust her with that knowledge, she hadn’t understood the gravity of his feelings towards Trey and had caused this huge rift between them for no good reason. Life really sucked the big one sometimes. Sighing, she finally pushed herself to her feet and wandered into the bathroom to start the shower. Maybe the hot water would help her relax and sooth her enough that she could fall asleep. Tomorrow would bring the results of who had made the final cut and would compete in the first round of live tapings.
    As she let the water wash away her worries, Annie smiled to herself. She was feeling pretty confident that she had made it into the final round. That was pretty damn amazing just by itself. If she didn’t make it any farther than this, at least she could say that she tried and made it all the way to the live tapings. How many people could say they had done something like that? And she knew that her family and friends would be immensely proud of her for giving it her best shot and going for her dreams.
    By the time she had dried herself off and crawled wearily into bed, Annie was feeling a lot better. Whatever happened with Casey wasn’t the most important thing right now, and she’d almost lost sight of that. It was time for her to stop moping and start concentrating on winning this competition and her dream job. Ignoring the fact that she was curling up with her pillows alone tonight, Annie reached over to the nightstand to retrieve her purse and pulled out a small joint. If she was going to sleep well tonight, she needed a little help. She smoked half of it and then tucked the other half back into her purse. In no time at all, the marijuana did its job and she was fast asleep.

 
     
     
    “We made it!” Erin squealed with excitement, jumping up and down in front of the wall in