How to Tame Your Rival

A spiked soda traps an artist in a fake romance with her old hockey crush.

Artist Evelyn swallows a doctored soda intended for arrogant hockey player Julian, triggering a binding wager that requires them to pretend to be a couple. The arrangement demands staged kisses and constant public proximity. Two years earlier Evelyn was certain her silent infatuation had faded, but the enforced intimacy dismantles her defenses, pulling her back toward the attraction she fought to suppress and risking the terms of the bet.

• romance
• campus
• fake dating
• rivals to lovers

1. Evelyn drinks a spiked soda by mistake
2. A wager forces fake dating with Julian
3. Her old crush resurfaces during the charade

Anyone who enjoys enemies-to-lovers tension fueled by a fake-relationship contract will appreciate this dynamic.