Page 27 of The Charade

Take that, you egotistical narcissist.

He didn't respond at first—just stared at me unblinking, like he couldn't believe what I'd just said.

Then, after looking me up and down with an appraising eye that made me feel like he was seeing and weighing my every flaw, he leaned back against his cushioned seat and said, "I don't think that will be an issue."

Okay.

Ouch. Talk about a slap to the ego.

But I wasn’t about to let him know how much his words stung, so I uncapped my pen and said, "Well, it looks like we're on the same page with things then."

It took everything in me to keep my hand steady as I signed his stupid contract when all I wanted to do was climb under the table and hide.

After signing my name and taking a deep calming breath, I decided to drive the point home that I was not the one who'd be left wanting in this arrangement of ours. So, at the bottom of the contract, I added in purple ink the words:

I, Carter Hastings, vow that I won't fall in love with the beautiful and alluring Ava Cohen, even though she is a Goddess on earth. I will be on my best behavior during our tutoring sessions and not let her enchanting personality, charming wit, or captivating eyes distract me from doing my job.

And just below that, I drew a line where he could sign his name.

I slid the paper back to him. "I'm going to need you to sign my little addition," I said, capping my pen.

A half-smile formed on his lips as he read my amendment to his contract. But then he signed his name in a nice, flowing scrawl.

"Looks like we've come to an agreement," he said, tucking the contract back into the front folder of his notebook. "How about we get to those questions now."

9

Carter

"We missed you during lunch,"Mack said, finding me in the hall as I walked toward Mrs. Johnson's room for my last class of the day. "Where were you?"

"I took Ava to The Italian Amigos."

"What?" Mack asked, his thick eyebrows knitting together. "And here I thought you said you weren't interested in the Cohen twins."

"I'm not."

He shot me a disbelieving look. "Then why take Ava to lunch?"

"We had a math assignment we needed to work on." An assignment that we'd only made a small dent in since we'd spent too much time chatting and going over my tutoring contract.

When I'd pulled out the contract for her to sign and she'd questioned me about my no-dating rule, I had to think fast for an excuse as to why that last rule was there in the first place.

My experience with my older brother Ian had come in handy as I'd played the part of a self-absorbed player who thought he was king of the world.

And from how riled up Ava had gotten after I'd basically implied that I was up to my eyeballs in propositions from girls, I figured I'd played the part well enough.

Which was great. I hadn't wanted to waste time with the female population this year, anyway. So even though I was pretty sure Nash must have hacked into my computer and changed my contract as some sort of prank, he had actually done me a favor.

At least, I'd stopped any chance of Ava ever being interested in me romantically. And if she did what I suspected she might and tell all the other girls about how full of myself I'd been during our lunch, it wouldn't be long before I had my weekends all to myself.

"Since when do you work on math assignments during lunch?" Mack asked.

We met a roadblock in the hall where it came to an intersection. As students shuffled past us, most of their heads several inches below ours since we were so tall, I said, "Ever since I needed an excuse to avoid Sofia."

"Ah, gotcha," Mack said. "I guess I'd probably want to avoid that conversation too, if I were you."

"Hopefully, she got the message that she doesn't have to try to be my friend just because she feels guilty."

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