Page 49 of The Charade

He seemed to study me for a moment before saying, "I guess it is."

Cambrielle,Elyse, and the rest of the crew joined us as we finished the last half of our meal. Nash and Mack decided to recount stories of the various pranks they'd pulled on the headmistress and the drama teacher and soon had us all laughing until we had tears coming out our eyes.

When we'd finished eating, Scarlett challenged us to a game of volleyball on the court below with a few of her volleyball friends. After playing a game where she, Hunter, and Mack basically dominated on the sandy court, I decided to take a breather and explore the little path that led into the gardens Cambrielle had pointed out when she was showing us the pool-house and pool on our tour earlier.

I was just walking onto the stone path lined with bushes and beautiful flowers when Carter jogged up to my side and asked, "Everything okay?" He wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, his breathing still hard from the volleyball game. "You're not escaping in here because you're mad that your team lost the game, are you?"

"No, of course not." I shook my head, finding it funny that he would even think of it. "I don't care about the game. The only things I get competitive over are basketball games and when other girls try to steal guys from me."

"Okay, good," he said. And then, with a half-smile slipping up his lips, he added, "But thanks for the heads up on that. I'll have to remember to warn my next fake girlfriend that you could be a little territorial over me." He winked.

I couldn't help but smile at his comment. "Are you planning to make this fake-girlfriend thing a habit?" I asked.

"I don't know, maybe." He shrugged his broad shoulders. "It's been kind of fun, don't you think? And it certainly seems a lot easier than doing the real thing."

"Has finding a girlfriend been difficult for you in the past?"

Because yeah, I definitely wouldn't believe that. He was hot.

And tall.

And from what I'd seen of his eight-pack abs in his room earlier, he was also in amazing shape—which was another kind of hot on its own.

Not to mention the less shallow attributes of being super smart and fun to talk to as well.

And while Carter wasn't the life of the party like Mack and Nash were, he was still really fun to be around in his own way.

So yeah, him having a hard time finding a girlfriend was not something that could be real.

"Finding a girlfriend isn't the problem," he said, apparently on the same wavelength as me. "I guess it's more the work that's involved in keeping one."

And there it was. This guy, who most girls my age would probably consider a teenage god, was insecure about his ability to keep the interest of a potential girlfriend because his last girlfriend had left him.

It was crazy, right?

Because I was pretty sure that if I hadn't signed a contract saying that I wouldn't catch real feelings for this guy, I might be in real danger of doing exactly just that.

Even with the contract, I had totally imagined what getting tangled in his strong arms and lost in his kiss would be like.

He was the forbidden fruit of Eden Falls Academy, and I was the girl tempted to taste him.

But since I couldn't admit to any of that, I just said, "Yeah, dating someone because you like them and not just because you want to get revenge on your ex is for the birds."

He put his arm around my shoulders and squeezed me against his side for the briefest moment. "See, and this is why our arrangement is so perfect."

He let his arm drop, and even though I'd only been close to him for a few seconds, I felt colder when he stepped away.

We walked down in silence for a moment, just listening to the sounds of laughter and voices from the party growing quieter the farther we got down the path.

I took in the beautiful scenery around me. The path was lined with daisies and hydrangeas, and then just beyond were various shrubbery and trees whose leaves were just beginning to show signs of change.

"How big is your family's property?" I asked. I'd never been to a home with such extensive grounds. They seemed to have everything you'd ever dream of having here. The beautiful home. The pool. The amazing yard.

"All in all, it's about a thousand acres." Carter slipped his hands into his pockets, his elbow bumping against mine as he did so. "But when my great-great-great grandpa first settled the town and bought his property, it was about ten times that."

"Your family lives on a thousand acres?" I stopped in my tracks and didn't even try to hide my shock. "What in the world do you do with that much land?"

"Lots of things." Carter shrugged and continued down the path. "We have a horse stable out that way." He pointed north. "And then the blueberry fields are over there." He pointed to the east. "The golf course is this way." He pointed west. "And then there’s just a lot of land that hasn't been developed much, and it’s where we ride our ATVs."

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