The Charade: A Billionaire/Fake Relationship Romance (Eden Falls Academy)
The Charade: Chapter 11

CARTER and I spent the next few minutes going over the details of our little arrangement. Since this was all pretend, and definitely not an exclusive sort of thing, it was pretty simple. Basically, we would just be extra flirty in the classes we had together so Sofia would have a front-row seat to it all, and then we’d just make it seem like our study sessions were more of a social thing instead of an actual requirement for me to pass math.

It was kind of a great situation, actually.

I was still allowed to flirt with other guys and go on dates if I wanted while he would, in his own words, continue to ignore everyone else like he usually did.

Man, my math tutor sure was a catch, wasn’t he? The kind of hot that could make me forget my own name, but severely lacking in social skills.

But if publicly flirting with him kept my secret safe while I earned my first ever A’s in math, I could put up with Mr. Grumpy Pants.

Carter pulled out his phone once we were ready to get back into the interview questions Mrs. Simmons had assigned us. ‘I think what’s next is whether we’d like to be famous or not, and if so, in what way?’

‘I’ll go first on that one,’ I offered. I liked that the questions so far were pretty non-invasive, even though our teacher had suggested that these might bring out some things we didn’t already know about our classmates. ‘I think it would be fun to be famous.’ It would mean that I’d probably not have to worry about money since hopefully, I’d be a rich famous person and not famous for something bad. ‘And as for what way, I’d love to follow in my mom’s footsteps and make a name for myself in the fashion world.’

Carter nodded as he wrote down my answer in his notebook. I smiled when I saw the words Ava wants a fashion empire in his blocky handwriting, because the word empire had so much power in it.

When he was done jotting my answer down, I asked, ‘And what about you? Do you want to be famous?’

‘Nope.’

The way he said it was so final, like he didn’t even care to entertain for one minute the idea of what it would be like to be famous.

‘Why not?’ I asked, so curious since I figured most everyone I knew would want to be famous in one way or another. If not famous themselves, then at least have something they created become famous.

‘I’m already critical enough of myself that I don’t need random strangers nitpicking at my flaws,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘When you’re famous, people strangely think that you somehow owe them the nitty gritty details of your life: who you’re dating, who you went on vacation with, what kind of toothpaste you prefer. I’ve seen my dad and Dawn deal with enough crap—and they’re only famous in the business world. I just don’t need to live under a microscope. I like my privacy too much.’

‘I must seem really naive to you then,’ I said, suddenly regretting what I said about wanting to be famous.

And to think I’d just been thinking that these questions were tame a second ago.

When he gave a non-committal shrug in reply, I knew he had to be totally judging me.

Ugh. So much for being on equal ground with this guy for once.

Carter cleared his throat. ‘Ready for the next question?’

I quickly jotted Carter’s answer down in my notebook. ‘Sure.’

Hopefully, I could answer this one without seeming stupid to him.

‘Okay, this one’s interesting,’ he said. ‘It asks if you ever rehearse what you’re going to say before making a phone call.’

I squished my eyebrows together, wondering how this was even a question. ‘Is that actually a thing?’ I asked at the same time Carter said, ‘I do. What about you?’

‘Wait— You rehearse your conversations beforehand?’ I asked, realizing what he’d just said.

‘If I can send a text, I’ll choose to do that instead,’ he said. ‘But sometimes, when I’m making calls for my dad’s company, I’ll run through what I need to say ahead of time so I don’t mess it up.’

‘Interesting.’

‘Not all of us are the social butterfly that you seem to be,’ he said. ‘I’m guessing from your reaction that you don’t do this.’

‘Can’t say that I do.’

Was it possible that my math tutor sometimes came off as unapproachable not because he thought he was above everyone, but because he had some social anxiety?

The next few questions were pretty easy, asking us things like what our favorite color was, favorite thing to do during our free time, and our favorite food.

Our answers were the following:

Me: Pink, hanging out with Elyse and our friends, and pizza.

Him: Blue, reading, and his family chef’s famous strawberries and cream crepes.

Apparently, he was a lot fancier than I was.

‘The next question asks what your favorite place in the whole world is,’ I said, after reading from the list. After thinking about all the places I’d ever been in the world, which granted probably wasn’t many compared to a lot of the kids at this school, I said, ‘I guess my favorite place that I’ve ever been to would have to be Habonim-Dor Beach near my grandma and grandpa’s home in Israel.’

‘Your grandparents are from Israel?’ Carter asked. ‘Does that mean you lived there?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘My mom came to this school when she was in high school and loved the United States, so she came back again to stay after college. I’ve only ever lived in Ridgewater until now. But we’ve visited my grandparents a few times when they offered to fly us over.’

Things had been pretty strained between my mom and grandpa for a while there. Having him disinherit her when she’d told him she was pregnant hadn’t exactly put them on the best of terms. But he’d come around a few years later with the help of my grandma and a huge change of heart, and eventually, they were able to patch things up and have a relationship again.

‘Cool,’ he said. ‘Is your dad from the United States, too? Or did he and your mom meet in Israel?’

‘Oh, um—’ I looked down at my notebook, feeling my cheeks heat up. ‘I actually don’t have a father.’

‘You don’t?’ He frowned.

‘Well, I mean,’ I said after realizing how that had sounded. ‘I obviously have a biological father out there somewhere since that’s how science works and all, but um, yeah, I just don’t know who he is…’ I let my words taper off at the end, wishing for about the thousandth time that I had at least a name or photo or something…anything to give me a clue.

But sadly, my mom was really, really good at keeping secrets.

‘Oh, sorry.’ Carter swallowed, looking uncomfortable. Then after seeming like he was trying to decide whether to say something or not, he said, ‘I can kind of relate. I, uh, I didn’t know who my dad was until I was eight.’

‘You didn’t?’ I met his gaze again, surprised that we would have something that was so rare in common.

He gave his head a slight shake, his expression somewhat cautious as he said, ‘All my mom ever told me when I asked about him was that my father was a gringo who’d only been in Guatemala for a short time.’

‘Yeah?’ Then, after hesitating for a moment, I asked, ‘Since you’re here now, I’m guessing you eventually found out who he was.’

‘Yeah.’ He sighed and shifted in his seat. ‘Anyway, um, my dad came to work at one of the orphanages he sponsors when I was eight and after putting two and two together—Nash and I could have passed for twins when we were younger and blue eyes aren’t exactly common among Guatemalans—he had a DNA test done and found out that he had a son he’d never known about.’

Wait. What?

Carter had lived in an orphanage?

‘W-what were you doing in an orphanage?’ I asked before realizing it was probably the stupidest question for me to ask right then.

People usually only ended up in orphanages for one reason.

Which meant Carter’s mom had probably died sometime before he was eight.

I was about to tell him that it was none of my business and I probably shouldn’t have even asked the question in the first place when a range of emotions crossed his face and he said, ‘My, um—’ He sighed heavily before meeting my gaze. His eyes showed a hint of pain when he looked at me. ‘My mom left me at a childcare one day when I was five and never came back.’

My heart stuttered to a stop.

Carter hadn’t been orphaned.

He’d been abandoned.

By his own mother.

And lived in an orphanage for three years before his dad had found him.

Suddenly, never knowing who my dad was sounded way easier than him being abandoned by the only parent he’d known at such a young age.

‘I’m sorry to hear that. That must have been so hard,’ I said lamely. What else could I say?

Based on his mention of his family having an employee who cleaned all of their fancy vehicles, and knowing he’d dated a supermodel in the past, I’d assumed he had always lived in the lap of luxury. But from just those few details he’d shared with me, it sounded like the first few years of his life had been more difficult than I could have ever imagined.

Geez.

He’d lived in an orphanage in a third-world country.

My mom, sister, and I might not have had the nicest house growing up, but we’d never gone without.

‘Anyway,’ Carter said, drawing in a deep breath. He chuckled awkwardly. ‘How’s that for a getting-to-know-you game?’

I shook my head slowly from side to side. ‘Definitely a bit deeper than I thought we’d get.’

That was for sure.

‘I promise I’ll try not to make all of our study sessions so heavy,’ he said.

‘I’m the one who started us off by saying the whole thing about not having a dad,’ I said with a shrug, hoping to lighten the mood.

‘True.’ Then shooting me a half-smile, he said, ‘But then I had to one up you with my whole sob story of living in an orphanage, since I’m competitive like that.’

‘I guess I’ll try to be less of an underachiever in the future,’ I said in a joking tone.

When he smiled at my comment, I was relieved to see that it actually reached his eyes this time.

And it was kind of the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in the world.

Dang. For all the range of emotions this guy had put me through in the past twenty-four hours, from lust to hate and everything in between, he really was different from anyone I’d ever met before.

And I had the feeling that if I wasn’t careful and constantly reminding myself that any flirtations we shared over the next few weeks were purely fake, I might just be in danger of getting the hugest crush on my math tutor.

A crush so big my heart might not survive it.