The Charade: A Billionaire/Fake Relationship Romance (Eden Falls Academy)
The Charade: Chapter 15

I WAS DISTRACTED for the next hour as Cambrielle showed Elyse and me the rest of her house.

I barely saw the various rooms we walked through. Barely noted all the people buzzing around on the main floor as they prepared food for the back-to-school barbecue that Cambrielle said about fifty of our classmates had been invited to attend. Barely heard the music the hired DJ played as he set up and tested his sound system.

I barely registered anything Cambrielle and Elyse chatted about as we moved from gorgeous room to gorgeous room, because all I could think about was the way my heart still felt like it was going to beat right out of my chest a full fifty-five minutes after standing with Carter in his doorway.

It was crazy. I knew it’d all just been his way of playing with me, and yet, my whole nervous system had gone haywire from our brief encounter.

I flexed my hands as Cambrielle showed us a library on the main floor that looked just like the one from the movie Beauty and the Beast , with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and a wooden ladder attached to a metal bar at the top to access the high shelves.

And even though I’d flexed my hand several times, I still remembered the way the thin fabric of Carter’s T-shirt had felt against my palms and how his heart had pounded when I’d touched him.

I couldn’t have imagined how fast his heart had been beating, could I?

We finished our tour of the upper and main levels, so Cambrielle showed us the way to the basement. After we’d gone down the wide staircase, Cambrielle gestured at the double doors to our right. ‘We have a workout room right through those doors.’ Cambrielle turned to me and said, ‘But you’ll probably be interested in this one, Ava, since you said you play basketball.’

We followed her to a different door, which had a narrow staircase that led down to the basketball court where Carter and Nash were playing a game with Mack, Mr. Hastings, the older brother Ian I’d seen in the family photos, and another guy I didn’t recognize who was probably Ian’s age.

The guys continued their scrimmage game as we walked by. From the way the ball was passed between Mr. Hastings, Ian, and his friend, it looked like the teams were separated into older guys versus my schoolmates. Mack jumped up to rebound a missed shot from Mr. Hastings and then made a fast pass to Carter who, currently unguarded, dribbled the ball down to the other end of the court and shot a lay-up. The ball hit against the backboard and then went through the net with a swish to score two points for his team.

Nash and Mack cheered and gave Carter a high five.

‘Okay, guys,’ Mr. Hastings said, his hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath. ‘I need to call it quits for the day. I can only keep up with you young bucks for so long.’

‘Oh, come on, Mr. Hastings,’ Mack called to the middle-aged man, spinning the ball on his middle finger. ‘You sure you don’t have time for a game of Knockout?’

Mr. Hastings shook his head, sweat dripping down from his blond hairline. ‘If I were twenty years younger, I might say yes, but since I’d like to walk up and down the stairs tomorrow, I’ll have to pass.’

‘Anyway, this is the sports court.’ Cambrielle gestured to our surroundings as we walked across the floor toward the guys. ‘We mostly play basketball in here, but we’re also set up for racquetball, volleyball, and basically whatever game you can think of.’

‘The twins are here. Nice.’ I heard Mack say to Nash as we approached, like he’d been too involved in the game to notice our entrance earlier.

‘I picked them up before the game,’ Nash said before stealing the ball from Mack and dribbling it over to where Ian and the other guy stood under one of the baskets, waiting to shoot more hoops.

‘So, what do you think of the Hastings mansion?’ Mack asked, leaning an elbow on Carter’s shoulder after he took a pull from a gray water bottle. ‘I’m guessing Cambrielle has been giving you a grand tour?’

‘It’s beautiful,’ Elyse said, her cheeks glowing as she looked up at Mack.

‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ I added.

Which was true. Even though I’d been walking around in somewhat of a daze, I had caught enough of my surroundings to know that this was probably the nicest house I’d ever step foot in.

‘Yeah.’ Mack shrugged, looking up at the windows at the top of the court that let in the afternoon sunlight. ‘My dad’s only a neurosurgeon, so our house looks like a shack compared to this.’

Everyone laughed at Mack’s joke, and I had to assume that his house was probably super nice as well.

Carter looked like he was about to say something about Mack living in a shack when Mr. Hastings joined us after getting a drink at the water fountain in the corner.

‘Hi, I don’t think we’ve been acquainted yet,’ he said, holding out his hand to me. ‘I’m Joel Hastings, Cambrielle, Nash, and Carter’s dad. It’s nice to meet you.’

‘Nice to meet you, I’m Ava.’ I shook his hand briefly, and then pointed beside me. ‘And this is my sister Elyse. We’re Ava and Elyse Cohen.’

‘Cohen?’ Mr. Hastings’s eyebrows shot up, like he recognized our last name for some reason.

‘Yeah, our mom is the fashion designer, Miriam Cohen,’ I said. His wife and daughter wore designer dresses, so maybe that was why our last name sounded familiar to him?

‘Miriam Cohen is your mom?’ Mr. Hastings’s blue eyes went wide, and his expression was one of surprise. ‘Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time.’

‘You know our mom?’ Elyse asked.

Mr. Hastings rubbed the back of his neck with his towel. ‘If she’s the same Miriam Cohen who went to the academy back in the day, then I’d have to say that your mother and I were very good friends.’

‘You were friends with their mom?’ Carter asked, mirroring my thoughts. ‘Now that’s a coincidence.’

Mr. Hastings nodded. ‘I know it’s probably difficult to imagine that an old fart like me could be the same age as your beautiful mother. But yeah, we go way back.’ He shook his head contemplatively, as if taking a stroll down memory lane in his mind. ‘I didn’t realize she had kids the same age as mine. We lost touch through the years, but I hadn’t heard of her marrying.’

‘Oh, that’s because she didn’t,’ I said. As far as she’d told us, our mom had a one-time, one-night stand with my mystery father and ended up with two miracles—Elyse and me—because of it.

‘Of course,’ Mr. Hastings hurried to say. ‘I certainly didn’t mean anything by it. I mean, I of all people should know you don’t need to be married in order to have children.’

He was probably referring to how Carter had been born to his mother and not known his dad for the first eight years of his life.

‘You say your mom’s a fashion designer now?’ Mr. Hastings narrowed his eyes and seemed to take in Elyse’s and my appearance, like he was comparing us to the memory he must have had of our mother.

‘She’s just getting ready for Milan’s Fashion Week,’ Elyse said, a smile stretching across her lips. ‘She’s been getting a lot of notice lately, which has been really exciting for our family.’

‘That’s so good to hear. I always knew Miriam was going to do great things one day.’ The look of pride in his eyes told me that he really must have been a good friend to our mom.

‘We’re really proud of her.’ I smiled.

‘I bet. And are you two juniors like Cambrielle?’

‘No, we’re seniors.’

‘Seniors?’ Mr. Hastings’s eyebrows shot up. ‘So you’re Carter’s, and Nash’s age?’

Had he assumed that we were Cambrielle’s age since we’d walked in with her?

‘Yeah, we’re seniors,’ I said, not used to my friend’s parents asking so many questions. Usually, a quick hi and what’s your name was all they ever cared about.

Maybe he was showing more interest since he’d been such good friends with our mother?

Though, apparently, not good enough of friends for her to ever mention him to us. But my mom didn’t really talk about anyone from high school.

Mr. Hastings glanced at his watch. ‘Ah, it’s already five o’clock. Looks like I better hit the showers so I’m ready for my hot date with my girlfriend.’

His girlfriend?

But wasn’t he married?

Seeming to notice my shock, Carter laughed and said, ‘He’s talking about his wife, Dawn. They’re weird, though, and like to call each other girlfriend and boyfriend.’

Mr. Hastings patted Carter on the shoulder. ‘Gotta keep the romance alive somehow, bud.’

‘Whatever,’ Carter said, but when his gaze briefly met mine, a bunch of butterflies swarmed my stomach as I remembered standing close to him in his room.

Pretty sure Carter didn’t need any tips from his dad about keeping romance alive, because just one look from him had me swooning all over again.

But I tried to push those thoughts away because he didn’t need to know this.

‘It was great to meet you,’ Mr. Hastings said, looking at Elyse and me again. ‘You’ll have to tell your mother I said hi the next time you talk to her.’

‘Will do,’ Elyse said, smiling at Mr. Hastings.

Mr. Hastings left, and it looked like Carter was going to say something to Elyse and me when Cambrielle came back over to us after shooting a few hoops with Nash and the other guys.

She put her hands together. ‘So, now that you’ve met the old guy at our house, would you like to see the pool and the pool house?’

Glancing at Carter briefly and wondering what he’d been about to say, I said, ”Um, yes.”

‘Why didn’t you show us those when we first got here?’ Elyse added.

Cambrielle laughed. ‘I figured I’d save the best for last.’

And then we were all off again.

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