SWNOVELS The Charade: Chapter 14
‘S-SORRY,’ one of the Cohen twins yelped when I walked out from my closet to see who had come into my room while I was changing into my basketball clothes. ‘Cambrielle said it was the third door on the left, and so I opened it and I…’ The girl—who I still wasn’t sure was Ava or Elyse—rambled on anxiously, a vein in her forehead becoming more and more pronounced the longer she talked. ‘And I didn’t realize anyone would be in here. And…I…um…’ Her gaze traveled from my face and panned down my torso and arms, and when it seemed like she was having a difficult time finishing her sentence, I realized that I was still holding my shirt in my hand.
She was totally raking me in.
‘Uh, sorry, I didn’t know…’ I started to apologize about my current state of undress before realizing I shouldn’t be the one apologizing, since technically, I’d been changing in my own room and had shut the door before doing so. So, I’d just let her finish her apology.
But instead of picking up from where her words had trailed off, her eyes narrowed as she looked at me. Her lips moved like she was counting under her breath, and then she suddenly blurted out, ‘You have an eight-pack?’
And with that one sentence, the mystery of which twin had barged into my room unannounced was solved.
Because from what I knew of the Cohen twins, only Ava would say something like that.
Deciding to test my assumption, I said, ‘Yes, Ava, I have an eight-pack.’ I pulled my shirt over my head since obviously my body was more of a distraction than I’d thought. ‘Is that the real reason you barged into my room just now? Because you wanted to practice your math skills by adding up my abs?’
‘What?’ Her jaw dropped, and then she added, ‘How did you know it was me and not Elyse?’
I tugged on my sleeves so they rested more comfortably on my shoulders. ‘Elyse doesn’t exactly seem the type to blurt out questions like that.’
Or the type to blatantly count a guy’s abs in the first place.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Ava put her hands on her hips. And when she did that, I couldn’t help but give her an inspection of my own.
Aside from the day she’d arrived at our school, I’d only seen her in her school uniforms. So seeing her in her jeans and a T-shirt was different. And while I may have admired her long legs in those plaid skirts she somehow looked better in than all the other girls at school did, Ava in her jeans just might rival even that.
But since she didn’t need to know that I too found her appearance distracting, I lifted my gaze back to her eyes and answered her question. ‘I just meant that Elyse is more reserved while you’re significantly less so.’
I mean, she had signed a contract that said she wouldn’t try to date me…only to immediately turn around a couple of hours later and convince me to fake a flirtation with her.
If that wasn’t the work of a master manipulator, I didn’t know what was.
I still couldn’t believe that whole thing had happened, actually.
One minute I was planning to ignore the entire female population at our school, and then before I knew it, I was purposely faking a romance with this girl I barely knew just to make Sofia think I’d moved on.
Insane, right?
And yet, I was still doing it.
I was even enjoying it a little because Sofia seemed to believe it all and hadn’t tried to approach me since the first day.
‘Well, I may be the more impulsive twin,’ Ava admitted. ‘But I promise I didn’t just pretend to get turned around in your family’s massive mansion just so I could catch you without your shirt on. I really thought this was the bathroom.’
‘So let me guess.’ I cocked an eyebrow. ‘You were just counting my abs for research purposes?’
‘For research?’ She furrowed her brow.
‘Well, yeah.’ I grabbed my basketball shoes from the loveseat in front of my bed and sat down to start putting them on. ‘If we keep pretending like we’re doing less scholarly activities during our tutoring sessions, it makes sense that you would want to know something like that to make our little charade more believable.’
I tied my right shoe, but when Ava didn’t make a sound, I looked up to see if I’d said something wrong. Her eyes were wide and her mouth had gone slack as if I’d just made her speechless.
‘W-why would us dating have anything to do with me knowing how many ab muscles you have?’ she asked after regaining her composure.
My eyebrows knitted together, and I was legitimately confused at how she couldn’t see the correlation between the two things.
‘You’ve had a boyfriend before, right?’ I asked, slipping on my left shoe and tying it. Because there was no way in the world that this girl didn’t have experience playing with guys’ minds.
‘Well, yeah.’ She shrugged. ‘I mean, I’ve dated a few guys. But, um, it wasn’t ever serious. And it’s not like we went hot tubbing or swimming all the time.’
Okay, so maybe she really didn’t know what I was getting at. Maybe she was less experienced with guys than I’d assumed.
Which was totally fine. Not all people my age took their romantic relationships to a more physical level.
And now that I was on this side of my relationship with Sofia, our breakup probably would have been a lot easier on me if we hadn’t ever brought sex into the equation. I didn’t necessarily regret it since we’d dated for two years and at that time, I’d thought I loved her. But it did add some complications and a bigger sense of betrayal when she left me for another guy.
So, instead of pushing the topic with Ava, I just said, ‘Yeah, I don’t go hot tubbing on all my dates, either.’
I finished tying my shoes and stood up, ready to get downstairs to the basketball court. But just as I was about to walk past Ava and through the doorway, she grabbed my forearm. ‘Wait, were you just hinting that people at our school—’ She shook her head before staring at me with her big, golden-brown eyes. ‘T-that Sofia’s going to think that we’re…that we’re hooking up during our tutoring sessions?’
And the look of shock and terror on her face at the thought told me that what I’d assumed about her dating life was probably right.
Spending the night with guys wasn’t an extracurricular activity for Ava.
But since I couldn’t resist being the one to keep her on her toes for a change, I stepped closer. She retreated. With her back pressed against the wall, I bent down so my lips were next to her ear and whispered, ‘With two people as hot as we are, I would almost bet on it.’
Her whole body went still—her breath seeming to catch as she took in what I’d just said. Then after a moment, she asked, ‘Y-you think I’m hot?’
I couldn’t help but chuckle at the way this girl’s mind worked. Because even though it was apparent that she was also overwhelmed by my close proximity and the thought of people assuming we were hooking up bothered her…my saying she was hot was the thing she wanted to address first.
In a low voice, I said, ‘I guess I did say that.’
Which was true. I liked what I saw whenever she was in my view.
Probably liked it a little too much, considering I was her math tutor and the only kind of relationship we’d be having this year was of the professional…or fake kind.
She braced her hands on my chest. Even though I’d just reminded myself of the boundaries our relationship would have, my heart didn’t seem to get the memo since it pounded against my ribs at her touch, my whole body acutely aware of just how close we stood.
Crazy as it was, I had the strange urge to close the rest of the distance between us—to do something so impulsive and so out of character for me—and just kiss her right then and there so I could find out if she tasted as good as she looked.
My gaze fell to her mouth which was parted slightly, so soft and supple-looking.
She pressed her lips together. When I lifted my gaze back up to her amber eyes, I imagined there was some sort of anticipation in them—like she was as curious as I was about what it would be like to kiss each other.
I could imagine worse ways to spend an afternoon.
I was about to slide my hand up to cradle her neck when Nash’s voice suddenly sounded from my Apple watch. ‘Carter, are you coming?’
And just like that, I was jolted back to reality.
Ava jumped at the sound of Nash’s voice as well and immediately removed her palms from my chest, as if we’d just been caught in a compromising position.
Which yeah, it would have seemed compromising…if anyone was actually around to see it.
After taking one last look at Ava, I pushed the button on my watch to respond to Nash. ‘I’m on my way.’ Then after standing straighter, I cleared my throat and said to Ava, ‘Sorry. I, uh, forgot what I was doing for a minute.’ I stepped back to give us both some much-needed space.
‘Yeah, I did, too.’ Ava tucked some of her long hair behind her ear. ‘I was trying to find the bathroom.’
‘The bathroom is right there.’ I pointed to the door straight across from my room, fighting the urge to run my fingers through her hair so I could discover if it was as silky as it looked. ‘Cambrielle is always getting her directions mixed up.’
Ava stepped out of the doorway, and it might have just been me projecting my own feelings onto her, but I imagined she didn’t seem in any hurry to leave quite yet.
But since I had people waiting for me downstairs, I came out of my room, closing the door behind me, and said, ‘I’ll see you later, Ava.’
‘Yeah, see you, Carter.’
And then I hurried down to the basketball court, wondering what in the world had just happened.