SWNOVELS The Charade: Chapter 37
ELYSE and I still hadn’t heard anything from our mom by the time the soirée rolled around on Saturday night. She’d said she’d explain everything this weekend, but so far all we’d gotten was radio silence.
It honestly wouldn’t surprise me if she’d just jumped on a plane and headed to Paris so she wouldn’t have to face this situation. I had that little faith in her at the moment.
Since there was nothing I could do besides move forward as best I could, I headed over to the Hastings’s estate with my sister and Scarlett and tried to mentally prepare myself for the evening ahead.
‘I know it’s probably a little over the top,’ Cambrielle said with excitement in her bright blue eyes as she led us up the stairs to her bedroom where we’d be getting ready for the party. ‘But my mom and I hired a glam squad to help us get ready for tonight.’
‘A what squad?’ Elyse asked when we made it to the top of the landing.
‘A glam squad,’ Cambrielle repeated. ‘Meaning, we have people here to help us with our hair and makeup.’
‘Really?’ Elyse asked, sounding more excited than expected since she wasn’t as into dressing up as I was.
Cambrielle nodded. ‘They’re setting everything up in my room already.’
And that seemed to be all the explanation Elyse and Scarlett needed to pick up their pace and hurry down the hall toward Cambrielle’s room with her.
As they curved around a corner, I slowed my pace to come to a stop in front of the family portrait I’d looked at my first day in the Hastings’s house. But this time, instead of admiring their clothes and the contented vibe the family exuded, I focused on the face of Mr. Hastings.
I looked at his blond hair. His high cheekbones. His aqua-blue eyes that matched the rest of his children’s eyes. I tried to see something in his face or his expression that would remind me of what I saw every time I looked in the mirror or in the face of my identical twin sister. But aside from him having a similar hairline and coloring and being tall, I didn’t see anything that would necessarily persuade me to think we were related.
But maybe that was because I didn’t want to see any similarities in this man and myself.
I sighed, looking at the rest of the family who was smiling down at me. They did seem like a happy family. I knew they weren’t perfect, since no family was, but as I studied them, I did feel my heart softening to the idea of being one of them. I had always wanted to have both a mom and a dad who loved me. Wanted brothers and even another sister, too. I could probably be very happy as a member of this family someday…once I got over Carter, that is.
Even though it was just a photograph, Carter’s eyes seemed to see straight into me, and it almost felt as if the real Carter was looking at me.
Was it crazy that I wanted to be a part of Carter’s family, but also be his girlfriend?
To wish for a world where I could have the kind of guy I’d always dreamed of falling in love with want me back, but also be part of his family at the same time.
I guess that was how it ended up working for most people. When you married a person, you married into their family.
The universe just wanted to make things more complicated for me than it did for the typical teen girl.
I was just giving my possible family one last glance before heading down the hall to Cambrielle’s room when a door down the hall opened and Carter stepped out, looking halfway dressed for the evening.
He wore his gray suit pants and black socks. His white button-up shirt was on but still currently unbuttoned, and he held two ties in his hands—one navy, the other pink—almost like he’d been on his way to ask someone which tie he should wear for tonight.
His hair was still tousled in the way that I loved, and I had the urge to run my fingers through it just to see if it was as soft as I remembered. Or if it too had changed this week like his apparent feelings for me had.
He shut his bedroom door and finally noticed me when he started walking down the hall in my direction.
‘Oh h-hi,’ he said, startling a little as he took in my appearance, apparently not expecting to see me this early for the party.
‘Hi,’ I said, tucking some hair behind my ear, suddenly feeling shy after not seeing much of him this week.
‘Hi,’ he said again. But then, after staring blankly at me for a second, he gave his head a quick shake and said, ‘I was just going to ask Cambrielle which tie she thought would look better for tonight. But since you’re here…’ He held up the ties in his hands, the opening in his dress shirt widening with the movement and revealing enough of his muscular chest to distract me for a second. ‘M-maybe you could help instead since you have such an eye for fashion.’
‘Sure.’ I set my dress bag and shoes on the floor. ‘I-I can try to help.’
He stepped closer, and only when he noticed my gaze raking in his exposed, tanned chest did he seem to realize that he’d left his room without buttoning his shirt.
‘Sorry,’ he said, his cheeks flushing as he looked down at his all-too-defined eight-pack abs. ‘I forgot what I looked like.’
‘I-it’s okay,’ I said, meeting his gaze through my lashes. And before I could stop myself, I added, ‘Your hands are full. Do you want me help you with that?’
‘With my shirt?’ he asked, his voice sounding slightly higher than it usually did.
I nodded. ‘Yeah.’
I was probably a glutton for punishment for wanting an excuse to stand close to Carter for a few seconds even though he’d been avoiding me all week, but my body craved his nearness.
Craved the chance to touch him for even just a few seconds, especially since he’d been hugging the other end of the table in our math class all week.
And buttoning his shirt was innocent enough, right?
He’d been about to go to Cambrielle for help, hadn’t he? So me helping him with this couldn’t be too taboo, could it?
Not that it would make me not want to do it if it was.
I stepped closer, close enough that I caught a faint whiff of his familiar cologne, and started buttoning his shirt from the bottom.
My hands shook slightly as I took the freshly pressed cotton in my fingers, my stomach fluttering with butterflies as I breathed him in. But I managed to slowly button each one on my way up, my fingers only grazing across his warm skin and making his stomach muscles twitch a few times.
‘Thanks for your help in making me more appropriate,’ he whispered into my hair, leaning closer as I worked on the button at the top of his collar.
Goosebumps raced across my skin from the warmth of his breath, but I forced my expression to remain neutral as I met his blue-eyed gaze. ‘Of course.’
The button hooked through the hole at the top easily, and even though I wanted to smooth my hands down his chest, wanted to have an excuse to touch him longer, I forced myself to take a step back, clasping my hands behind me for good measure.
He studied my face for a moment, probably noting the flush of my cheeks, the shyness of my gaze, and every other physical sign of my attraction for him. But then, seeming to remember that we weren’t supposed to notice things like that about each other anymore, he cleared his throat. He held the two ties up again and asked in a soft voice, ‘Which one do you think I should wear tonight?’
I studied the ties, comparing the two colors against his skin tone and eyes. The navy blue would look nice, very professional and appropriate for any occasion. But since I liked a little pop of color and the pink actually looked really good next to his tan skin, I said, ‘I’d go with the pink if I were you.’
‘Yeah?’ he asked.
‘That’s my favorite, anyway. But if you like the blue better it would look great, too.’
‘Pink is good,’ he said.
And as if to show that the decision was made, he looped the pink tie around his neck.
I bent down to pick up my things on the floor, deciding I should probably go to Cambrielle’s room now even though all I wanted to do was find a reason to stay and talk to Carter since this was the longest we’d been alone in what seemed like forever.
I wanted to ask him why he’d been treating me like a pariah all week. Why he’d skipped out on our tutoring session when I still needed his help.
‘Is that the dress you were talking about?’ Carter pointed to the dress bag when I looped it over my arm.
I looked at the black bag, remembering how I’d teased him just a few days ago about how high the slit hit on my thigh. ‘This is it.’ My cheeks burned a little because there was still a huge part of me that hoped Carter would like how I looked in it tonight.
He looked at the bag again. It seemed like he wanted to say something about the dress, or maybe something else about tonight, but then he gave his head a small shake and said, ‘I’m sure there’ll be a lot of guys dying to dance with you when they see you tonight.’
And there it was.
Other guys…
As in: Not. Him.
My vision blurred as the pain of that thought rushed over me.
We were really over, weren’t we?
Carter swallowed and lifted his eyes to mine. Just as I feared, there was a finality in his expression that made me feel cold all over.
This was him saying goodbye.
This was him saying we were over and any thoughts I might have entertained about us being together were just me being foolish.
When he’d avoided seeing me all week, when he barely talked to me at school, I’d known that he was probably putting distance between us because things were just awkward with us not knowing what the future held.
But maybe…maybe he just hadn’t cared about me in the same way I’d cared for him after all. Maybe saying goodbye to what we’d been wasn’t any harder to him than the simple flip of a switch to turn his feelings off.
Maybe once he found out that we could be related, he’d been able to think through his attraction for me and decide that none of it had mattered in the first place.
I didn’t know which hurt worse: the possibility that Carter had never cared for me like I’d thought and it had all been just something I’d exaggerated in my head, or that he had cared but was able to turn it off and move on in a matter of a few days.
I’d been told growing up that love was always somewhat unrequited. That even when a couple was married, one partner’s feelings were usually stronger than the other’s.
But I’d thought that Carter and I could have been the exception. That maybe our love for each other was equal.
But from the stony way he was looking at me as he practically told me to dance with and date other guys, I knew I must have been wrong. Maybe I really had cared about him more than he’d cared for me.
Maybe moving on was as easy for him as turning the page in a book and starting the next chapter of his life with someone else.
And because I never wanted to be seen as the one left wanting in whatever situation I was in, I lifted my chin and straightened my shoulders like I had that day in the Italian Amigos when he’d told me that falling in love with me wouldn’t be an issue. I said, ‘I guess it’s a good thing I brought my best dancing heels because I intend to dance with as many cute guys as I can tonight to make up for lost time.’
His eyes tightened as my words hung in the air between us, and for a second, I regretted saying them. But then he said, ‘Then I’ll try not to get in the way of all those cute guys for you tonight.’ He stepped to the side and gestured for me to continue down the hall to Cambrielle’s room. ‘I hope you enjoy the party, Ava.’
I nodded. ‘I hope you enjoy it too, Carter.’
And before the tears stinging at the back of my eyes could show themselves to Carter, I walked to Cambrielle’s room and fervently hoped I could make it through the night.