Juliana Haygert - Playing Pretend

“I do!”

She shook her head again and I swear the glint in her eyes was murderous. “This escapade better not be in every newspaper tomorrow morning. I swear I’ll kill you if I find a picture of you with some random guy.”

“It’s not like—”

“Does he know who you are?”

“W-what?”

“The man you slept with. Does he know who you are?”

“Oh my God, I’m not hearing this.”

“If he does, I hope he’s discreet, because so help me, if he tells anyone about this, if it leaks and turns into gossip that will end up in the newspaper, I’ll kill you. And him too. You betrayed my trust. How long have you been doing this? How many times have you lied to me like this? Do you just pick any man at random? Like what? Your boy toys?”

“Do you hear yourself?”

“Oh, Lord. And I always thought you were with Tracy. You can ruin our lives. You can ruin my career. You can ruin your career. I won’t allow it.”

“ My career?”

“I should put bodyguards on you to follow your every move.”

“What? No!”

She halted and watched me with those hawk eyes of hers. “I guess it’s too late to fix this now. If this man wanted to tell someone, it’s already been done. He better remain quiet.”

What I was supposed to tell her? I wouldn’t talk to her about Mason when she was determined to think he was a boy toy. “Mother—”

“But be warned,” she cut me off. “I won’t tolerate this kind of behavior anymore. Do as I tell you or you’ll have bodyguards following your every move. And the first thing I am telling is this: You won’t be seeing this man anymore.”

Mason

I brought my coffee to my lips and the doorbell rang. I almost spilled the whole thing on me. Christ, it was ten in the morning. Didn’t people know I went to bed at four last night? Unless it was Charlotte, then I wouldn’t mind at all. We could crawl into bed together and I could nap on her arms. Nothing sounded better.

But she had been here yesterday, and I knew she had some event to attend today with her mother—most Saturdays were busy for her. Maybe she had escaped.

The bell rang again and I marched to the door.

I opened it and froze.

“Hello, Mr. Rowell,” Donnie said. “May I come in?”

I recovered from my shock and put on a pretend act. “Who are you?”

“You know very well who I am. But you see, I also know who you are.” He examined me with something like disgust in his eyes, and I gulped. Fuck. He knew about Charlotte and me. “Now may I come in?”

Charlotte

I strolled to class on Monday with gusto. After all, it was the last class before finals and then goodbye summer semester, hello three weeks of vacation.

I checked my phone as I sat in my usual seat. Three days of sharing only messages and quick calls with Mason weren’t enough. I needed to find a way to see him soon.

After a boring lecture, the professor dismissed us and I walked out of the classroom, checking my phone again.

As I looked at the screen, messages from Liana, MaryAnn, and Becca exploded in my inbox. Five. Ten. Fifteen. Fifty in less than a minute. What the hell?

My belly growled. It was past lunchtime and I was starving. I would check and respond to those messages when I got home. My mother wouldn’t be there, but our cook was supposed to have lunch ready for me.

I stepped out of the building, intent on marching to the parking garage as fast as I could, and noticed how campus was too crowded for a Monday, or any other day or time of the week during the summer semester.

Every student was looking at me, whispering to his or her friends, pointing at me. A few of them spied at cell phones or tablets or newspapers, and then turned his or her judging gaze at me.

Uh-oh.

My cell phone rang, but I didn’t check it either. Whatever it was, I wasn’t going to stand here and find out. My mother had drilled me about this once.

“Just get out of there,” my mother had said. “Get to your car and drive away, or find somewhere safe and hide. Only then you stop to see what’s happening.”

With my heartbeat speeding out of control, I lowered my head and rushed my steps. As the seconds passed, the crowd grew, and the whispering grew louder.

“Miss McClain!”

Oh, shit. I didn’t have to turn to know that a wave of reporters had landed on campus and was now in pursuit.

My cell phone kept ringing and ringing, the reporters yelled my name, and the students stood there, not helping me in my escape. In fact, they stood in my way, making it harder.

Against my better judgment, I broke into a run. As I stepped onto the parking garage’s sidewalk, a sleek black car appeared beside me.

The passenger side window rolled down and my mother’s chauffer spoke. “Enter, Miss McClain.”

I didn’t think twice. I opened the back door and launched myself into the car.

I half-expected my mother to be inside, yelling at me for whatever had happened.

“Are you okay, Miss McClain?” the chauffer asked.

“Yes,” I answered with a shaky voice. It was an automatic answer. I wasn’t okay at all. “Where’s my mother?”

“She’s on her way to the Executive Mansion. She’ll meet you there.”

I nodded and pressed the button to raise the black glass between us.

As the car drove off campus, I leaned back in the seat and looked at my cell phone. Over four hundred messages from Mason, Liana, MaryAnn, and Becca, and fifty calls from them, my mother, and Donnie.

I didn’t check those though. Instead, I opened the internet browser and google myself. Tons of news headlines showed up on my search. I clicked the first one I saw.

Oddly, it was from the Washington Post . The picture caught my attention first: Mason and I getting heavy against a tree. My heart raced as I shifted my gaze to the headline: The Secret Life of Charlotte McClain.

Without reading the rest of the article, I turned off my phone as if I could erase it all along with it.

Charlotte

“I told you this would happen!” My mother threw the newspaper on her desk, making me flinch in my seat. She pushed her chair back and paced. “I can’t believe you did this, Charlotte. I can’t believe you let this happen.”

I didn’t know what to say. I was still in shock from what I had read in the newspaper and several gossip websites. Some of them had more pictures of me, Mason, or us together. Me on my knees, drawing on a sidewalk, my short skirt almost too revealing and my hair a mess. Another, I was roller-skating in an abandoned park. They also had photos of Mason working in shitty bars and around his not-so-great neighborhood.

According to them, Mason had gotten involved with me so he could do this, so he would have pictures of us to sell to the paparazzi for a fortune. It all had started during spring break. He had seen me, recognized me, and seduced me. Then, he arranged the move to Washington so he could start part B of his plan. He found out I was going to the Memorial Day Ball and got a job there. From there, he manipulated me more and more. He was the one who took the pictures to the newspaper, and then later to every gossip blog on the worldwide web.

They also mentioned me. How I had let Mason use me, how I had used him. How I spent my time in dangerous parts of the city, went to raves—really?—and done several other crazy stunts, all because he had enticed me. The press called him my boy toy—disgusting. The boy toy had brought out a crazy-driven Charlotte, and now that she was out, who knew what I would do?

Christ, the shit they invented!