Page 1 of The Ruse

1

ELYSE

“Ready for yourfirst Thanksgiving with your father?” Mom asked when we stood on the doorstep of the Hastings’ family estate, hesitating just a moment before we rang the doorbell.

“I guess,” I said, even though a kaleidoscope of butterflies fluttered in my chest. “At least, I guess I’d better be since it’s happening right now.”

Mom stepped closer and put an arm around my shoulder, pulling me close. “It will be great.”

But even as she said it, a look of apprehension filled her dark-brown eyes.

Which should have been expected.

While Ava, my identical twin sister, and I were still getting used to the idea of Dr. Brendon Aarden, a world renown neurosurgeon, being our father—after not knowing who he was for the first seventeen years of our lives—my mom was probably a little more nervous than I was right now. She’d be eating dinner with not only one of her high school exes but two—Joel Hastings, Brendon’s neighbor and best friend, was hosting the meal with his wife Dawn.

“Should we ring the doorbell then?” I asked, glancing down at my mom who was several inches shorter than my five-foot-nine-inch height.

“Let me just take another deep breath.” Mom inhaled through her nose and released it slowly. Then she pulled her shoulders back and stood a little straighter in her black Jimmy Choos, the skirt of her navy-blue dress swishing around her knees. “Okay. Let’s do this.”

I transferred the apple pie we’d brought to my left hand and reached out to press the doorbell.

While we waited for someone to answer the door, I looked up at the gigantic stone country house that my friends Cambrielle, Nash, and Carter Hastings lived in.

When I’d first come to the Hastings’ mansion in September after starting my senior year at Eden Falls Academy, I’d been in awe of the house. My grandparents, who were very well-to-do in Israel, had a pretty-good-sized house that I’d visited during a few summer vacations growing up, but it had nothing on this place with its gray stone exterior, dozens of windows with white shutters, and tall white columns that held up the portico above us.

Did I mention that Mr. and Mrs. Hastings were billionaires? And that their home and grounds could fit right in with Mr. Darcy’s estate inPride and Prejudice?

Yeah. They were crazy rich.

And even though hanging out with the top one percent in the country was becoming more normal since most of the kids at my private school came from money, it hadn’t always been that way for us. My mom’s career as a fashion designer hadn’t taken off until this past year.

The door opened, bringing my attention back to what was in front of me. In the entryway stood a woman with dark-brown hair and brown eyes: Mrs. Dawn Hastings.

I’d expected one of the many staff members to answer the door, since they usually answered it whenever Ava and I came by, but the Hastings must have given all their staff the holiday off.

“Welcome,” Mrs. Hastings said, stepping back and gesturing for my mom and me to come in. “I’m so glad you could make it.”

“Thanks,” Mom said, nodding her head slightly at the woman who had married her high school sweetheart. “We appreciate you inviting us.”

And if Mrs. Hastings felt any sort of threat at having her husband’s old girlfriend joining them for Thanksgiving dinner, it didn’t show. She just smiled warmly at us and said, “Any family of Brendon and Mack is our family, too.”

Family.

It was still so weird to have Brendon and Mack as part of what had always just been my mom, Ava, and me.

“If you’d like to hang your coat in the closet, it’s just right there.” Mrs. Hastings pointed to the closet door to our right.

“Thank you,” Mom said, already slipping out of the fitted wool coat she’d gotten on a recent trip to Paris. She hung her coat inside, and then I handed her the apple pie box so I could hang mine beside hers in the closet.

“Anyway, if you wanted to join the adults in the kitchen, we’re still waiting on the turkey,” Mrs. Hastings said to my mom. Then looking at me, she said, “And I think most of the kids are upstairs, if you want to go up and find them.”

“Sounds good,” I said.

I glanced back at my mom to make sure she was fine with me leaving her with the people she hadn’t been close to since high school.

“Go ahead and find your friends and sister,” Mom said with a look that told me she was going to be fine.

“Okay,” I said. The two women disappeared around the corner, my mom carrying the pie with her.

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