Page 1 of Faking the Rules

Chapter 1

There are moments that split your life into before and after—mine happened at eleven minutes past midnight on New Year's Eve, when I found my fiancé in bed with my cousin.

It wasn't just the betrayal that shattered me. It was the realization that the three years I'd spent with James had been built on quicksand. The future I'd meticulously planned—marriage after graduation, teaching positions at neighboring schools, the renovated Victorian in my hometown—disintegrated in an instant.

"It doesn't have to change anything, Ellie," he'd pleaded, drunk and desperate, clutching a sheet around his waist while my cousin slipped out the back door. My cousin’s name is Alexa and we weren’t even that close – but still. He couldn’t have picked someone I didn’t know? "It was just sex. A mistake."

Maybe for normal people, finding your fiancé balls-deep in your cousin could be filed under "mistakes to overcome," somewhere between forgetting an anniversary and leaving the cap off the toothpaste. But I've never been good at forgiveness. My father used to say I got that from my mother—the woman who walked out when I was seven and never looked back.

So instead of forgiveness, I chose escape. Transferred universities mid-junior year, leaving behind the ruins of my carefully constructed life for Westford University—a school known for three things: its elite literature program, its frigid winters, and its championship hockey team.

And that's how I ended up here, hiding in the corner of the university library's third floor on a Friday afternoon in February, silently cursing Professor Harmon and his sadistic group assignment system.

"Did you hear me, Gardner? I said I need your notes from Tuesday."

I look up from my laptop to find Declan Wolfe looming over my study carrel, one hand braced against the wall beside my head, the other extended palm-up in expectation. He's close enough that I can smell his cologne—something expensive and woodsy—and the faint scent of mint on his breath.

Declan Wolfe. Westford hockey god. Campus celebrity. The walking embodiment of every privilege I despise.

"And I need a winning lottery ticket and eight hours of uninterrupted sleep, but we don't always get what we want, do we?" I snap, turning back to my screen.

He doesn't move. If anything, he leans closer, his broad shoulders blocking out the fluorescent lights overhead, casting me in his shadow. That's what Declan Wolfe does—he takes up space. Commands attention. Drowns out everything around him until he's all you can see.

"I missed class," he says, voice low but firm. "Coach called an emergency practice. I need to catch up."

"Sounds like a you problem."

His jaw tightens, a muscle jumping beneath tanned skin. "Look, I get that you don't like me—"

"Don't flatter yourself, Wolfe." I close my laptop, fixing him with a level stare. "I don't think about you enough to form an opinion."

It's a lie. I've spent far too much of the past six weeks cataloging all the reasons Declan Wolfe represents everything wrong with higher education: the way professors fawn over him despite his sporadic attendance, the ease with which he navigates social spaces I find paralyzing, how he moves through the world with the entitled confidence of someone who's never had to fight for anything in his life.

And yes, the physical perfection that makes ignoring him an Olympic-level sport—all six-foot-three of hard muscle, dark hair that perpetually looks like someone's been running their fingers through it, and blue eyes so intense they should come with a warning label.

"Bullshit." He straightens, crossing his arms over his chest. The movement pulls his henley tight across shoulders built from years of competitive sports. "You've had me in your crosshairs since the first day of class."

That first day of our shared literature class. When Professor Harmon introduced me as a transfer student, and Declan had looked me over with an assessing gaze that made me feel simultaneously invisible and exposed, before turning to his friend and whispering something that made them both laugh.

I stand, gathering my things with deliberate slowness. At five-foot-nine, I'm tall for a woman, but Declan still towers over me, forcing me to tilt my head back to meet his gaze. "Contrary to what you might believe, Wolfe, not everything revolves around you. I'm here to graduate with honors and move on with my life, not waste energy on some hockey jock's ego."

He steps back, allowing me space to move—a courtesy that feels somehow more condescending than if he'd stood his ground. "You know, I've met a lot of uptight people in my time,but you..." His eyes track over me, a slow assessment that makes my skin heat despite myself. "You take it to a whole new level."

"And I've met a lot of entitled athletes, but you..." I sling my bag over my shoulder, mimicking his tone, "you're exactly what I expected."

His smirk is slow, calculated to infuriate. "And what's that, Gardner?"

"Someone who's never had to work for anything a day in his life."

The smirk vanishes, replaced by something darker, more dangerous. For a moment, I glimpse something behind the golden-boy facade—a flicker of genuine anger, maybe even hurt—before the mask slides back into place.

"You don't know the first thing about me or what I've worked for," he says, voice dropped to a low rumble that vibrates in my chest. "But since we're stuck together on this project for the next month, maybe you should stop making assumptions."

I hate that he's right. Professor Harmon's major assignment—a presentation on gender dynamics in post-war literature worth 40% of our final grade—has paired us together despite my very vocal protests.

"Fine," I say tightly. "You want my notes? Here." I pull a folder from my bag and thrust it at his chest. "I expect them back on Monday, unmarked and unspilled on. In other words, don’t get them near the keg. Or any other kind of fluids."

"Yes, ma'am." He gives me a mock salute. "See you Monday, Gardner."

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