The Boyfriend Contract
Table of Contents
The Boyfriend Contract
The Kiss
List of Melanie Marks Books
The Boyfriend Contract
By Melanie Marks
Copyright 2017 © Melanie Marks
Cover Image © Yuri Arcurs | Dreamstime
All Rights Reserved.
Table of Contents
The Boyfriend Contract
The Kiss
List of Melanie Marks Books
Note: Melanie Marks’ newest books are:
The Boy Next Door; Hockey Guy and Tutor Girl; and Jane’s Air (All are available now)
Newest books by Melanie Marks:
The Boy Next Door
Hockey Guy and Tutor Girl
Jane’s Air
When You Noticed Me
Heartbreaker Hanson
The New Boy
Dearest (Hot) Enemy
(There are a LOT more books than just those)
For updates and full list check Melanie’s website: byMelanieMarks.com
(Check often as she’s always writing new books)
BOOKS by Melanie Marks
His Kiss
Slumber Party Wars
Fall For Me
The Boy Next Door
Hockey Guy and Tutor Girl
When You Noticed Me
Kissing The Bad Boy
Jane’s Air
Please Love Me Back
Even When I Sleep
Want To Hate You … Too Bad I Love You
Heartbreaker Hanson
Smokin’ Hot (Accidental) Kiss
The Tough Boy’s Tender Kiss
Dearest (Hot) Enemy
My Brother’s Best Friend
The New Boy
The Dating Deal
Newest book: The Boy Next Door
(Actually, there are a LOT more books than just those)
For updates and full list check Melanie’s website: byMelanieMarks.com
(Check often as she’s always writing new books)
***
UPDATE: Newest book:
The Boy Next Door
We grew up right next door to each other. He’d been my everything—first my best friend, then my boyfriend … then my total enemy. Unfortunately, my heart still longs for him, but sadly so does every other girls’ at our school. I should stay away from him, definitely; but once he starts inexplicably talking to me again, he makes it hard. In fact, he makes it impossible. And impossible for me to get together with the guy I’m pretty sure I’m meant to be with. He’s doing everything he can to keep us apart. What’s up with that???
(The Boy Next Door is available now)
The Boyfriend Contract
CHAPTER 1
I’m not going to think about it—Nate’s sad eyes as I broke up with him.
It was for the best.
It was.
It really was.
That’s all I’m thinking about as I float to the music, dancing on the stage during ballet class. Thing is though: at some point I’m going to have to stop dancing and face reality.
Not now though.
Not yet.
When class is over, I keep dancing anyway. I have my best friend put the music back on for me so I can dance alone on stage. I love this anyway—having the stage all to myself, dancing for absolutely no one out in the dark empty auditorium. As usual, it’s like therapy, soothing my mental angst.
Nate will get over me—fast. He will. He’s an adorable guy with an irresistible heart. I did him a favor. He’ll see that. He will.
As I’m getting lost in my hopeful thoughts, my best friend Dara flutters by me. Which is weird; and unexpected. Her sudden presence on the stage makes me jump. I had thought I was alone by now. Everyone else had left, Dara too—I’d thought. But nope, here she is, suddenly fluttering around the stage. Weirdly.
She leaps towards me, then pirouettes beside me and excitedly whispers in my ear, “There’s a guy watching you dance.”
My heart slams against my chest. “W—what?”
But Dara just smiles at me mischievously, her eyes sparkling as she mouths the words, “He’s hot!”
She does it as she gracefully floats away from me—backwards on her toes. She continues going, going, going until she’s gone, backstage.
!!!
I’m left alone, peering out into the dark auditorium, my heart pounding so hard I’m afraid it’s going to pounce right out of my chest.
A guy’s watching me? How freaky!!
I can’t actually see out into the shadowy audience seating though. It’s too dark. But all of the hairs on my arms are now standing on end and there is a chill running down my spine, though I’m kind of suspecting (or at least hoping) Dara was only kidding. She likes to tease me about boys. She says they fall over themselves to get to me—and that there will be another one at my feet to take Nate’s place in less than twenty-four hours. So this could just be her way of screwing with me … right?
Right??
Oh—yikes! My heart jumps to my throat, because suddenly I can make out a form lounging in the middle of the dark seating.
“Relax January,” the form says, still cast in darkness. (The form has a sexy male voice.) “I didn’t mean to scare you. I was just enjoying the show.”
Before he makes a move to rise, he lights up his phone and shines it on his face. Probably so I don’t freak out. Only I do. Because it’s like seeing a ghost—a very gorgeous ghost.
“Conrad,” I breathe out.
He smiles slightly. “I didn’t mean to give you a heart attack—I swear.” He bites his lip to hide his contrite-ish (sort of) (almost) grin. “Sorry,” he murmurs.
“You were spying on me in the dark?”
“Well, I figured you would run away if you knew I was here, I didn’t want to stop the glorious show, and I knew it would—the moment you saw me, you’d stop. Which you did … unfortunately.”
I try to get my mouth to work. And sound chill, though I’m anything but chill. “What are you doing here?”
He grins slightly, like his answer is hilarious. Which makes me know I’m not going to like it.
He pauses, then says, “I’ve been coming here a few days now to give you something of yours … but every time I come, I get lost in what I’m seeing—you dancing. And so, I decide every time, it wouldn’t be so bad to come back the next day to give it to you instead.” He raises his eyebrows, “Been happening a while now.”
Though I know I’m going to be sorry I asked, still I can’t help being curious. Big time.
Guardedly, I peek at him, then finally ask, “What do you have of mine?”
With a mischievous smirk, he murmurs, “Here you go.” Then he hands me a pair of my underwear.
I blink.
My underwear!!
I stare at them in confusion. And wonder. I mean, what the—?? I drone out, “Perv!”
He breathes out a laugh. “You’re the perv—you gave them to me.”
My jaw drops. I look around really quick to make sure no one heard that big fat lie. “I did not!” I hiss.
He chuckles. “You did. They were glued to my sweatshirt that you finally returned to me—which you had for years, by the way.”
“That’s because I thought I burned it,” I growl.
Quickly, I get back on track, “But ‘by the way’ I did not glue my underwear to your sweatshirt, delusional perv.”
His eyes twinkle. “You did, actually. It was static-clinged to the back of my sweatshirt. I didn’t notice until I got to a party and it was pointed out to me by a friend—that I had a pair of girl’s panties on my back. I was both embarrassed and turned-on at the same time,” he leans in towards me, “—confusing combina
tion.”
He grins, “—but I was only a little embarrassed—and a whole lot of the other.”
He goes on, since he’s enjoying this—making me blush and squirm. He says, “In my head, I was like: ‘Why thank you, January!—nice surprise.’ But I didn’t say it out loud, because I didn’t want this side of you to get out around the hockey guys, as you have the—apparently mistaken— reputation of a girl that wouldn’t give a guy her underwear.”
I squint at him—evilly, as I don’t need to confirm this, but I don’t exactly like him making fun of it either. (You can’t really win with the guy—not when he teases—he can go either way, and he does.) So, I keep my mouth shut, but mostly it’s because I’m too discombobulated from seeing him again to give any sort of fitting comeback. (Man, I wish he didn’t look so gooood.)
His eyes twinkle merrily as he watches me continue to go up in flames, but he bites his lip to hide his grin, since now he’s trying to rein in his teasing, for the moment. He says affectionately, “So, you want to get a cup of coffee and talk?”
I stuff my underwear into my backpack. “I thought I made it perfectly clear the other night that I don’t want to talk to you.”
He nods. “I thought so too, but then you gave me your underwear.”
I grunt. Loudly.
Of course it makes him smile. “Were you trying to hint something to me?—giving me your ‘lucky’ underwear?”
I groan, ’cause yeah, the underwear say “Lucky” on them. Face-palm. Of course he’s playfully insinuating it means my “get lucky” underwear. (It doesn’t!!!)
I mutter, “Hey, it’s a theme.”
His eyebrows go up.
Groan. “—I mean, a holiday theme. It has a shamrock on it. I’d bought it for St. Patrick’s Day. I also have a pair for Christmas. It says Ho Ho Ho—”
My face burns as his eyebrows go up even further.
Clear amusement twinkles in his gorgeous eyes. (Groan.)
I snap my mouth shut. “Wait, that doesn’t mean anything either.”
He rubs at his mouth to hide his huge smile. “Your cute weird rambling makes it seem as though you haven’t changed since I moved away—but your underwear make it sound as though you’ve changed a lot,” he raises his eyebrows leaning in confidential-like, “—and like you’ve gotten way over your kissing shyness.”
“I did!” I gush out, then snap my mouth shut. Grumpily I add, “But not as my underwear messages may imply.”
He smiles and his eyes go all soft. His voice too, “I missed you, January.”
CHAPTER 2
***THE PAST***
Back When I Was Twelve
The first time I met Conrad, I’d crawled through his window.
Don’t get the wrong impression of me. I mean, when I was twelve I didn’t normally crawl through boy’s windows, and I didn’t do it that day on a dare or anything like that either.
I climbed in his window to use his bathroom.
He was quite shocked to see me do that, I admit. But it’s not as strange as it sounds, I swear. See, I had been at the cemetery behind his house, visiting my grandma’s grave.
Anyway, when I crawled through the window of what used to be my best friend’s house—wham! My heart slammed against my chest, because amazed blue eyes were staring at me as I tumbled in.
Gorgeous blue eyes.
Blue eyes of a gorgeous boy.
Eek!
“Um,” I said as the boy continued to stare at me, looking amazed, like I didn’t just come through his window, but came from heaven.
“Um …” I said again, my heart pounding wild. Whoa, his stare! Yowza. It had me breathless and dizzy and needing to be hosed down.
“I didn’t know anyone lived here,” I gushed out when I could finally manage to get my mouth to say actual words and actually work, even if I couldn’t get my eyes to. I mean, they were fastened to the boy’s hypnotic stare and I Could. Not. Look. Away.
Once I was able to speak, I gushed on, “I mean, my best friend used to live here, but she moved away last week. Her name was Beth and I used to come to her house all the time after visiting my grandma’s grave. Her mom would make us root beer floats.”
Right after I exploded all of that information out (and probably would have kept exploding more—like how I noticed the window was open and I needed to use the bathroom super embarrassingly BAD) but just then a woman came into the room we were magically hypnotized in carrying a big box that said “Conrad’s Stuff.”
The woman looked perplexed as she blinked from me to her son, then back to me, then to her son again, then back to me, sort of looking as though she was wondering, How did this strange person get into my house without me seeing? But all she finally said was, “Oh, I didn’t know you had company, Conrad.”
The boy’s eyes finally dragged off me and went to the lady. “Mom, will you make us root beer floats?”
His request (and voice) made my heart soar.
***
I had an exquisite visit with Conrad that day—discussing video games and music and podcasts as we sipped on our root beer floats. He was fantastic! And the first boy I had ever been particularly “interested” in, but I had been thoroughly interested in him, and it was more than just that my best friend had just moved away and I was sad and lonely (though I was). When I got home though, I tried telling myself that’s all it was—missing Beth—that had me so longing and restless. But I rode my bike up and down Conrad’s street the rest of that summer hoping to see him again.
Alas, though I never did.
Then summer ended, and school started.
The first day of middle school my breath caught when I noticed him in the crowded school hallway. But he was always with the popular kids and didn’t notice me. Ever. In fact, he seemed to be couple-ish with the head cheerleader, Sabrina Maze. So, groan. My heart sank realizing my dreams and fantasies of us under a beautiful dreamy love-spell that day I crawled through his window was just that—a fantasy.
And I was an idiot.
By the end of the week, I had totally given up hope of even ever talking to Conrad again, let alone becoming special to him. I mean, hello—he hadn’t even noticed me the whole week. Sigh. Then after school one day, I was on the playground swing, just, well, sitting there.
“Why do you look so sad?”
I blinked up at the unexpected voice, then my heart skyrocketed. It was him!—Conrad.
I swallowed, then bit my lip. “I’m okay.”
He slid into the swing beside mine. “You don’t look okay.”
“Thanks.”
He smiled at that, then peeked into my eyes. “You look troubled,” he said.
I was troubled.
For a moment, as I stared into his beautiful kind eyes, I had serious negotiating going on in my head. Should I try to be sexy and mysterious?—or admit my troubles?
Finally, I decided to just go with the latter. I wasn’t up for trying to put on a show, and it wasn’t like he was going to be interested in me the way I wanted him to be anyway. He was friends with the super popular crowded. And Sabrina.
I sighed. “You know how I told you my best friend Beth moved away? Well, I’ve been having trouble making other friends without her. I mean, close friends, you know? But there was this one girl, Rene, that I thought was becoming like, a best friend—well, I thought she was. But then it turns out she was just using me. I mean, I guess her older brother liked me—and he was paying her to hang out with me, and invite me over to their house.” I wipe away a tear. “It turns out it wasn’t that she wanted me there, it was that he did—her creepy brother, Benny.”
I cringe at the memory of Benny trying to kiss me.
Conrad notices.
“That was a creepy thing,” Conrad says. “Want me to beat her up?” he offers matter-of-factly, like it’s the reasonable solution. Then he pauses and scratches his chin, “Oh wait. Can’t do that to a girl, sorry. Want me to beat him up—the yucky brother?”
; I sigh. “No, he’s older.”
Conrad shrugs, “I don’t mind. I like to fight—I’ll beat him up.”
I draw out a breath, “No, I don’t want you to.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Then you want me to teach you how to fight?—so you can beat up your fake friend?”
I mumble sadly, “No, I just want a new best friend.”
Conrad tilts his head. “I’ll be your best friend.”
My heart pounds. “You will?”
Thrilled by his words, and the exquisitely delightful thought (Conrad, my best friend!) I want to give him a contract, that he has to sign. But I settle for his nod—though I’d really rather have the contract.
Conrad smiles, like he’s pleased with this—us agreeing to be best friends—you know, since it’s kind of weird and everything … deciding on such a thing. Especially since we’ve only talked twice—though the conversation had been spectacular.
“You sure you don’t want me to beat up the guy, best friend?” Conrad asks.
“I really don’t. Besides you can’t,” I tell him. “When I told my mom, she got super mad and called his mom, and now he lives with his dad in another state.”
“Well … that’s good,” Conrad says.
“Yeah, but Rene has been telling everyone that she dumped me as a friend because I’d take massive dumps in her toilet.”
Conrad breathes out a laugh. “That’s cold.”
I grimace. “Yeah. And now she’s head of the flag team—which is a big deal to her. So, it’s like she gets everything she wants—to spread nasty rumors about me, and get the whole flag-team to think I’m smelly and clog toilets. The only thing she doesn’t get is the money her brother promised her to get tight with me.”
Conrad bites his lip. Sweetly, he had offered me part of his banana, which I declined, since no way can I eat. The whole situation has me sick (though Conrad’s unexpected/glorious promise to be my best friend has made me feel a LOT better) (Tons!) He glances thoughtfully at the banana now, then looks up at me with a mischievous gleam in his eyes. “Karma will get her,” he tells me reassuringly.