No Time for Romance, Only Top Scores

Rich families sign stand-in contracts, paying a woman by the month to take the place of a first love who is gone. Claire Winslow signs one with Jasper Stone. She is preparing for the graduate entrance exam, her grandmother's treatment has to be paid for, and the study material she needs is beyond her; the contract brings a hundred thousand a month and access to tutors and exam resources she could not get on her own. In the house she refuses to imitate the other woman and spends the time on her books instead, working problem sets and keeping a notebook of the questions she gets wrong. At the family's dinners she has vocabulary lists with her and reads the political news. Jasper decides she has feelings for him. His parents put questions to her about her schooling and where she comes from, and the first love comes back from abroad. A fall on the stairs is arranged to look like Claire's doing, and she answers it with the building's camera footage and what she knows of the law. She takes a full score at a national competition, which brings her to the notice of a master's supervisor at the school she is applying to. When the contract runs out she turns down Jasper's offer to keep her on, moves back into the dormitory with her materials, and studies with her roommates. The family needs the supervisor's cooperation and comes after her again, and she puts their threats out on a livestream. In the first round of the exam she scores 465 and places first.