Page 102 of How to Blow It with a Billionaire

I didn’t deserve to be joked at. But I laughed and felt better. Accepting Caspian’s comfort because he’d offered it and I needed it.

Still had to deal with the damn party though. In the end, I googled the closest branch of Moss Bros and forked out fifty quid to hire a tux and all the fixings. Of course, everyone else was probably going to be in bespoke designer shit, but at least I was in the vicinity of appropriate. I didn’t have a mask either, but anything in my budget wasn’t going to work for an event like that.

Basically I’d be Kaylee in that episode of Firefly where she goes to a party in the best pink dress in the ’verse. But everyone is all sneery because it’s off the rack instead of custom made by poor people.

Then, as I was sloping moodily home past the Mac concession on the ground floor of Debenham’s, I had a eureka moment. I didn’t need to buy a mask at all—I could use makeup. That way it could be as extravagant and unique as I wanted, and people would go “oh, isn’t he arty” rather than “oh, isn’t he cheap.” I stocked up and raced back to the flat.

It took a bit of practice, some diligent eyebrow shaping, and most of what was left of my afternoon but I was pleased with how it turned out. I’d managed to give myself butterfly wings: dark pink at the inside corners of my eyes, blending into blue and yellow and pearly green as the design unfurled across my cheeks and brow. The colors seemed especially vivid against the austerity of my hired formalwear and I felt, honestly, a little bit…magical.

Needless to say, I did what anyone would have done under the circumstances and I selfied the living fuck out of myself.

And was therefore so late that Caspian had to come up and get me.

“Did you change your mind?” he asked, stepping softly in the living area. “Are you all right?”

I yelped, nearly dropping my phone. “No, I mean yes, I mean I haven’t changed my mind sorry.”

“What are you doing?”

As it happened, what I was doing was working a MySpace angle but there was no way I was admitting that. I lowered my arm sheepishly. “Just, um, trying to get a signal.”

“Clearly.” He sounded very dry. “I sent you three texts.”

“God. Sorry.” This was the problem with having two phones—it was double the opportunity to miss things. Closing Instagram down, I turned hastily and—

Wow. Oh wow. Caspian.

He was immaculate in full black tie. Effortless, too, nothing imprecise or overdone: just fiercely fine tailoring and the subtle sheen of matte silk from the reverse and buttons of his classic, one-button peak lapel jacket. His mask was a single strip of black satin that I could already tell would make everyone else look too ornate and tacky by comparison. And it seemed so completely miraculous right then that this man, so steeped in wealth and power, who could have anything in the world he wanted…wanted me.

My heart twisted itself into a knot so tight and tender I could hardly breathe.

Then he crossed the room and drew me into his arms. Turned my face up to his and gazed at me in a manner I’m sure Jane Austen would have described as ardent. “You’re enchanting,” he said. “I want to kiss you, but I’m afraid I’ll smudge it.”

“Err.” I was good to take the risk but words weren’t working so well. Despite the fact that a couple of minutes ago I’d been fearlessly broadcasting how hot I looked to the whole internet, his compliment had flustered me. And was probably undoing all my hard work because I hadn’t factored being bright red into my mask design.

“This will have to suffice for now.” He caught my hand, drew it to his lips, and kissed my knuckles. All soft and gallant and unexpectedly sweet.

I just about swooned. “How about we ditch the party?”

“I don’t think Eleanor would ever forgive you.”

It was the only time he’d ever spoken of her in a way that suggested he had any understanding of what she might care about. Or interest in it. And he was right too—as much as I’d have liked to unwrap and eat Caspian like a Godiva Carre, it would have been a shitty thing to prioritize on Ellery’s birthday. “I don’t think she’d be massively happy if you didn’t show up either.”

“On the contrary, I think she’d be quite pleased.”

Had he even been in the same argument I’d witnessed yesterday? I made a whingey noise, wanting to protest, but also not wanting to start another fight with him about something we’d never agree on.

“And you’re sure about tonight?” The question was casual enough, but his eyes were so intent on mine he might as well have been saying are you sure about me?

“Yes. Definitely.”

Holding my hand tight to his chest, Caspian bestowed another of his fleeting kisses upon my nose, and then let me go. “Then come on. Fashionably late is one thing. Late is quite another.”

We traveled mostly in silence. The car took us right into the heart of Kensington—past on-site security and into a leafy boulevard literally behind Kensington Palace itself. A street of private mansions, delicately illuminated by Narnia lampposts and patrolled by armed guards.

It was hard to process really…the existence of a place like this, right in the middle of England’s capital, where the land values were unthinkable. Even One Hyde Park, with all its aggressive opulence, had been obliged to build upward. Not these languorous, three-story homes, with their wings and gardens and stable blocks. There was a quietness of conviction here, an unshakeable expectation of wealth and its advantages that was frankly kind of scary. How did you get the balls to own a place like this? To believe you deserved it?

The houses themselves, though, were just a little bit incongruous. The ornate stucco frontages, all pillars and porticos and wedding cake molding struck me as something I’d have expected to find in a Henry James novel. Status symbols of people called Vanderbilt. Not English old money.

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