Page 22 of How to Blow It with a Billionaire

“Caspian. I don’t like having to ring my brother. Because I couldn’t find you. He told me it was none of my business.”

Wow. That was a seriously dick move on Caspian’s part.

Which was when I got it. I’d hurt her. Or, rather, I’d acted like she was irrelevant to me, and that had allowed her own stupidhead brother to hurt her. It was a realization that helped banish a lot of my own frustration. “I’m so sorry. Of course it was your business.”

“We’ve only hung out once. I don’t care where you go or what you do.”

“You know, I’m not going to leave, Ellery.” Now I’d figured out what was happening, it was easy to ignore what she was actually saying and try to address what she meant. Or, at least, what I thought was bothering her.

“That’s what Nathaniel said.”

Nathaniel. Again. It was all I could do to keep myself gruntled. “Yeah, well. I’m not him.” I seemed to be saying that a lot these days.

“He promised he’d always be there for me.” Ellery drove her boot even more viciously at the poor, defenseless, very expensive wall.

I sat down on the edge of the bed in the hope that it might encourage her to stop and sit down too. It didn’t. “You got on with him, then?”

“He was okay.”

From Ellery this was practically a declaration of undying devotion. And, God, when was I going to stop getting all freaked out over Nathaniel? Every time I heard his name, I got skewered by this spike of bad feels. Sort of general dislike and, well, I guess it was some relation of jealousy. This nasty sense of always following in his footsteps.

I fully intended to be a mature grown-up about it. Unfortunately, what came out of my mouth was: “Did he go to many raves with you?”

Ellery glanced up—her eyes as sharp and bright as her sudden grin. Apparently, in being sullen and pathetic, I’d said the right thing, somehow. “No.” She finally stopped beating up the apartment. Slinking back into the room, she flumped onto the floor, knees pulled up to her chin so she was a grumpy knot of boots and legs and elbows. “We did other stuff. It was…I dunno. Like having a proper brother. But Caspian fucked it up.”

I didn’t want to argue with Ellery. But at the same time, I wouldn’t have been much of a friend if I’d twiddled my thumbs while she said unreasonable shit. “You wanted your brother to stay with a guy who didn’t make him happy?”

“Nathaniel was good for him.”

“By what metric?” She glared at me and I knew I was pushing my luck. But I continued anyway, “Look, it’s really hard to understand relationships from the outside. And, besides, you’re being super inconsistent right now.”

“Super inconsistent?” she repeated, with a sarcastic little lilt.

“Well, either you hate Caspian, in which case you wouldn’t care whether he’s with someone good for him, or maybe you do care about him at least a little bit. And either Nathaniel was your friend, in which case Caspian should have been irrelevant, or…or he wasn’t.” Okay, that hadn’t gone quite to plan. “Shit, sorry, that sounds bad.”

She was tugging at the buckles on her boots, making them catch and clink. “He said it was too complicated. And painful. Hanging out with me when he wasn’t—oh whatever. Doesn’t matter. Caspian takes everything. He always has.”

I couldn’t keep arguing with her about people I didn’t know and a past that wasn’t mine. So I changed tack. Gave her something I did understand. And could guarantee. “He won’t take me.”

“Yeah right.”

“It’s true. Chicks before dicks.”

She gave me a swift, sardonic look from beneath the tangles of her hair. “He’s definitely that.”

“And I’m really sorry I went running off to Scotland without telling you. I was just messed up and confused. I promise I won’t do it again. At least, I won’t if you give me your phone number so I can communicate with you instead of waiting for you to randomly turn up.”

“Whatever.” But she tossed her iPhone at me.

I added my name to her address book and sent myself a text before passing her mobile back.

There was a slightly awkward silence.

She fiddled with her phone a while. It had a gorgeous mother of pearl case that glinted with its own soft rainbows when it caught the light. Not very Ellery. Or maybe very Ellery. It was hard to tell sometimes.

“So.” She glanced up, at last. “Want to shoot some people?”

I made a gurgling noise.

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