Page 24 of How to Blow It with a Billionaire

No reply.

Wow. In less than ten minutes, I’d achieved an almost one hundred percent fun to awkward conversation rate. Go me.

Ellery swung her boots off the sofa and stood up.

“I’m going now.”

A glance out the nearest window confirmed it was late and dark. And maybe cold. “You can crash here if you like. I promise not to keep saying stupid things.”

“Got somewhere to be.”

That could have meant anything from shooting up in the toilets of a twenty-four-hour McDonalds or floating down the Thames in a bag. Although probably she was just on her way to some kind of soul-crushingly trendy party.

Anyway, I wasn’t her keeper.

She had more than enough of those already.

“You can come if you like?” she offered.

Admittedly, One Hyde Park wasn’t the most homey of places. But at least I was allowed to hang out there in my underpants. “Once I’ve engaged pajama mode I’m kind of locked in.”

“I get it. Pajamas are dangerously cozy. Fuck pajamas.”

And with that, she was gone.

Since I’d fallen into that weird space where it was too early to go to bed and too late to do anything useful—like attempt to have a career—I decided to fix my toes. Marshalling my bottles of nail polish, I got rid of the remains of the Sally Bowles experiment, and repainted in alternating sparkly purple and silver. While I was glad Caspian couldn’t see me, hunched unattractively over my own feet like something from a National Geographic pull-out, I was hoping he’d appreciate the end result. After all, he’d told me in Kinlochbervie that he found my taste in self-decoration distracting. Which now I thought about it, didn’t sound all that flattering. But the way he’d said it…oh God the way he’d said it. Insta-melt.

Proud of my handiwork, but also conscious that Caspian might not be up for a barrage of needy selfies, I sent it to Nik.

Nothing.

Boo.

And here I thought Nik could always be depended upon to find me cute on demand. What time was it in Boston anyway? Eight? Nine? A quick social media stalk soon revealed he was in the on-campus pub with some of his MIT friends. They looked like they were having fun, huddled round a rickety table and drinking what was probably craft beer. It gave me a weird pang for my barely over university days, though it was mainly the sense of community I missed, not so much the whole being expected to get a degree in English thing.

At that moment my phone buzzed. It was Nik:

Sry, crap reception. Adorbs.

I sent him back a kissy face, feeling mildly bad for having interrupted his evening with my feet, and then went to bed. Lounged around on the edge of sleep, wanking idly, and thinking about Caspian. About Friday.

Which was foreverrrrrr away.

Though, actually, while I generally preferred my gratification undelayed, it wasn’t too bad—waiting for Caspian like this. Knowing I meant something to him and that he wanted to be with me as much as I wanted to be with him. There was no more nervy uncertainty, just a warm flutter of anticipation. Maybe we’d be able to spend the whole weekend together. A prospect so sweet it made my newly bright toes curl as I came.

Chapter 7

I spent the next day glued to my email. Just in case Milieu were all “we loved your article so much we got in touch with you straight away even though that literally never happens.”

It hadn’t happened.

So I dedicated myself to being moderately productive, which mainly involved restocking my food supplies and writing, and only fretting about Milieu/daydreaming about Caspian a little bit. Nik woke up hungover in the middle of my afternoon and we long-distance buddy-watched an episode of Supergirl, me curled on the sofa, Nik apparently still in bed and not consistently conscious.

I was back in the study and back at work—go me—when Ellery said, “Come on, we’re leaving.”

“Oh my God.” I finished having a minor heart attack. “Are you ever going to like knock or warn me before turning up?”

She thought about it for a moment. “No.”

---