Fated To My Billionaire Call Boy novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Rehearsal

Wynn swears she sent no one, Hallie goes ahead anyway, and Friday's rehearsal turns into a kiss that makes the rate feel too low.

I wrote back to Lawson with my thumbs shaking and sent it before I could change my mind.

"A friend. See you Saturday."

Then I turned my phone off and walked three blocks to Wynn's bakery in yesterday's dress.

Wynn Murnane was elbow-deep in croissant dough when I came through the back door.

She looked at me once and dropped the rolling pin.

"You went home with someone," she said. "You're wearing the dress. You have the face."

"I did not go home with someone."

"You did something."

"I hired someone."

She stared at me.

"Hallie."

"You sent me the text," I said. "The companion at the Aldine bar."

"I sat down at a table. A man came in wearing a red pocket square, and I handed him an envelope."

I held out my phone.

Wynn wiped her hands on her apron and read the screen.

Her face changed.

"Hallie, I was joking at dinner. I wouldn't send a stranger to a hotel bar and let you walk in alone. I didn't send this."

I took the phone back.

"It says it's from you."

"Then somebody wrote my name on it."

We looked at each other over the dough.

"Who knew you'd be at the Aldine?" she said.

"Nobody. I didn't know until I went."

Wynn chewed her lip.

"What was he like?"

"Ephraim Stanwick," I said. "From Statistics 201."

Her mouth fell open.

"Front row Ephraim? The one who answered every question and ate the same sandwich?"

"He works as a companion now, I guess. I think things got hard for him."

"Oh, Hal." She wasn't laughing. "That is the saddest, sexiest thing I have ever heard. Did he do the job?"

"He put a blanket over me and slept on my couch."

Wynn put both hands on her chest.

"I'm going to cry into the butter. Are you going to see him again?"

"He's coming tonight to rehearse. For the party."

"Rehearse what?"

"How to look like we like each other."

Wynn gave me the look she gives a cake that has not risen.

"Honey," she said. "You are going to have a very difficult evening."

He arrived at six on the dot.

I'd cleaned the flat as well as a flat with a bathtub in the kitchen can be cleaned.

He wore a gray suit that was a little too wide at the shoulders and a plain tie.

He had a small paper bag from the bakery on the corner.

"Pastries," he said. "I didn't know what you like."

"Everything," I said.

"I figured."

I laughed, and he looked at me as if he'd been shown a trick he had waited years to see.

We sat at the drawing desk, because there was nowhere else to sit.

I told him the rules.

"We got together last month. A friend introduced us. Don't say Statistics 201, because Lawson will ask questions."

"All right."

"Don't say where you work."

"I won't."

"Lawson touches the small of the back when he wants to make someone feel owned. Don't mimic that."

Something went dark in Ephraim's eyes.

"Does he touch you like that?"

"He did."

"If he ever does it again," Ephraim said quietly, "you tell me, and I'll be standing between you before you finish the sentence."

The room was very still.

"That wasn't in the rate," I said.

"No," he said. "That's extra."

I got up to put the kettle on, because my hands needed a job.

He followed me into the kitchen and stopped a step away.

"How old are you now?" I asked, to say something.

"Thirty," he said. "You're twenty-nine."

"You remember."

"I remember a lot of things."

The kettle began to tick.

I turned around.

"It's tomorrow," I said.

He went still.

"You told me last night to ask again if I still wanted it," I said.

"I still want it. I've had one coffee and a croissant."

"Kiss me, Ephraim."

For a second he didn't move at all.

Then he took my face in both hands, slowly, and he lowered his mouth to mine.

It was not careful.

It was a long, deep, hungry kiss, and I heard myself make a sound I hadn't made in years.

My hands went into his hair.

He walked me back until the counter was behind me and lifted me onto it.

His mouth moved to my jaw and the side of my throat.

"Hallie," he said against my skin, in a voice scraped raw.

"Again," I said.

He kissed me again, and the kettle screamed, and neither of us moved.

When he finally pulled back we were both breathing.

I touched my mouth.

"That," I said, "was worth more than six thousand dollars."

He laughed into my neck.

"Wait," I said, tipping my head back. "Say it the way you'll say it to Lawson."

"Ephraim Stanwick."

I smiled. "Like the freight billionaire in the magazines. Imagine."

His hands tightened very slightly on my waist.

"Same name," he said. "Less money."

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