Chapter 19 #2
I roll my eyes, disgusted by my own insecurities.
Ring, ring… ring, ring…. My phone vibrates on the side table and with a pounding heart I scramble to answer it.
Mr. Doe
He’s calling me….
He wants to talk.
“Hello.”
“Hi, Doe.”
My heart pounds at the mere sound of his voice, husky and soft.
“Did I wake you?”
“No.” I sigh, I was hoping you’d call.
I scrunch up my face, play it cool.
“You went straight home,” he says; his voice is different than it was earlier, soft, and cajoling.
“I did.”
“Thank you.”
I frown, he’s thanking me for doing as he asked.
“How did the event go?”
“It was good.” He seems tired…or quiet…. Off.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“Yeah.” He sighs. “A bit of a rough end to the night.”
“What happened?”
“I snuck out of there and went back to my yacht and….” His voice trails off.
“Go on.” I bite my lip as I listen.
“Hermione turned up and was causing a scene on the marina when she wasn’t permitted to board.”
“Oh.”
“It’s a wonder you didn’t hear her from Paris.”
“You do crazy things when you’re heartbroken.” I try to make him feel better. “Did you go and talk to her?”
“I did.”
I close my eyes, unsure if I want to hear what he’s going to say next. “How did that go?”
“Not great.”
We stay silent on the line, waiting for the other to say something.
“Eventually…I left.” He sighs.
“You left her on the yacht?”
“I had no choice; she was completely losing it.”
“Is she okay?”
“She had her staff with her, and mine were there too. I knew that if I was removed from the situation she would calm down and listen to them. She will be safely back at her place now.”
“Where are you now?”
“I’m at a friend’s apartment.”
“Are you okay?”
“It’s not a nice feeling to break a heart.”
“I know.”
“Anyway….” He tries to change the subject. “How was your day?”
“Not as dramatic as yours.”
Silence….
“I didn’t mean to scream at you.”
I smile. “Yeah you did.”
“Maybe a little,” he replies. “I just saw red when….”
“When what?”
“When I think of you with someone else.”
“Why?”
“You know why.”
I bite my bottom lip with a smile, more than he knows…I do know why.
“I just have a lot on my mind right now,” he continues.
“Okay.”
“Just….” He cuts himself off.
“Just what?”
“Can you just not….”
I wait for him to elaborate but he stays silent.
“What do you want from me, Edward?”
“I don’t want you to be with anyone else.”
Why?
Play along.
“I’m not interested in anyone, Edward. Spending time with another man is the very last thing on my mind.”
He stays silent on the other end of the phone and honestly, what is going on with him? Is this his way of telling me that we have something, or?
He’s so confusing.
“Philippe said you told him that you were going to end him.” I can tell that he’s smiling.
“Oh, hell.” I smile, embarrassed. “I don’t even know what I said, I was too infuriated to think straight.”
“He was impressed.”
I giggle. “Where are you?”
“Lying on the couch, I called you as soon as I got in.”
I picture the enigmatic Mr. Prescott lying on a couch in his black dinner suit calling me and I get that giddy excited feeling that only he can deliver.
“I should let you go…. It’s late,” he whispers.
I hold on the line, not wanting to get off the phone.
“Good night, Doe.”
“Good night, Edward. Sweet dreams.”
“With you involved, they always are.”
Oh….
The line goes dead and I flop back on the bed and smile up at the ceiling.
In his own fucked-up way, I think he just asked me to wait for him.
EDWARD
“More caviar, sir?”
“Thank you.”
The waiter places another tray of caviar down onto the table.
“What I want to know is what was in those cocktails last night.” Sinclair sighs, he’s lying on a deck chair beside the table, wearing sunglasses and a good dose of green at the gills.
“Alcohol,” I reply as I cut my bread. “You should stop drinking, you can’t handle it.”
“That’s it!” a woman screams from a yacht a few down from the one we are on. “I’m leaving.”
We all turn. “Is that coming from….”
“Good. Because if you don’t, I fucking will.” A male voice echoes through the marina.
“Uh-oh.” Theo smirks. “Trouble in paradise.”
“You’re nothing without me,” she screams.
“Ha,” he bellows. “You’re nothing without your fucking handbags.”
“What a dumb comeback.” Theodore screws up his face. “Seriously…handbags, is that the best he’s got?”
“Fuck you!” she cries.
“I already did that,” he yells back.
We all laugh at his stupid reply.
“Abysmal.” Nicholas raises an eyebrow as we all listen in.
“I think I was drugged.” Sinclair throws the back of his arm over his eyes. “Just the smell of that food makes me sick.”
“Only you could be sick from lobster and caviar.”
“Oh god, don’t say it, I’m gagging.”
Theo and Nicholas roll their eyes at his dramatics and I chuckle. “Drink more water.”
“It’s not working,” he moans.
“Elsie, can you find this idiot some Tylenol or something?” Theo asks. “Put us all out of this misery.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Just throw him overboard, Elsie,” I say as I peel a shrimp.
Elsie smiles as she disappears.
We are on the Serene, having lunch on Theo’s yacht.
More screaming, more slamming, more dramatics echo over the marina. “That’s it, I am leaving. For real this time.”
“Promises. Promises,” Alexander yells back. “Hurry up. I’m waiting to go out.”
We all chuckle again.
“He’s such a prick.” Nicholas shakes his head as he peels a shrimp.
“Margarite looked good last night, Sinclair.” Theo smirks as he crunches on some ice.
“Stop.” He holds up his hand in a stop signal. “I honestly don’t know how it happens.”
“I think it goes something like, Sinclair, do you want to come back to my place?”
“And you say…. Yes.” Theo widens his eyes. “Shocking, isn’t it?”
“Christ Almighty, that was the last time. I swear,” he huffs.
“Until next time.” I smile as I sip my drink.
“Did you know Hermione was coming last night?” Theo asks me.
“No, and don’t remind me. The night ended on a total nightmare.”
“What happened?”
“I left without saying goodbye, trying to avoid a scene. Twenty minutes later she turned up at the marina screaming and crying and….”
The boys stop eating as they listen.
“What happened?”
“I brought her inside and….” I throw up my hands. “Ended it once and for all and then she was completely losing it and she wouldn’t leave and the situation was spiraling. I ended up leaving her with the staff on my yacht and went and slept elsewhere.”
“Fuck.” Theo frowns. “What’s Volter going to say?”
“He already warned me earlier in the night that if I hurt her that there would be hell to pay.”
“You idiot,” Sinclair says with his eyes closed. “I told you not to get mixed up with her. He’ll fucking kill you.”
“Not if I kill him first,” I mutter, annoyed.
“I thought you two were good. Out of nowhere you just break up with her. What happened?”
I shrug. “Complicated.”
“You met someone?” Theo frowns.
“Kind of. Maybe.” I shrug. “I don’t fucking know.”
“Who is she?”
“None of your business.”
“When do we meet her?”
“Probably never.”
“Why not?”
“Because she has no interest in money.” I shrug. “And we all know what happens if they don’t want money.”
“They want time.” Theo sighs.
“Something that we don’t have a lot of.”
“You idiot.” Sinclair sighs. “You break up with a princess for a no-name who hates money and wants time. How is this ever going to fucking work?”
“It won’t.” I shrug. “I already know that.” I glance over at my green friend. “Someone hurry up and throw him overboard.”
“Where is she from?”
“Not far.”
“So have you gone out with her…. Or?”
“What’s with the twenty questions?” I chew my food.
“This is just unlike you to be secretive.”
“Because I don’t want to talk about it. Next subject.”
ALORA
Ring, ring…. Ring, ring.
Mr. Doe.
“Oh my god, he’s calling me.” I scramble to answer my phone. “Hello.”
“Good evening, Miss Sorenson,” his voice purrs.
The sound of his deep, velvety voice gives me butterflies. “Hi.” I swoon.
You already said that.
I screw up my face, for once in your life just act cool.
“I called to see if you got home from Paris safely.”
“I did. Thank you.” I glance at the clock, 8:12 p.m. “Where are you?”
“In bed.”
I get a vision of him all naked and sleepy, wrapped up in blankets.
“Already?”
“I had hardly any sleep last night, I’m exhausted.”
Oh…I wonder did he see Hermione again after he called me, or…?
“Can you do something for me?” he asks.
I smile as excitement runs through me, is he going to ask me out on a date? “Sure.”
“Check your handbag.”
“What?” I frown, not at all what I expected the favor to be. My excitement dissipates.
“I want you to check your handbag.”
“For what?”
“I think Pascal has planted a tracker in your purse.”
“What?” I screw up my face. “No he hasn’t.”
“How did he know where you were last night?”
“It was a coincidence.”
“No. It wasn’t. In the entire city of Paris, he ran into you yesterday and then stayed at the exact same hotel and then crashed you at dinner last night.”
Hmm, come to think of it, that is a little weird.
“Humor me,” he says. “Put me on FaceTime and let’s go through your purse.”
I have a green mask on my face and a treatment in my hair, I look like a greasy alien.
“No, I will just look while I talk to you.” I put my phone on speaker and get up and retrieve my purse.
“I’m telling you, there is no tracker in my purse.
He’s not like that.” I begin to look through it. “What am I even looking for?”
“An AirTag or something that isn’t yours.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, something that’s different. Not yours.”
“Nope.” I dig to the bottom. “Nothing here.”
“Take the items out one by one and then feel in the lining.”
I roll my eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Just. Do. It.”
I begin to take things out one by one.
So much for calling to romance me.
“What’s in there,” he asks.
“A purse. Makeup bag. Lipstick. Hairbrush.” I keep taking things out and I pull out a pen. It’s black with the name of a restaurant on it. “A pen.” I stare at it for a moment. “I’ve never been to this restaurant.”
“What is it?”
“It’s a pen, but I don’t know where it came from.”
“Unscrew it.”
“What?”
“Unscrew the fucking pen.”
“Don’t swear at me.” I begin to get annoyed. “It’s 8 on a Sunday night and I feel like I’m in the principal’s office.”
He exhales as if I’m annoying him too. “Just do it.”
I unscrew the pen and it pops apart. “It’s popped apart.”
“And?”
I go through all the bits, the usual ink cartridge and spring then there’s a little black cylinder attached to the barrel of ink, I hold it up and look at it suspiciously. “That’s weird.”
“What?”
“Theres a black cylinder attached to the barrel of ink.”
“That’s it.”
“What?” My eyes widen.
“Philippe will be over to collect it soon.”
“Oh.”
Why don’t you come and get it?
“I….”
Don’t ask him to come over, play it cool.
“Okay.”
“He’s leaving now.”
“My address is—”
“I know your address.” He cuts me off.
“So you’re a stalker too?”
“Only in my spare time,” he replies, and I can tell he’s smiling.
“I’ll wait for Philippe.”
“Good night, Doe.”
Wait, that’s it?
“Umm….” I think for a moment, waiting for him to say something more.
He doesn’t.
“Good night, Edward.” The phone clicks as he hangs up. I sit for a moment and stare at my phone, that was the weirdest phone call of all time. He calls me to talk to me, but then he doesn’t even talk to me.
How odd.
EDWARD
The sun is just going down, my elbow is resting on the car door as I watch the building. People are leaving and the street is winding down for the day.
“Come the fuck on, you idiot.” I sigh. “I don’t have all day.”
He appears through the rotating glass door and my phone beeps with a text from the car behind.
Philippe
Go time
I get out and cross the street, I follow him around the corner and up to his car in the parking lot, my men trail behind at a safe distance.
He turns and sees me and his eyes widen. “Prescott. What are you doing here?”
“Teaching you a lesson.” I put my hand around his throat and slam him up against his car. “You go near Alora again and I will fucking kill you.”