He’d paid for dinner, even the tip. And it was an enormous amount of food, with appetizers, a couple of entrees and almond cookies. He’d even included a couple of Diet Cokes. It was all very thoughtful.
He was no self-entitled prick any longer, if he’d ever even been close.
I cleared off his desk and laid out my wonderful Christmas dinner. Most people would lament not having a home-cooked dinner on the holiday. But I knew my mother’s cooking, and I was much happier with Peking Delight’s offerings, non-traditional as they were.
About half an eggroll into my feast, my phone buzzed with a call from Montrose. Not just a call, but a FaceTime call. I contemplated how I looked for about a half second, until I realized it was more important to get the call before he hung up than run my fingers through my hair and put on lip gloss. Instead of answering on my phone, I slid my laptop over in front of me, careful to not drag it through crab rangoons and duck sauce, and took the call.
I wanted to see Montrose on a screen larger than my phone.
“Merry Christmas,” he said when his face appeared on my screen. It seemed like he was on a laptop too, given how much of the room behind him I was seeing. He looked like his normal self, and yet…so…damn sexy. Deep brown hair tousled and looking like he’d just gotten out of bed. Tired face with a few days of beard growth, but with those intense, intelligent grey eyes looking straight at me. Or at least at the image of me. He had his laptop tilted at an angle so I just saw his head and the upper part of the room behind him. Lovely, tasteful drapes and an ornate tray ceiling.
“Merry Christmas to you, too. Thank you for the dinner. You ordered way too much. But it’s fabulous.”
“You’re welcome. And I was thinking you could put the leftovers in the fridge in the corner for some other meal. There’s a microwave in the closet that you could pull out—I’ve never used it, I seldom have any leftovers when I order from there. Peking Delight has indeed been a delightful find in Schoolport.”
“We haven’t discovered them yet, but I’ll for sure be letting Jane and Lily know about them when they get back.”
“That would be Ms. Winters and Ms. Spaulding?”
“Yes,” I said, growing just a tiny tense speaking of Jane in front of him. I tried not to let it show on my face, by taking a sip of my soda.
“I knew you all sat together in class. I didn’t realize you were roommates.”
“Technically Lily and Jane are roommates, and they’re both my suitemates.”
He nodded and I waited, my breath still, to see if he’d ask more about Jane.
“Did I catch you right in the middle of eating?”
The angle of my laptop caught my full plate, so I just shrugged and said, “That’s okay. It will keep.”
“No, go ahead and eat while it’s still hot. I really just…”
“What?” I coaxed.
“Nothing. I should get going too.”
“Have you already done Christmas dinner?” I asked, then took a bite of my eggroll, as if to prove to him he wasn’t keeping me from my meal.
“Yeah, we got done about an hour ago. My parents went to friends of theirs for after dinner drinks. My sister and her boyfriend went to his parents’ place.”
I took another bite of eggroll and made a “mmm, goood” face while I chewed. “Not that anything would taste better right now—thanks, again—but what did your mom make for dinner?”
He laughed, and much as I loved hearing him laugh on the phone, it was so much better to be able to see him. To watch how his grin turned to a smile. How his strong throat moved and his eyes crinkled at the corners. “Dear God. Evelyn Montrose cook a holiday dinner?” He wagged his index finger back and forth. “No, no, dear,” he said, jaw clenched in a faux upper crust accent. “One does not cook for the holidays. One has it catered. So much better to be able to speak with your guest, you see.” He’d turned a little Thurston Howell III at the end, and for a second I thought he might call me Lovey.
“I see. Of course. WhatwasI thinking?”
His grin stayed, but the fakeness dropped away. “It was—what did they call it—a standing rib roast.”
“Sounds fancy. Was it good?”
“Of course it was good. Evelyn wouldn’t serve anything but the best.” There wasn’t bitterness in his voice, but I wondered if there had once been when describing his mother. Certainly Aidan inFollyhad secretly loathed the pretentiousness of his parents, even while enjoying all the perks of being well-off.
Had Montrose done so as well?
He’d said in numerous interviews that Aidan Colly was not Billy Montrose, but the outward similarities were numerous. Maybe he hadn’t even seen it himself.
Having read the book so many times, and now seeing a glimpse of Montrose himself… No. I couldn’t think like that. They were not the same.
