“Welsh. I’m Welsh.”
“That must be it.” His expression grows somber.
“Must be what?”
“Why I like you.”
“Like me? I assumed you just tolerated me.”
He blows a French raspberry sound and shakes his head, patting my shoulder as he walks up to the door. “You do make it difficult, my friend, but some of us know a fellow softie no matter how hard he seems from the outside.”
Stunned, I watch him enter the code and enter my building, then just manage to slip in behind him before the door slams shut.
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
Jules
I wake up with the kind of dull, thumping head pain that comes from hangovers or heartache.
Or, in this case, a combination of the two.
I don’t want to go. But I have to. Starting tomorrow, I’ll no longer have a place to stay or a job. And I don’t hang around when my time’s up. I just don’t. I can’t. If I do…
No. No, sticking around too long is a trap I’ll never fall into again.
Burrowing deeper into my pillow in search of more blessed sleep, I try to visualize Italy right now. Milan for New Years—San Sylvestro. It’ll be festive. So much fun.
So, so fun.
With my face screwed up tight from the effort not to cry any moreannoyingtears, I dig deeper into the pillow and then pull the thing out to stuff it over my head and cut out the daylight entirely. The second the pillow’s gone, I hear something.
What is that? Music? Please let it not be Colin blaring some angry, rhythmic crap downstairs. I can’t take it. I can’t take his bitterness when I’m feeling so—
Wait, is that George Michael? No. No way.
I sit up and cock my ear.
Oh my God, it is. And the song is “Last Christmas.” I only know it because Nana has always been a fan. Also, everyone I’ve ever met from the UK considers it to be a cornerstone of the Christmas canon, no matter their age, so I’ve heard it alotover the years.
Who’s playing that?
Someone else must be home. No way is it him. Oh, please tell me Enora’s back.
She’s got to be home early. Which isn’t a good sign for her relationship. Or maybe it is, given how awful I find her boyfriend. A break-up is the best possible scenario.
Relief runs through me at the idea that she’s here and I can spill everything that happened last night and she’ll laugh when I tell her what we did in the elevator and all the things we said. Well, not all of it. I won’t tell her about the personal things he shared. Those are for me. They’re mine.
Ours.
I drag my robe on over my silly reindeer PJs, slide into my flip-flops and race to the front door, still convinced that it’s her, except the moment I’m on the landing, I understand my error.
Of course it isn’t her. I’ve never heard music from her place. Just from his.
Le Grump’s.
Only he’s not Le Grump anymore. He’s Colin.
And Colin absolutely, positively does not listen to Christmas songs by eighties pop groups.Never. Not once in his life. I guarantee it.
