She Was Never Just the Billionaire’s Wife (Natasha and Chase) novel Chapter 129

(Julian)

The text comes through at nine fifteen.

I’m at the bar at the Beverly Wilshire. Drinking alone. Don't tell anyone.

I stare at my phone for a full ten seconds.

Three weeks of charm offensive.

Orchids.

A handwritten card after the gala.

Several coffees dropped at the Stein M&A reception desk with a note that said only thinking of you.

A text every other day that asked nothing, demanded nothing, and made it clear that if she ever wanted company that did not have an agenda, the offer stood.

She has finally taken me up on it.

Persistence always pays off.

I type back, Be there in twenty.

I make it in fifteen.

She’s in a back booth in a red silk blouse that drapes her frame in a way that would make angels weep.

Her hair is down, which is not how she wears it to the office.

She honestly is the most breathtakingly beautiful woman I’ve ever met.

There’s a half-empty whisky in front of her and a full one beside it, which tells me everything about the pace.

I slide in across from her.

"Natasha."

"Julian."

She does not look surprised.

She does not really look at me at all.

"You came."

"You texted."

"I did, didn't I?"

She picks up the second glass.

"That was probably stupid."

"Probably."

I order myself a soda water with lime.

The waiter, who’s known me for years, doesn’t blink at my out of character order.

I want to be the only sober person in this booth tonight.

Natasha is extremely chatty when she’s drunk.

She doesn’t tell me anything specific, which is a small disappointment, but she tells me plenty.

Someone altered her hospital records and she suspects Chase.

Mason has a new girlfriend who irritates her.

Lily’s new doctor is apparently both great and a bastard.

Sonia was in a luggage shop on Rodeo this afternoon buying the kind of suitcase a woman buys when she’s not coming back.

Those last two are both very interesting and I file them away for later investigation.

I order her another drink.

The waiter, unprompted, does it a second time.

I tip him for it later.

By eleven her sentences have started to come apart.

"I can't go home like this," she says, more to the table than to me.

"Liam's there. Mom and Dad. Can't have my dad seeing me drunk at midnight, Julian, he's already worried, he's been worried for months, I can't-"

"Then don't go home."

She looks up.

“I’m not going home with you!”

The horror in her tone is slightly hurtful.

"Get a room here," I say.

"Sleep it off. Go home in the morning when you've put yourself back together. Nobody has to see anything."

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