Page 59 of The Billionaire's Cinderella

Huh.

Again, not a tragedy. But she’s usually home by now, and this morning she seemed as excited about tonight as I am.

Is she sick?

I’m not that far from her apartment, so I make a quick decision to stop by and make sure she’s okay. By some miracle, I find parking on her block, ditch the car and hurry up the steps of her brownstone to hit the buzzer, trying not to feel a tinge of resentment that I don’t already have a key.

“Who is it?” she asks.

“It’s me. You okay?”

The intercom carries her unpleasantly surprised silence loud and clear. She doesn’t have to say anything for me to hear the oh, shit, what do I do now? in her tone. And it hurts. Some primitive caveman corner of my brain wonders if she’s got another guy up there, but that’s not Ella. I may not know what the hell is going on right now, but I know that much.

“Ella. Can I come up?”

“I wasn’t expecting you but… Yeah. Sure.”

She buzzes me inside. I hurry up the staircase, my dread growing with each step. By the time I knock on her door, my imagination has supplied all sorts of disaster scenarios. She’s been diagnosed with something horrible. Someone died. The bakery burned to the ground. She decided she hates my guts. Yet none of that prepares me for the look on her face when the door swings open.

Her expression is wounded. Bleak. Resolute.

I wouldn’t dream of kissing her hello with her staring at me like that. And that’s before she turns away and walks to the other side of her living room as though she wants to put some space between us.

My spark of dread flares into a forest fire.

“What’s going on?” I ask, shutting the door behind me.

She takes a deep breath. I can literally see her shoring up her courage for this conversation.

“It’s not that big a deal,” she says. “I just needed some time to think. I was planning to call you in the morning.”

I want to believe her. Hell, I need to believe her. But something is seriously wrong here, and I know her too well by now to pretend it’s not.

“Bullshit.”

She stiffens, but that seems only fair. Maybe she doesn’t like being challenged, but I don’t like this feeling of waiting for an invisible anvil to drop on my head.

“I ran into Rebecca today when I was picking up my shoes.”

I wince inwardly.

Well, shit.

That can’t be good.

“And…?”

“And she was happy to mention some big ball that you haven’t invited me to. Also that you’re having lunch with her next week. I didn’t know about either of those things, so it was kind of a nasty shock to hear about them from a woman who’s probably jealous of my relationship with you and wouldn’t mind stirring up trouble. Oh, and she offered to sell and/or loan me her old gowns in case you do invite me to the ball. And she stopped by my cute little bakery to get some herbal tea because she’s watching her weight and would never dream of eating a pastry. So how was your day?”

Yep. Not good.

I open my mouth, struggling with which issue to tackle first.

“Sorry about that. Rebecca has a snobby streak. It’s one of the many reasons we’re no longer together.”

“Right,” she says. “You’re no longer together, so obviously you want to have lunch with her next week.”

I try to absorb that like a man. I had it coming.

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