Page 31 of Coffee Break with the Billionaire

People? Like… me, people?

Fenella glances up at the sky, but I look at her. At the length of her neck. At those cheekbones that sell things, like handbags.

I think other things sold the handbags, but since the rest of her is completely covered, I’ll say it’s the cheekbones.

“Look! A shooting star,” Fenella cries.

“A satellite,” I tell her without taking my eyes off her.

She does a little jump. “No—look.” She grabs my arm and hoists it up to force me to look where she’s pointing. I pull my gaze away from her pink cheeks, and yes, slightly blue-tinged lips, just in time to see the tail end of a falling star. “I’ve never seen one before.”

Her first falling star. Normally, that would be a gift for me, but all I can think about is that Fenella is cold.

And what I could do to warm her up.

“Make a wish,” Wyatt calls.

I know what I’m wishing for.

Fenella glances over at me, catching me in her violet gaze, and I wonder again how a person can have purple eyes.

But then I stop wondering because Fenella doesn’t drop her gaze. She looks like she wants—

She looks at my mouth and it’s as if she skims a finger along my lips.

I tell myself it’s my imagination.

Only it’s not.

Chapter eleven

Fenella

The next morning, thesun wakes me in my suite of rooms in the castle because I forgot to pull the curtains again. They’re heavy and long and a pain to close, so I’m up earlier than expected this morning.

Gunnar told me Camille stayed in the same room before they married, so I’m a little puffed that this is a room fit for a princess. But would Camille still be considered a princess if Odin abdicated his position in the line of succession?

These are things I don’t need to think about. Or do I have the bandwidth to consider because I wake up thinking of Silas?

He gave me his coat.

The thick lump lies on the end of my bed—it’s no Moose Knuckles, not even a Canada Goose. Some no-name brand that I would never deign to look at in the regular world, let alone wear.

But Silas gave it to me to wear because I was cold.

Maybe I wake up thinking about him because of the scent emanating from it. It definitely smells like coffee. I lie there for a few minutes until I push off the covers.

The floor is freezing under my bare feet. I need to remember to wear socks to bed, but I was warm last night when I returned to the castle. Overheated, maybe, since I wore the coat in the car, with the heat turned up full.

I pull on the coat in front of the mirror. It’s a non-descript grey-brown, hanging almost to my knees. It’s huge. Is this what I looked like last night? I zip the coat up and it’s all coat—all winter coat and no me. I flip up the hood; my hands have vanished and only my pink satin pyjama pants stick out the bottom.

It smells of coffee and Silas, pine—or cedar maybe. A tree smell. But there’s something else, something salty. The sea?

Salted caramel? Does Silas smell that sweet? And why should my stomach give a little lurch that I know what he smells like now?

Did I actually appear in public like this?

No, I wore a beanie. A toque, they call them here, which makes it worse. I have to push back the hood to find the brown knitted hat. It’s rough in my hands but once on my head—

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