Page 57 of Roommate Wars
Elise’s handwriting was neat and elegant. I don’t know what I expected, but not something so pretty.
Dinner? More frozen food? Fast food? Didn’t matter; I was game.
I rushed through my morning routine and was at my bedroom desk by eight, making phone calls and emailing my assistant to book a helicopter to Napa for me and Thalia a week from today for an investor lunch. By the time I checked the time, it was only three in the afternoon. Fuck, this day was dragging.
Elise should be home around six, which meant I had several hours until I saw her. I decided to catch up with Max.
Jack: Have you heard from Lizzie? She was text-harassing me for two months straight, but I haven’t heard from her in a couple of weeks.
Max: Had lunch with her about a month ago. She traveled to the East Coast for work, but she’s back now.
I’d met Lizzie at the same time I met Max, probably because she’d been Max’s friend first. Lizzie came from the same high society Max did, but like Max, she wasn’t anything like the people in their world. Lizzie was open, inclusive, and warm, and extremely fun to be around.
I’d spent quite a bit of time around Max’s parents and their friends, but it wasn’t until I sold my first company at the ripe age of nineteen for a fortune that high society gave me a second glance. Suddenly, I had value. Suddenly, they wanted to do business with me. Suddenly, they wanted to introduce me to this person or that person in exchange for an early in on my next project. Max’s parents were decent people underneath it all, but the others… Most were fuckers.
I typed out a text to Lizzie.
Jack: Where are you? Where’s my daily dose of ridicule?
Almost immediately, I received a response.
Lizzie: Calm down. I’m dealing with client drama. I don’t have time to send you reels.
Lizzie’s harassment usually came in the form of funny animal reels she sent daily. One of a chicken chasing a dog or a dog stomping on a pig to get it to play. Now that I thought about it, this was probably her way of saying, “Come hang out.”
Jack: What happened to friends before work?
Lizzie: Was that ever a thing?
Jack: I just made it one.
Lizzie: (eye-roll emoji) Says the guy who’s running multiple companies and shows up to lunch in sweatpants—when he bothers to show up.
Jack: I’ve stepped it up. I wear jeans now.
Lizzie: Are you and Max in cahoots? He just texted me. I hear nothing from you knuckleheads for weeks, and suddenly everyone wants a piece of me.
I chuckled. Same old Lizzie.
Jack: Beer night?
Lizzie: Sure, I could use it.
We moved to a group text with Max and discussed dates while bickering about availability, because when Max and I were free, Lizzie wasn’t, and she liked to point out how difficult we were. We finally settled on a time and day, and the text thread went silent.
When I glanced at the time again, it was only half past three. I groaned, unable to focus.
Instead of hanging around the house pretending to work and waiting for Elise to get home, I changed into running shoes. I had a lot of pent-up energy that had begun this morning after waking fully aroused. Running up and down Russian Hill a few dozen times should help cool the jets.
ChapterTwenty-Four
Elise
I set a ridiculouslyexpensive cut of meat in the pan while talking to Soph on the phone, and it started to sizzle.
Was the temperature too hot?
I checked the stovetop, but according to the filet mignon directions on YouTube (the font of gourmet cooking), I was preparing it correctly.
