Lauren Weisberger 3-Book Collection: Everyone Worth Knowing, Chasing Harry Winston, Last Night at Chateau Marmont. Lauren Weisberger
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we’ll be using your, uh, your …’
‘Security?’ he provided helpfully, somehow sensing my discomfort at using the word bouncers.
‘Yes, exactly, although I’ll have to check on that.’
‘Sounds good to me. As of now, only Lot 61 is free that night, but Amy may want to consider rearranging the schedule. Who will be hosting?’
‘Oh, uh, a guy named Philip Weston. He, uh, he’s—’
‘I know who he is. Your boyfriend, right? I’ve seen you guys together a lot lately. Yeah, I’m sure Amy will be thrilled to hear that, so I wouldn’t worry about Bungalow being free that night.’
‘No, no, he’s certainly not my boyfriend,’ I said as quickly as possible. ‘It’s not like that at all. Actually, he’s just this weird guy I sort of know who—’
‘None of my business, that’s for sure. Guy always seemed like kind of an asshole to me, but what do I know, right?’ Was that bitterness I detected? Or wanted to detect?
‘Yes, I suppose it’s not any of your business, is it?’ I said with such prissiness that he actually physically recoiled.
We stared at each other briefly before he looked away.
He took another sip of his coffee and began to gather his stuff. ‘Well, then, this has been fun. I’ll check with Amy and get back to you about the venue. Assume it’s fine. Like I said, who wouldn’t jump at the chance to have Mr British Royalty himself throw a party, right? He’s going to have to start tanning now if he has any hope of being dark enough in time.’
‘Thanks for your concern, I’ll be sure to pass that along. In the meantime, you enjoy making your little puff pastries. I’ll work out the details of the event on my own or directly with Amy, since as much as I enjoy being verbally attacked by you, I don’t really have the time right now.’ I stood up with as much steadiness as I could manage and began to lurch toward the door, already wondering how things had managed to go so terribly wrong in so little time.
‘Bette!’ he called just as I was about to pull open the door. He’s so sorry. He just had a really long day and is under a lot of stress lately and hasn’t been getting enough sleep and he didn’t mean to take it out on me. Either that, or he’s so wildly, insanely jealous of the fact that Philip and I are dating that he simply couldn’t refrain from saying something nasty. Or perhaps a combination of the two, I thought. Either way, I would of course forgive him when he begged for me to understand and apologized profusely.
I turned around, hoping all the time that he would rush toward me with a plea for forgiveness, but instead he was holding up something and waving it. My cell phone. Which naturally began ringing before I’d reached the table.
He glanced down and I spotted the tightness in his face before he forced a smile. ‘What a coincidence, it’s the man of the hour. Shall I take a message for you? Don’t worry, I promise to tell him we’re on a jet on our way back from Cannes and not sitting at a downtown Starbucks.’
‘Give that to me,’ I snapped, wanting to kick myself for programming Philip’s number into my phone while yanking it from Sammy’s fingers and noticing only briefly how nice it was to touch his skin. I silenced the ringer and tossed it in my bag.
‘Don’t not answer on my account.’
‘I’m not doing anything on your account,’ I announced. I looked back only once as I stormed out, only to see him watching me and shaking his head. Not exactly how the same scene would’ve played out in The Magnate’s Tender Touch, I thought with not a little remorse. But I cheered myself up slightly with the rationalization that all new relationships – even the fictional ones – have obstacles to overcome in the beginning. I would not give up hope on this one. Not yet.
The rest of the day after the Starbucks encounter passed in a blur as I alternately obsessed over my bizarre fight with Sammy and Penelope’s news that she was moving. Both of these, combined with the reality that I was entirely responsible for planning an event that was to take place in two and a half weeks, made me want to curl up with Millington and watch back-to-back showings of When Harry Met Sally on TNT. By the time I arrived at home, my small-talk quotient was rapidly approaching zero, and I still had to traverse the entire lobby to reach the elevator, where I would surely be accosted by Seamus. I’d managed to press the button and was silently rejoicing in my victory when he materialized, as always, out of nowhere.
‘Good day?’ he asked with a huge smile.
‘Um, yeah, it was fine, I guess. And you?’
‘Fine sounds very different from good, Bette!’ he was practically singing. What sort of vibe did I give off that said ‘Talk to me’?
‘I suppose it is different, but I think “good” would be an overstatement. It was definitively fine,’ I explained, wondering if it’d be worth it to climb thirteen flights of stairs rather than wait for the elevator and endure the interim conversation.
‘Well, let’s just say I have a really good feeling it’s going to get better,’ he replied with what was, unmistakably, a wink.
‘Mmm, really?’ I said, desperately staring at the elevator doors and willing them to open. ‘That’d be nice.’
‘Yep, you heard it here first. I officially predict that your day is going to improve significantly within the next couple of minutes.’ He said this with such certainty – and in that particularly rankling I-know-something-you-don’t-know tone – that I actually looked up at him.
‘Is there something I should know? Is someone here?’ I asked, both horrified and curious as to who might be staking out my apartment, waiting for me to get home.
‘Okay, well, I’ve said enough, that much is for sure!’ he sang. ‘It’s none of my business, of course. Time for me to get back to the door.’ He tipped his hat and turned on his heels and I wondered if there was any possible way to ask him nicely never to speak to me again.
I knew exactly what he’d meant when I stepped off the elevator and rounded the corner to lucky number 1313. Resting against the door were the most gorgeous flowers I’d ever seen. My first thought was that they’d been mistakenly left in front of my door and were actually for someone else, but as I got closer, I could see my name written in black marker on the outside of the envelope that was nestled behind the cellophane wrapping. After accepting that it wasn’t a delivery glitch, a second thought popped into my head immediately: they were from Sammy, who’d thought over everything that had happened earlier and wanted to apologize for his behavior. Yes! I knew he wasn’t such a bad guy, and flowers were such a sweet, gentlemanly way of getting in touch to say he’s sorry. I’m sorry, too, I mentally directed toward the flowers. I don’t know why I was so bitchy and nasty, especially since I haven’t stopped thinking about you for one second since then. Yes, I’d love to meet you for dinner and put that whole stupid conversation behind us. And if you must know, I’m already beginning to envision you as the father of my future children, so we’d best be getting to know each other. How much our kids will love hearing that our lifelong love affair began with a fight and makeup flowers! It’s almost so romantic I can’t bear it. Yes, darling, yes, I forgive you and I apologize a hundred times myself and I know this will make us stronger.
I heaved the arrangement upward and unlocked the door, so delighted with this surprise that I barely even noticed Millington wrapping herself around my leg. Flowers always featured prominently in romance novels, which made receiving such a first-rate bouquet even more wonderful. There were actually three dozen roses in shades of bright purple and hot pink and white, all clustered tightly together in a short, round bowl that appeared to be filled with some sort of sparkling glass marbles. Completely absent was any sort of adornment – no ribbons, bows, filler greenery, or