I spent the rest of the day thinking about Liam. He was only a few thousand feet away, concocting all kinds of culinary genius in the chef’s kitchen. He still probably had flour all over his face, but I bet he was also wearing a wide grin. He really loved cooking.
I hadn’t seen Zayn since I had woken up that morning and, four hours later, still hadn’t seen him. Matter of fact, he wasn’t lying in bed when I woke up. It was a Saturday, so he couldn’t be attending to business at work. That put me at a loss of words, not like I cared where he was or what he was doing. I didn’t give two shits about that asshole, but I did find it mysterious how he had managed to crawl out of bed undetected. I was very close to not sleeping on the bed last night altogether. I had spent the rest of the evening, following the incident, eating dinner by myself and playing the piano, weak attempts to calm myself down. It was nearly one in the morning when I crept into our bedroom and found him sound asleep on the bed. I wasn’t to yank him out of bed and beat him to a pulp with my pillow, but I decided against it. Zayn had his own problems; he just didn’t know how to handle them. Because he was a dumbass. No surprise there.
At four in the afternoon, I sat in front of the piano once more and practiced a few more pieces. I was getting very good, perhaps good enough to play a live performance. The thought sent a smile onto my face. But who’d attend the performance? Lisa? Liam? Fabulous.
I rose to my feet, boredom sweeping over me. I desperately needed something productive to do with my time, so I made my way over to the library. I looked for a few books on Spherical Astronomy, a topic of interest to me from my university days. A professor of mine from Princeton was one of the leading researchers in Spherical Astronomy, a continuation of calculus-based physics and higher mathematics. It was incredibly fascinating, combining all of these topics with astronomy and defining secular topics in space and time. I have no idea why I assumed that this large collection would include books on the subject matter of Spherical Astronomy; most of the books in the library were on either economics or business. However, I was both surprised and relieved to find a few mathematic textbooks, all including small subsections discussing Fermant’s Theorem, a topic of great concern in Spherical Astronomy. I brought the books out of the library and into the nearest sunroom, where I jumped onto the coach, extended my legs before me, and began diving into the world of higher mathematics.
I had gotten a few pages into the first book when I heard the doorbell of our West Wing ring. My ears peeked up in curiosity as I waited for a butler to answer the door. Placing the book onto my thighs, I leaned closer to the wall; the main door was on the other side of this wall.
“Miss Bronston.” I heard the butler say.
Rebecca? I thought, running my ear against the wall. I looked completely idiotic but refused to stop eavesdropping.
“Is Z here? Oh, I’m sorry. I mean, is Mr. Zayn here?”
I frowned.
“No, Miss Bronston, he is not.”
“What a shame. Is the Mrs. here, by any chance?”
I raised my eyebrow at that; she was obviously referring to me.
“I believe she is. Shall I fetch her?”
“No need. Would you tell Mr. Zayn that I had stopped by?” She paused for a moment. “Tell him that it’s nothing urgent; I just wanted to see him.”
“Of course, Miss Bronston.”
The door closed and I heard the butler walk down the hallway. I collapsed back into the couch, an expression of pure confusion glued to my face. What was that all about? Oh well.
Mathematics was exciting and all, but what truly intrigued me was the prospect of meeting Liam again. I could visit him all I wanted but I would come off too strongly if I actually followed through with that proposal. I had never seen him outside of his territorial grounds, so I figured I wouldn’t run into him outside of the chef’s kitchen. I was damned either way.
