Both Brandy and Chloe gaped at her.
“A ball? You know you’re bringing me as your single guest, right?” Brandy said.
Ella lowered her phone. “You say that like I’m going.”
Chloe jutted her head forward. “Uh, why wouldn’t you?”
Even if she went, she wasn’t sure she’d bring Brandy along. While they’d been friends for a few years now, and Ella loved her company in smaller settings, Brandy was an extrovert who insisted Ella be one, too. It would be disarming enough at the ball around Hawk Danielson. She didn’t need Brandy there trying to drag her onto the dance floor.
“It seems a little condescending, don’t you think? They’ve never invited any of us before. Look at the date. The ball is in two days. It’s like they’ve only just now realized we’re a part of the corporation too. Sure, custodial isn’t the most glamorous thing to do, but it’s a job, and even Mr. Danielson said this morning how—”
Brandy cut her off. “Wait. You met him?” She and Chloe exchanged a look. “You failed to mention that.”
“Yeah, it was kind of embarrassing, actually,” Ella said. “After work, I met with Samantha, you know? When she gave me that fabric. Anyway, I ended up getting stuck in an elevator with him.”
Both machines stopped whirring. Chloe and Brandy stabbed their shocked gazes into her. “You got stuck in an elevator with him?” Chloe said. “Is it just me or does that sound completely romantic?”
“Please tell me you took the chance to swoon into his arms,” Brandy added.
The pit of her stomach coiled. Ella had fantasized about that very thing all through lunch and even now while watching the needle on her machine zigzag up and down. How easy it would have been to play the bumbling idiot. To tumble against him, take advantage of the secluded darkness and the moment’s spontaneity and kiss a complete stranger.
He’d said he wanted a distraction. She certainly could have distracted him with a few harmless kisses.
Truth be told, she hadn’t had to pull away from his embrace. He’d been so mesmerizing, and he hadn’t seemed to mind her proximity in the least.
What would have happened if she’d tried something like that?
It was useless to even imagine. She felt stupid even considering it. Things like that only happened in movies, not in real life. Not between all-out gazillionaires and lowly custodians.
“It was anything but romantic,” Ella said, deciding not to mention his phobia of tight spaces. She wouldn’t want her problems brandished all over the place. In fact, it made her respect him that much more for not being as perfect as he appeared in pictures.
“So tell us.” Brandy scooted away from her sewing machine and placed the half-sewn pillowcase on her lap. “What’s he like?”
Ella attempted to act indifferent. She turned her attention to the cluttered stacks of papers beside the TV, trying to ignore the irony. She cleaned by profession, and yet her house grew messier by the day. She hadn’t seen the surfaces of anything in here since she’d moved in. “Why do you care?”
“You can’t be this impartial,” Brandy said. “Especially not if you saw him. He’s scrumptious.”
Ella lifted her chin. “I hadn’t noticed.”
Chloe belted out a laugh. As Ella’s roommate, she knew her better than most people would. “That’s the biggest chunk of baloney I’ve ever heard. Seriously, what was he like?”
Ella’s body temperature ticked up a few notches at the memory of being held by him, either from embarrassment or at how considerate and then outright flirty he’d been. That whole hindsight being 20-20 wasn’t fair. Why couldn’t she have foreseen the effect he’d have over her at the time? Would she have done anything differently?
“He’s nice. He told me a little of his Christmas traditions and kept his cool under duress. He even—”
“What?”
Whoops. Too much.
“Nothing,” Ella said. “He held the door as I left, that’s all.”
But that wasn’t all. She couldn’t stop thinking about how he’d continued asking about her even once the elevator started moving again. As though he’d been genuinely interested in her. She’d wanted to stay too, to keep talking to him and answer his questions. But she couldn’t let him know who she really was.
It shouldn’t matter, but even without the thievery accusations, admitting she was nothing more than a custodian who scrubbed toilets, cleaned floors, and picked gum off the underside of desks to someone as influential as Hawk Danielson seemed like the definition of undignified.
“Is Mr. Danielson going to be attending his honorary ball?” Chloe asked.
Ella’s face heated all over again. “I don’t know.”
“Would you stop acting completely uninterested in this guy? The pink in your cheeks is totally giving you away.”
Ella flattened her hands over her face. “Will you guys give me a break about it?”
Brandy and Chloe exchanged grins. “Someone’s touchy. I thought you said nothing happened with him.”
“Nothing did.”
“Yet,” Brandy added with an eyebrow quirk.
“And nothing will.”
“You’ll never know,” Chloe teased, reaching over and tapping a finger against Ella’s phone, “unless you go to his fancy ball.”
Ella lowered the piles of paper she was sifting through and glared at her friends. “You guys are crazy. Christmas Eve is in two days. You know how many pillowcases we have to finish before then.”
“Why would pillowcases hold you back?” Brandy leaned against the table, resting her cheek on her fist.
“Because,” Chloe said, folding her arms. “Knowing our girl Ella, if she goes to a ball, she’s going to insist on making her own dress. And she doesn’t have the time if she’s got to sew pillowcases.”
She’d hit the spot. It was just Ella’s way; she liked the experimentation, the design of things. Outdated as it was, Project Runway was one of her favorite shows. She would even attempt to do some of their challenges, giving herself the same parameters and timeframe. It was
