“A bra would be a hell of a lot cheaper,” I said.
“Men,” she said, giggling. I looked at the time on my watch and groaned internally. It was eight thirty-one. It was eight twenty-six the last time that I checked. Anna was, putting it delicately, the worst date that I had been on in a while. No offense to the girl, I mean, there were probably people who did want to hear her discuss the pros and cons of overseas plastic surgery, but I wasn’t one of them. She hadn’t really stopped talking since the date started and I was still yet to identify anything that we had in common.
We had just had our appetizers. Me, the scallops and her, an elaborate, tiny little salad which she hadn’t finished. The waiter came up, cleared our table and served up our entrees. I picked the steak and she was having salmon. The brief intrusion meant we didn’t have to say anything for a few seconds. When the waiter left, I tried to save the situation.
“How’s your food?” I asked.
She picked at the salmon. “I only really eat seafood in Japan. I think they’re the only ones who really do it right, you know?”
“What do you eat in the States?” I asked.
“Oh,” she said, spearing a piece of the meat and looking at me, “I don’t cook. My chef takes care of that.”
She worked hard for her figure, that much was apparent. The breasts were a surgical addition. That wasn’t a guess, she actually told me, but she worked out every day and had access to the most exclusive beauty treatments that money could buy. I wasn’t knocking it, she was gorgeous. Her hair was beautifully styled; rich, honey blonde. Her makeup made her hazel eyes pop and her skin glowed. She was a stunner but so was every other girl that my mother had set me up with. They all looked like models. They all had an exquisite pedigree and expensive, lavish lifestyles.
Yeah, but they were all dull as a bucket of paint. They had never had to work a day in their lives. They had a crew of staff waiting on them hand and foot. They were sheltered, spoiled and worst of all, boring.
Give her a chance, I thought. It’s not her fault she grew up privileged and sheltered.
Oh, come on, it wasn’t really that, was it? Anna was beautiful, worldly and our parents probably knew each other. She just wasn’t her.
“So, you mentioned Japan. You must travel a lot,” I said.
“Not really to Japan that much. I can’t deal with how many people don’t speak English.” I stared at her.
“It’s Japan. Why should they speak English?”
“It’s the twenty-first century. If they want foreigners to come to their country they should probably start.”
Right there. That was the moment that I broke. I stood up. Anna’s eyes widened, looking at me.
“What are you doing? Where are you going?”
Why was I standing? Because I would rather be getting a root canal than be here on this date with her. I would rather mow a football field-sized lawn one blade of grass at a time than be here on this date with her. It didn’t matter how many women my mother talked into going out with me. Unless one of them was her, I didn’t care. Chances were I’d never find her again anyway. Why suffer with another one of my mother’s perfect-on-paper picks when none of them would ever come close?
I pulled my wallet out and threw four hundred-dollar bills on the table. That would cover the meal and the bottle of wine that was sitting, half full in the middle of the table.
“I’m going home, Anna,” I said.
“Why?”
“Because you have convinced me to stay single for the rest of my life.” Her mouth fell open. I didn’t wait around to hear what colorful names she had to call me but no doubt she had a few. It wasn’t like me to walk out on dinner with a date but at this point, I would rather just take my mother’s disappointed phone call than spend another minute with Annaliese Barringer. Her father started a clothing store that eventually sold to LVMH for a cool couple billion. She was a socialite who had been running in powerful circles her whole life. She was perfect, my mother said when she was telling me about her.
They were all fucking perfect. They were all gorgeous, all went to the right schools, had the right, powerful friends and kept the right company. I didn’t care about any of those things. I wanted her but I had a better chance of getting struck by lightning than I had of that happening again.
I walked out of the restaurant. I didn’t live that far away so I gave Barry my driver the night off. I shoved my hands into my pockets. It was coming. If Anna was quick then the call was coming tonight. If she wasn’t, then tomorrow at the latest. My mother was going to call me a fool for letting someone as beautiful and sweet as Annaliese go. She’d tell me off for walking out on the date and say it was only a matter of time before women like that didn’t even want to look at me anymore.
Good. I didn’t want to look at them either.
Then she’d get into the meat; the real reason that she was mad. It didn’t matter that I didn’t like her like Annaliese like that, it mattered that I was the head of the Hampton family since the Duke, my dad had died. I had the title. Someone had to inherit the duchy after me and all the baggage and money that came with it. She liked to remind me like there was any way in hell that I could forget. Annaliese would make a perfect duchess. She’d agree to have a couple of kids so long as she could get her body back afterward and there you go. The Hampton fortune and family name would live to see another generation. She’d make a perfect duchess alright, for someone else, but not me.
I walked the steps up to my townhouse and let myself in. There was music coming from the living room. I walked through the entryway to the living room, the music getting louder. My place was modern but classic. Leather furniture, but a smart TV. Old school but modern where it counted. I kept my vinyl collection and record player there which Niall, my cousin constantly made me reconsider.
“You having fun in here, fucking cat burglar,” I said, over the music. Niall looked up from the handful of records he was thumbing through. He was sitting on one of the leather armchairs like an emperor with a tumbler of scotch in his other hand.
“You know, if you don’t want me to come by, you should really change your passcode,” he said. I walked over and took the drink from him.
“Hey,” he said.