Chapter Thirteen: Creamy Pasta

Layla’s POV

The ringing pulled me out of sleep before I was ready.

Loud. Persistent. The particular kind of phone ring that had no patience for being ignored.

I opened my eyes slowly and looked at the nightstand beside me. His phone. Sitting right there on my side of the bed — I had not noticed it last night when I came back to the room after talking with Haze. I had been tired enough that I had simply climbed into my side of the bed and fallen asleep without paying attention to much of anything.

I turned to look at Ian.

Fast asleep. On his side of the bed, facing away from me, entirely unbothered by the sound that had yanked me out of a perfectly good dream.

I tapped his shoulder.

He groaned. A deep, low sound that did not come close to being a wake-up response. He did not move.

I tapped him again. Harder.

Another groan. He shifted slightly. Still asleep.

I looked at the phone. Still ringing.

I pulled back the duvet, raised my leg, and kicked his.

The groan that came this time was different — louder, more aware, the sound of someone being dragged back from sleep against their will. He moved. He scratched his face with one hand. He turned.

His eyes found me, heavy with sleep, his voice coming out low and rough in the way that voices did first thing in the morning.

“Did you just kick me?”

“Your phone was ringing,” I said, keeping my voice completely calm. I had made a decision before opening my eyes this morning that I was not going to argue with him before breakfast. “I tapped you twice and you didn’t wake up. So I kicked you.”

He pressed his hand against his forehead and rubbed it slowly. His jaw was tight. He was clearly in pain — headache, probably, from yesterday’s exhaustion or whatever mood had driven him to bed last night.

I did not particularly care. But I noted it.

“Common sense,” he said, his voice still rough, “would have told you to leave the phone ringing.” He looked at me with those blue eyes that were even sharper in the morning than they were during the day. “Instead you disturbed my sleep by hitting me with your ugly legs.”

I stopped.

“I’m sorry.” I pulled the duvet back and looked down at my legs — long, smooth, well-maintained legs that I had never in my life received a complaint about. “Did you just call my legs ugly?”

“I—”

“Are you blind?” I turned back to him. “Have you actually looked at these legs? Because I have. Frequently. And ugly is not a word that has ever been used.”

He opened his mouth.

“And for the record,” I continued, “I was trying to help you. I will remember never to do that again.” I pulled the duvet back over myself. “You are welcome, by the way.”

“I don’t need your help,” he said, sitting up. “I never asked for your help. What I need is for you to stop talking for five consecutive minutes which has apparently never happened in your life so far—”

He stood up, crossed to the bathroom, and closed the door behind him.

Not gently.

I sat in the bed and stared at the bathroom door.

I breathed in. I breathed out.

I am going to be so calm today, I told myself. I am going to be completely calm and reasonable and I am not going to say a single thing that I will regret.

I got out of bed.

The house was beautiful in the morning.

I had known it was beautiful last night but beauty hit differently in daylight — the light coming through the tall windows, the clean lines of everything, the way the space felt intentional rather than just large. Haze had told me last night that Rose Lawson their mother had designed the interior herself. Looking at it now I understood why it felt like a home rather than just a house. It had been made by someone who knew what warmth looked like and had deliberately put it into every room.

Haze had given me the full tour in the kitchen at midnight — five bedrooms upstairs, a cinema, a gym, another living room. Downstairs, the main living room, the dining area, Ian’s home office, three more bedrooms, and a kitchen that was larger than the kitchen in my grandpa’s house.

One of the rooms downstairs was locked. I had noticed it. I had not asked.

Ian lived here alone — just him and his staff, until yesterday when I arrived with my boxes and my ballgown and my list of reasons to dislike him. The staff were on leave. Which meant for the time being it was Ian, Haze and me in this house with whatever was in the kitchen.

I opened the refrigerator.

Fully stocked — ingredients, everything I needed. The only problem was that neither Ian nor Haze could apparently cook at all. Haze had told me this with cheerful honesty the night before. We survive on takeout and whatever the staff leaves us, he had said. Ian once tried to make eggs and set off the smoke alarm.

I pulled out what I needed.

Forty minutes later the creamy pasta was done — enough for three, because regardless of how I felt about Ian Lawson I was not petty enough to cook for two people while a third person existed in the same house. That was not how I had been raised.

I was setting the dishes on the dining table when Haze appeared in the doorway, his hair still messy from sleep, his eyes lighting up immediately when he saw the food.

“Lay Lay.” He came forward and looked at the pot with the expression of someone who had been surviving on takeout for too long. “You made pasta.” He paused. “This is actually Ian’s favourite food.”

“Good morning, Haze,” I said, ignoring that information completely. “Sit down and let me serve you.”

“Good morning.” He sat. “Thank you for this. Genuinely.”

We were just about to eat when I heard footsteps on the stairs.

Ian came into the dining room in a black Gucci tracksuit — clean, put together, both hands in his pockets, his expression carrying the particular arrangement of his face that meant he was processing something he had not expected.

He looked at the table. At the food. At me.

“Ian,” Haze said brightly, “Layla made breakfast. Creamy pasta — your favourite.”

Ian looked at the pot for a long moment. His expression shifted — something moving across his face that settled, unfortunately, into the specific look of a man who had decided to be difficult before the day had even properly started.

“Can you even cook?” he said. He looked at the food with undisguised skepticism. “Just make sure my brother doesn’t get sick after eating whatever this is.”

I opened my mouth.

Haze got there first.

“Ian.” His voice was firm in the way that younger siblings occasionally became firm when they had decided enough was enough. “This pasta is delicious. I can tell just from the smell.” He looked at his brother directly. “She woke up and made breakfast for all three of us. Could you just be decent for once and acknowledge the effort?”

The dining room was quiet for a moment.

Ian’s eyes moved to me.

I looked back at him steadily.

“It’s fine,” I said. My voice came out even. Measured. “If you don’t want to eat it, don’t eat it.”

Something flickered across his face — quick and small, there and gone. He had been expecting me to fire back. I could see it in the slight adjustment of his posture when I didn’t — the recalculation of someone who had prepared for a response that didn’t come.

I turned back to Haze and served him a generous portion.

Ian could do whatever he wanted.

But I filed it away — the look on his face when I said something he had not expected. The slight shift when I chose calm over fire.

I will give you your reply, I thought, picking up my own fork. Just not today. And not in a way you will see coming.

I ate my pasta.

It was, for the record, very good.

*******

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— Ruthie ❤️