My Accidental Billionaire Husband (Katia and Julian) novel Chapter 63

Blind date

Katia

I took a very calm sip of wine.

Robert recovered admirably. He named a figure. It was decent. Not exceptional, but decent. He glanced at me when he said it, the way people did when they were hoping for approval, which told me everything I needed to know about why he was here and what he thought this lunch was.

“That’s fine,” Aiden said, with the measured generosity of someone trying to be encouraging. “Not as good as Mum’s, but fine.”

Mother laughed a bright, social laugh designed to move past the moment. Dad, who had been quiet at the end of the table, pressed his lips together in a way that might have been suppressing a smile,

Robert turned to me. He was good at pivoting. “Your son is extraordinary.”

“I know.”

“He clearly takes after you.”

“Mmm.” I set my wine glass down. “Robert, how long have you known my family?”

4

He took a fractional pause. “Your mother and I were introduced through mutual friends. About a year ago.”

A year ago. After I came back to New York. After the WEG contract. After the society magazine article and the press coverage and the public emergence of Katia Kensington as someone worth knowing. A year ago, Martha had been introduced to a suitable man and had been storing him in reserve for the right moment.

The right moment, apparently, was a Sunday lunch with my son present.

“How lovely,” I said.

The conversation moved through the courses the way these things always did–Robert talking about his portfolio, his properties, a recent trip to the South of France, the right schools, the right clubs, the right connections, all of it designed to establish that he was the right kind of person for the right kind of woman. He was charming. Genuinely, technically charming. Under different circumstances, at a different table, without the specific context of my mother watching us like a chess player watching a board, he might have been pleasant company.

These were not different circumstances.

“You must find it challenging,” Robert said at one point, “running a company and raising a child alone.”

“I don’t find it challenging,” I said. “I find it normal. It’s all I’ve done.”

“Of course. I just mean — “He smiled carefully. “It must be nice to have support. The right kind of support.”

Aiden looked up from his dessert. He looked at Robert with the expression he wore when he had been following a conversation and had reached a conclusion about it

“My mum doesn’t need anyone’s portfolio,” he said pleasantly. “She has her own.”

Robert laughed a slightly startled laugh, the kind that bought time.

“He’s not wrong,” Dad said quietly from the end of the table. It was the first full sentence he’d contributed to the meal.

Mother gave Father a look that could have stripped paint. Father looked back at his plate.

I pushed my chair back at ten past two. “We should get going. Aiden has his reading before dinner.”

“You’ve barely *Mother started.

+25 Bonus

“It was a lovely lunch, Mother. Robert, it was nice to meet you.” I looked at him directly for the first time without the boardroom smile. Just clearly, just straight. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

He had the grace to understand what I meant. He nodded once.

Aiden said his goodbyes with impeccable politeness handshake for Robert, a kiss on the cheek for Mother, and a long hug for Dad that made Dad’s eyes go soft in a way that nearly made me stay longer.

Nearly.

In the car, I called Sam before I’d done my seatbelt.

She answered on the first ring. “How was the family lunch?”

“My mother set me up on a blind date.”

Same paused, “At a family lunch.”

“With my son present.”

“Bold,” Sam said.

“Stupid,” I said.

“Both.”

“Both,” I agreed. “His name is Robert Ashford. He’s in finance. He’s perfectly pleasant and completely pointless, and she had him waiting in the hallway like a prize behind a door.”

“What did Aiden say?”

“He told him his portfolio returns weren’t as good as mine.”

Sam laughed a real one, the kind she didn’t bother managing. I love that child.”

“So do I.” I looked out the window. The Kensington house was already gone behind us, already shrinking into the rearview. ” She’s not going to stop.”

“No,” Sam agreed. “She’s not.”

“Make a note. The next man she sends my way gets a very polite legal notice and a fruit basket.”

“I’ll draft the template.”

Aiden looked up from his tablet in the backseat. “Were we just at a blind date, Mum?”

“Go back to your reading.”

“Because I thought it was a normal lunch and then it wasn’t.”

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