Page 18 of Hit For Six (Balls and Banter #1)

CHAPTER TWELVE

Monty

The bus pulled away and despite the heartwarming glimmer of hope that Monty now knew Lola lived in the same city, he felt like he’d lost a part of his soul. Going back to his thoughts on Friday night, he’d been reduced to a reckless bloody Prince Charming again.

Yes, he’d narrowed down the radius for his fairytale door knocks, since Lola lived somewhere in the vicinity of a bus stop on the University route, but he wasn’t holding a glass slipper as an excuse to cold call on Bath’s residents.

There was nothing to show for tonight. Just the searing hot memory of that kiss and Lola’s insistence that they were incompatible.

For a moment it had looked as if she’d wanted to recreate their making out session there by the weir, but Monty wouldn’t dream of pouncing on her.

Not in real life. Even if Lola had no idea how much he craved a relationship with someone as authentic and intriguing as she was.

There was no point plying her with the opposites attract line.

Her mind was made up. His wealth and class were a trap. Neither had brought him happiness.

He skulked back to The Bubble Bath as the rain continued to lash down.

Monty looked more like he’d been standing under a power shower than lounging around a bathtub sipping cocktails, but something about his disturbing predicament, and the way that the passersby were giving him the once over for his underprepared choice of attire, made him stop in his tracks. Then the realisation hit him.

He needed to get back to his apartment. Sod the meal.

He needed to get back to the full-length mirror in his bedroom (and not just to indulge in self-pity over his sorry state).

Concluding the discussion with London would have to wait.

As would Monty’s day’s holiday. It was crucial that he attended the company meeting tomorrow. Clear-headed and ready to do battle.

He finally snapped out of his trance as the rain slowed to a drizzle, and made his way to the cocktail bar’s entrance. But it seemed that everyone else had had the same idea– about forgoing the restaurant, at least– and Monty bumped into a distressed London at the top of the stairs.

‘Where the bleep have you been? We’ve been worried about you.

Well, some of us more than others.’ London rolled his eyes in Tim’s direction as his drunken frame staggered up the final steps and cannoned into the back of the doorman.

It was all Monty could do not to pick his teammate up and throw him in a giant puddle.

‘Listen, I’ve settled the bill but we’ve come to the unanimous decision that a certain somebody’s shoddy behaviour has made it impossible for us to carry on with the celebrations tonight.

We’ll reconvene… and I will be scheduling in a very stern word with the person in question next week.

He’s on his final-final warning now. I’ll call you soon, Captain.

I know the wait for news must be impossible but just be patient. All good things, etcetera.’

Luckily the restaurant had a waiting list so something good had come out of the night and the team had inadvertently made a dozen people in the city feel as if they’d won the lottery.

But now Monty was back to feeling as moody as the clouds.

He should have jumped to Lola’s defence at the stadium.

The fact that he hadn’t told him everything he needed to know: he was nowhere near invested enough in his day job.

He planned and implemented online campaigns for Beau-re-mi’s collections, for fuck’s sake.

He should know every garment inside and out.

But he hadn’t as much as associated the incident with his company’s summer wardrobe. He ought to be fired.

Now he’d cost Lola her job. Monty was puzzled, though.

She hadn’t seemed devastated about walking away from it.

Something didn’t add up. And he couldn’t help but think that whilst Maxine had got some things right about her business, she’d gotten others very wrong.

It was all well and good having these finishing touches in place; the doorman who made you feel as if you were entering a private Mayfair club, the exquisite cocktails, the decor (well, kind of…

if you were into Victorian bathrooms). But look at the lack of attention to detail where her staff’s safety was concerned.

She’d overspent on the frippery and now couldn’t afford to hire enough workers or upgrade to proper electrics.

Then Monty thought back to his eureka moment in the square and felt judgy.

Was Beau-re-mi really such an exemplary business model?

The walk home seemed to take forever, hardly helped by cars splashing surface water and people not watching where they were going because they had the luxury of a giant umbrella. But even if he had cover he wouldn’t use it, Monty needed the penance.

He refused to feel bad about Tim’s fate, on the other hand.

Monty had been to private school with the guy and they’d been cricket rivals for years when they’d played for different local teams. But their banter had always been friendly– or so he’d thought.

Once they’d both signed up with Bath Beasts, Tim’s joshing had swiftly spiralled into jealousy, especially when Monty was chosen to be captain.

Tim knew he was the weakest link in the team with his increasingly poor deliveries and missed shots on the pitch.

The only thing he’d been hitting was the bottle– ever frequently at social events, making a bigger and bigger dick of himself.

Now his envy had reached an all-time high and he couldn’t stand seeing Monty being fawned over by London and the scouts.

It was uncalled for when Monty had given his all and his success had been fairly won.

Besides, he wasn’t the only player in contention for great things; Seth and Sanjay were also rumoured to be in talks with the powers that be.

Finally Monty reached the Royal Crescent.

Now he needed to put his plan into action.

Fast. He ran up the stairs to his apartment, changed out of his wet clothes and into his lounging pyjama bottoms and a T-shirt, and gave his Venetian blond hair (as his mother would insist upon referring to it) a jolly good towel rub.

But there would be no time for relaxation tonight.

He’d be fueled by coffee and justice. All right, maybe a quick peanut butter and jelly sandwich too.

Settling himself on his bed, Monty took a deep breath, pulled out his phone and followed through with what he should have done on Friday, tapping TikTok’s iconic musical note symbol.

It would be the quickest place to watch the very moment when Lola made the catch.

But as his thumbs typed keywords into the search bar, he thought back to the real life person behind the screen persona; the girl he’d kissed tonight.

No, he still couldn’t do it like this. He’d hunt down every arsehole who’d commented on the video and make them live to regret it.

Monty needed to tackle such a delicate situation the old-fashioned way, pausing the frame on a bigger screen and analysing the content properly.

He sped across to the lounge and flicked on the TV, pressing play on the footage he’d recorded and fast-forwarding to his first six of the game.

All these hours when he could have been fighting her case. But better late than never.

As the action-packed few seconds pinged onto the screen, Monty was mad with himself for not checking the footage sooner.

Now there wasn’t a doubt in his mind about what had really happened.

Who was the idiot designer behind that dress?

It had to be a man. He couldn’t believe his delusional colleagues, who were flinging emails to and fro like hot potatoes this weekend; each of them intent on covering up the potential fallout by jabbering on about trivialities like hotels for next year’s London Fashion Week, or the upcoming buyer’s trip to Japan, or Keanu Reeves unwittingly making upmarket High Street trendy again, after being spotted wearing a sharply-tailored Beau-re-mi suit on a recent jaunt around Paris with his girlfriend.

Okay, perhaps the magazines were going wild about the latter now, but the positive spin wouldn’t last long.

And it didn’t change the fundamental fact that brM had screwed up.

Whoever was behind the design of Lola’s dress was not getting away with it.

Monty pulled a bedsheet out of the chest of drawers and stood in front of the mirror, mummifying himself in the white fabric as if he was fashioning a toga for a fancy dress party.

He was on a mission. Once he’d satisfied himself with his efforts, he began to snip away at the right side with scissors to create a single floaty shoulder strap, diagonal to the narrow and flimsy criss-crosses of material on the right.

He didn’t have pins to hold things in place so he improvised with a stapler from his desk drawer, holding his breath that he wouldn’t pierce his skin.

But the quality didn’t matter. When he noted the positioning of the ties of the Beau-re-mi dress in his mind’s eye and imagined Lola’s side turn as she made purchase with the ball, Monty’s findings were conclusive.

He ran back down the stairs two by two, still in his makeshift dress and knocked on the door of the bottom apartment, pacing about and almost tripping over several times on his hem as he waited for Aunt Sally to open the door.