Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 129951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 650(@200wpm)___ 520(@250wpm)___ 433(@300wpm)
“So Battle can rub Vivi in her face! She’ll just die. Isn’t it smashing?!” Tempie had taken on Courtney’s excitement in a droll way when she related this to us.
Normally, I’m all for vengeance.
But after what Chelsea said about Prue and Chassie, with them right there listening, Battle was concerned he might not be able to handle being anywhere near her without causing a scene, something he didn’t want to do at one of his best mates’ weddings.
He also didn’t want her to say anything else to them or to me.
And this was why I was sticking close.
I went to him and took his hand.
“You are the very model of the modern duke,” I said. “You’ll keep your cool, I know you will. And as Tempie said, with Chelsea’s personality, she’s eventually going to whittle down her choices to some loser who she can walk all over who will make her extremely unhappy. We’ve already won, baby. She can’t do anything to us.”
“That doesn’t mean, if she does, it won’t piss me right off.”
Well then.
What did you say to that?
Because he was right.
But for Rally and Courtney, I knew he’d keep his cool.
Thus, I decided on saying nothing, just sticking to my plan of keeping an eye out.
He tucked my hand around his elbow, and we headed out.
Primrose Lodge was outstanding from the outside, though smaller than The Downs.
But inside, they’d kept décor that had probably been there since two turns of a century.
It wasn’t worn down, but it was worn (mildly) and dated (completely).
Still pretty, in its way.
But it wasn’t bright and warm and open, like The Downs.
While all sorts of scurrying was going on throughout the house, Battle escorted me out of it and onto the lawn, slowing his gait as I navigated it in my nude heels.
He then sat me in one of the white chairs arranged before an arch festooned splendiferously in peach, cream and yellow flowers, set up in front of the detached orangery.
He bent and touched his lips to mine, then moved to the other men wearing morning suits who were loitering at the arch.
Okay.
So…
It was a month after the Hamish/Christian weekend at The Downs.
And a lot had happened.
Let’s get into it.
First, I started my book, and yes, it was obsessing me.
Though, two things were cool about writing in the studio.
One, I found it was kind of fun to “go to work” rather than stumbling to my desk in my house with a cup of coffee and a bedhead.
At The Downs, I got up.
I took a shower.
I got dressed.
Then the cats and I headed out to the studio, now covered in blooming wisteria, which if the wind blew, sent confetti petals all over the place. And the wind blew often.
It was like being in my own magical little world.
I would arrive in the studio to what Patsy sorted for me to be treated to: a big carafe of coffee, a jug of cream in a bed of ice and something lovely but easy to eat, like an almond croissant and some fruit or a bacon butty (and some fruit).
The second thing that was cool about writing my book in that studio (okay, so this wasn’t strictly about the studio, but it was about what I was doing there) was running my chapters by Battle, I found to my surprise, was awesome.
Due to that response, obviously, he hadn’t nixed anything (yet).
But his compliments and enthusiasm meant the world.
Better?
When he was home, he didn’t get all demanding of my time, or pouty that he didn’t have it.
No, in fact, if I called to the house for a sandwich or something, often, it was Battle who brought it out to me.
Not to interrupt me. I only got my delivery and a quick kiss.
He did it to support me.
In other words, we could say, for a variety of reasons, the “falling” bit of falling in love was no longer part of the equation (and that was the best of all of this).
Other than that, everyone left me alone to do my thing, and that was crazy kind.
However, that didn’t mean things didn’t happen.
They did.
The unsurprising stuff:
We still hadn’t run across Charlie’s letters.
I was beginning to think this might be a rare miss in Ravenna’s psychic powers.
The only thing I knew was, it was what it was, and as usual, I just had to sally forth.
So I did.
The kinda boring stuff:
I took Noelle up to a run and I didn’t fall off.
Progress.
I also, at Battle’s suggestion (all right, it was a demand, but I decided to think of it as a suggestion), phoned Mr. Atkins and told him I’d found other accommodation, and I wouldn’t be taking the cottage.
As he said he would be, Mr. Atkins was cool with it.
And so I wouldn’t miss out on time by the sea, Battle promised to take me there for a weekend, if I found a time in my writing where I could go.