Not too close, of course.
We sit in silence, watching the fire for a while, before I plant my hands on the quilt, leaning back a little. “Do you think Glynnis had someone shoot out our tire?”
Miles laughs, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t put it past her. She’s a bit mercenary, ol’ Glynn.”
“Oh my god, please tell me you have called her ‘ol’ Glynn’ to her face.”
“I have not, as I enjoy having my tongue actually in my mouth and not mounted to her wall.”
Crossing my legs, I turn to face him more fully. “I will give you a million dollars if you do it,” I tell him, and he looks over, tilting his head to one side.
“A million dollars?”
“A million dollars or what I currently have in my wallet back at the house, which I think is, like, five pounds in your weird Monopoly money.”
“Tell you what,” he says, putting his hands down on the quilt to lean back a little, “I will call Glynnis ‘ol’ Glynn’ if you promise to drink a Pimm’s Cup. No, not drink, chug.”
I screw up my face, sticking my tongue out. “Blargh.”
That makes him laugh again, and I’m smiling back when I glance down and realize that our hands are nearly touching on the quilt.
Miles follows my gaze, and his laughter dies.
They’re just hands, resting there against the quilt. His, graceful, long-fingered, mine with chipped polish and an octopus ring on my pinky.
The rain is tapering off now, but I can still hear it drumming softly against the roof, and to my right, the fire pops and smokes. Over that, there’s the sound of my own breathing, a little faster than it was before, and I hear Miles sigh as the two of us just keep looking at our hands, only the littlest space between them.
We’ve been closer than this before. The other night at the ball, when we danced, there was a lot less space between our bodies than there is now. Hell, that day in the park, I was basically in his lap.
But those things were for show, and this . . .
This feels real.
His hand edges just a little bit closer, his pinky brushing mine, and that—that one tiny touch—sends a shiver of sparks racing through me.
Sucking in a breath, I go to move my hand closer.
The door flies open with a bang, and Miles and I leap apart so dramatically you’d think we’d just been caught together naked instead of touching pinkies. He actually makes a sound, this kind of startled yelp that I’d tease him about had I not cried out, “Nothing! Nothing!” when we bolted apart.
Ellie and Alex stand there, still in their tweeds, rain dripping off the umbrella Alex is holding over both their heads.
Alex frowns, but Ellie is looking back and forth between me and Miles, her arms folded over her chest.
“We saw the jeep on our way back, figured you’d be here,” Alex says, and Miles nods quickly, smacking his palms on his thighs.
“Yeah, yeah, good thing we were close.”
Smiling, Alex looks around. “This place is cozier than I remembered,” he says. “And nice work on the fire.”
Clearing his throat for what has to be the 8,000th time today, Miles turns to the fireplace, picking up the poker and tamping the flames down, moving ash over the still-smoldering peat. As the fire dies, so does whatever spell this place has cast over me, and I go to stand next to Ellie, putting the past few minutes out of my head.
“You rescued us!” I tell her, my voice bright, and her eyes narrow just the littlest bit.
“Rescued or interrupted?” she asks quietly, and I roll my eyes, gathering up my damp jacket and moving past her to Alex’s Land Rover, which, thankfully, has a roof.
Miles climbs in the back seat beside me, and as the Land Rover heads back toward Baird House, neither of us say anything.
And we both keep our hands firmly in our laps.
Chapter 30
I’m never going to get used to all the tea.
We’ve been back in Edinburgh for a couple of days now, and lately, everywhere we go, someone has tea to bring us. Sitting down at the palace? Have some tea. Meeting with Glynnis about wedding things? More tea, please. And now, even at the dress studio, there is tea.
I take the china cup from the smiling assistant, careful not to let it rattle in the saucer in case El hears it and snaps at me again. She’s been like that lately, quick to criticize anything I do that isn’t flawless. There’s a part of me that always wants to argue back, but another part wonders if this is just how she feels every day. Watched, judged, found wanting. Maybe it makes her feel better to get to do the same thing to someone else—I don’t know.
In any case, the tea cup doesn’t rattle even a bit, and I manage not to make a face when I take a sip, even though the tea is way too strong, way too hot, and way too unsweetened for my taste.
Mom and I are in a special fitting area in the back of the designer’s studio. No shops for the future king’s bride, of course. We get to go straight to the source, and from what I understand, these fittings are carried out like they’re spy missions or something. There were decoy cars when we left the palace this morning, one leaving from the front, the other from a back door near the kitchens. We weren’t in either of those, instead leaving about fifteen minutes later through yet another secret staff entrance, and we’d taken just a regular cab, nothing fancy. But all of us had worn hats and sunglasses, me and El in simple ballcaps, my mom in this hot-pink straw thing with flowers that probably drew more attention to her than if she hadn’t been wearing a hat at all, but such is Mom.
We still haven’t seen El’s dress, but that’s because she wants to save the surprise. Still, I can see a few sketches pinned to the wall of various wedding gowns, all of them looking fancy enough to be El’s, and I squint at one over my teacup.
“Do you have to wear sleeves?” I call out. “Like, are shoulders too scandalous for church?”
From somewhere in the bowels of the studio, El calls back, “It’s a surprise!”
“It’s a dress,” I mutter, glad she can’t hear me.
Mom can, though, and she reaches out with one leg, the toe of her shoe brushing my calf. “Be nice,” she says, and I set my cup on the little gilt-and-marble table next to us.
“I am being nice,” I tell her. “See, look.” I give her my best smile, the one that looks like I’ve been shot with a tranq dart, and Mom chuckles, shaking her head.
“You and your father, peas in a pod.”
“I’m taking that as a compliment.”
“You should.” Then Mom leans over and pats my knee, her teacup and saucer balanced in her other hand.
“You’ve been a real trouper through all of this, darling,” she tells me. “I know it hasn’t been easy. The papers and the pictures and the ball. That boy.”
Right.
That boy.
Miles and I haven’t really talked since we got back to the city. We did one quick stroll down the Royal Mile for Glynnis, but both of us had kept our hands in our pockets, and we’d hardly said anything to each other besides random comments on the weather, the shops, anything that was completely neutral and boring.
The headlines over those pictures had read “MILES APART?,” so Glynnis is not exactly thrilled with either of us at the moment. But after that day in the bothy, faking things with Miles just felt too weird, and besides, I was heading home soon anyway. The pictures from the park and the ball had done their job—no one was talking about me and Seb anymore, and just yesterday, there had been blurry shots of Seb and Tamsin up in the Highlands, kissing. (The headline there was “SEB LANDS GLAM TAM!,” which was kind of a weak offering in my opinion.)