Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 130255 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130255 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Esme narrowed her eyes at me. “Did he make you say that?”
Laughing, I shook my head. “No. I’m aware of his position on relationships. When it comes down to it, we really are just friends.”
“Hmm. If you say so.” She picked up the dirty dishes and turned, then looked over her shoulder back at me. “But like I said to him once, friends don’t fuck, Ellie.”
I raised my eyebrows, smiling. “They do in my books.”
“Yes,” Esme agreed with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “And then they get married in the last chapter.”
Ah.
Yes.
Well.
Shit.
I had no response to that.
She cackled, walking out of the dining room, and I turned to Max.
“I lost that one, didn’t I?” I said with a grimace.
He nodded. “Yes.”
“She’s good.”
“Yes,” he repeated. “In future, smile and nod.”
“She’s not going to let that go now, is she?”
He shook his head slowly, still scratching the top of Sir Winston Purrchill the Traitor’s head. “No. She’s not. I’m never going to hear the end of it.”
Another awkward grimace from me. It was really all I had. “Just tell her what I did. It’s the truth, isn’t it?”
“Which part? The part about us being friends or it not being any deeper than friendship?”
“Both are true.” I hesitated. I am a big, fat, lying liar. “Right?”
He inclined his head, not really answering at all.
“Hey, if you don’t want to be friends, then that’s fine. I will take my cat and go and—”
“Whoa, whoa. Don’t be drastic with the taking of the cat.” He circled his arms around Winston in a blockade.
I crossed my arms over my chest and sat back in my chair. “See? You love that cat. It’s ridiculous. You couldn’t stand him six weeks ago.”
“That’s when I thought he was going to eat my birds. Now I know it’s only my mice and rats, he’s my best mate.”
“I’m not sure what to say to that. I think you like him more than you like me.”
“It’s best I don’t respond to that.” He grinned, and my silly little belly did a silly little flip.
“Wow. Now I’m offended.”
“Look at him.” Max scratched under Winston’s chin with one finger, and my cat trilled happily, leaning into him. “How can you not love him?”
“I do love him. He’s my cat. You’re monopolising him.”
“He jumped on my lap. Was I supposed to ignore him?”
“Well, no, but if you carry on, he’s not going to want to come home with me.”
“I’d be okay with that.”
“I wouldn’t!” I huffed, glaring at him. “You can’t just steal my cat.”
“You threatened to sell him to me earlier.” Max looked down, grinning at Winston, who was more than happy to continue accepting all the loving from him. “I’m not stealing him. It’s not my fault if he loves me.”
“Actually, it is. He doesn’t like anyone. You’ve done something to make him like you, and I’m not okay with it.”
“Your cat has dreadful taste,” Esme said, walking back into the dining room with the apple pie in her hands. “Look at him over there. Doesn’t he have mice to be catching?”
“Probably, but he won’t go anywhere while he’s getting love like that. He’s a little whore,” I said.
“They’re so rude to you,” Max cooed to Winston. “Yes, they are. So mean. Mean ladies.”
I frowned at him, reaching for my water. “Is he scaring you, too?” I asked Esme.
“Since the day he was born,” she replied dryly, eyeing him and the cat. “A little more than usual right now, though, I’ll be honest.”
Oh, good.
It wasn’t just me.
“You haven’t spiked his water, have you?”
“Sadly not,” she replied, ignoring Max’s dark glare in her direction. “If I did, it’d be with a love potion so he’d get married and give me grandchildren. Heck, I wouldn’t even mind if he didn’t get married.”
I frowned. “Titles can’t be inherited without marriage, right?”
“An heir must be born of the body in wedlock,” Max said dryly. “No adoption, no surrogacy, no accidental one-night stands who show up five years later like they do in your books.”
“That was one book,” I corrected him. “And that wasn’t the duke’s kid. It was his brother’s.” I paused. “How do you even know that? Are you reading my books still?”
“No,” he replied, right as Esme said, “Yes.”
We both looked at her.
She shrugged, cutting the pie. “I saw what I saw, Max.”
My lips twitched. “You saw him reading my books?”
“Oh, sure. Grandma can read them, but if I do, it’s weird.”
“Of course it’s weird,” Esme replied, scooping vanilla ice-cream out of the tub and setting it next to a warm slice of pie that she set in front of me. “You reject romance in every facet of your life, yet you’re now reading romance novels and, worse, enjoying them, while regularly canoodling with the author of said novels. If you’re not careful, I’m going to think you’ve changed your mind and will be happy to get married and give me the grandchildren I’d like.”