Page 31 of A Break in Communications

“Seems like she mentioned me being a big reader, too?”

“Oh.” She laughed, leaning back in her seat, looking for all the world like she belonged here. Did she want to? Belong in my passenger seat? She looked so comfortable in it, like she’d ridden there next to me a million times, like… I pushed the thought away. “She mentioned a few things,” she said, eyes twinkling at me. “Such as… you didn’t want to read her Sherlock smut.”

“Oh my god.” I put my hand over my face, not even bothering to hide the laughter of mortification at this point. “I don’t know why she’s like that…”

“I don’t know why my grandmother is like that. I apologize for… all of that,” she said, waving a hand back towards the house. “I didn’t think you’d come in and meet her.”

“Didn’t realize I wasn’t allowed. That I was only supposed to pull up and admire your castle from a distance.”

She rested her elbow on the center console, smiling slyly at me. “Are you so sad about the prospect of not coming into my house, darling?”

Ugh—as if I cared. She was the one who—well—I didn’t know if—honestly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if her grandmother was just screwing with me. And I needed to know, because if Lucy actually did want me, then… then… then what?

“Devastated,” I said lightly, pushing the flowers her way. “Now hold these so I can drive, dearest.”

She took them, and I got a shudder when her fingers brushed mine. Did she do it on purpose? Did she spend a lot of time thinking about her fingers touching mine? “You’re not prohibited from going inside the house,” she laughed. “Just… don’t take it to heart too much, whatever she told you.”

I paused with my hand on the transmission. “About her,” I said.

“Mm?”

“What’s her name? She told me to just call herma’am.”

She laughed, rolling her eyes. “That woman… it’s Charlotte.”

“You spend a lot of time telling Granny Charlotte how pretty I am?”

She sighed, sinking back in the seat, buckling her seatbelt. “I’ve talked about you a lot. She’s probably interpreted that however she’s felt right.”

I couldn’t work out the answer in the middle of all this. Whatever… I’d get to it another time. I put the car in reverse, pulling out of the driveway, the music coming back on. “I have to say, I kind of expected someone… nicer.”

“See, this is why I was hoping I could warn you before you met her.”

“Scared I’ll judge you by your scary grandmother?”

“Mm. Maybe just worried she’ll scare you off and then I’ll lose my moderately pretty date.”

I laughed despite myself. Pulled out onto the road and drove for a bit before I found myself saying, “Has she scared off girls before?”

I had no idea why I was asking about Lucy’s love life, but she didn’t make it weird. “I’ve introduced her to a girl before… things didn’t last long with the girl in question, but I don’tthinkGrandma was the reason. Think she just didn’t like my lack of emotional availability.”

“Well, aren’t we self-aware?”

She raised her eyebrows at me with a smile. “Aren’t you supposed to say something likeoh, you must have grown a lot since then, with your strong sense of emotional availability…”

“Hm. Strange. I don’t seem to have said that. Your grandma’s going to be relieved once we drop this thing, isn’t she?”

“Probably not. She loves you.”

“Oh, does she?” I raised my eyebrows, not taking my eyes off the road. “What does she do when she hates someone?”

“She’s polite. She’ll be devastated once we put this behind us, and get doubly so on my case to find a girlfriend. One who cooks and cleans…”

“I’ll bet anything you don’t go for the housewife type anyway.”

She laughed, looking out of the side of her eye at me. “And what, pray tell, is your read on my type?”

Wasn’t that the million-dollar question? “Well,” I said after a second, “I hear you can be bossy, so probably someone who likes to take orders.”

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