Page 21 of Rosie and the Beast Next Door

“I am so glad you asked.” I opened the novel. “It’s a series of steps one must take to guarantee someone of a certain personality falls in love with you. Specifically, to help Max recognize his love for me.”

“So what’s step one?” Charlie not-so-discreetly rolled her eyes, but they glittered with excitement too. There was a reason we became best friends right after I moved to Winterhaven. Charlie was up for almost anything, even if we disagreed on my determination to get with Max. She said he was a snob, but I suspected that he was just reserved. Which was why he required a bit of a push.

“Are you willing to pretend to be sick so we have to remain at the bookstore for a few days?” I asked.

“I live less than a mile from the bookstore. We have cars.”

“I’ll name our first child Chuck after you.”

She leveled me with a stare. “Someone could literally carry me home if I got sick. This isn’t regency England, and I’m not Jane.”

“How committed to this plan are you?”

“Zero percent.”

“Fine.” I huffed, even though it had been a long shot that she’d agree. “I have a back-up plan.”

“I’m afraid to ask.”

I grinned. “Oh, you’ll see.” But I was getting ahead of myself. The back-up plan was step two. Step one, like all good plans, was all about reading.

Chapter 10

Rosie

“I declare after allthere is no enjoyment like reading! How sooner one tires of anything than a book!”—Pride and Prejudice

The book club regularswere all there. Gene from the grocery store who started coming after his wife passed away last year. Mrs. Mabel, the high school English teacher who’d been teaching longer than me or Charlie had been alive. A rotating batch of students came every month (and spent the entire discussion glued to their phones) because they got extra credit for showing up. Mr. Willingham, the octogenarian probate lawyer who had represented me in court, pro bono, after the public indecency incident, even though that wasn’t his law specialty. He fell asleep half-way through and when he abruptlyawoke, he confessed on my behalf to something I hadn’t actually done, but it was the thought that counted.

Charlie’s fiancé, Greg, came when he was in town—my least favorite meetings, by the way. I hated him even more than Lily, and that was saying something. Charlie had the literal soul of a saint wrapped in the body of a person who didn’t like to say no. The combination was deadly in the hands of the wrong person. Like Greg, who took advantage of her at every turn, and she just couldn’t see it.

Max and I rounded out the numbers of Winterhaven’s Literary Book Club.

The store was closed on book club nights, so Charlie knocked on the window to let Max know we were there. I held the acrylic painting I’d done for him out from my body, still not quite dry, but dry enough, and waited for the bam of electricity to hit me like it did every time I saw Max.

“Charlotte,” he said in his cultured tone. He wore wire-rim glasses and his dimpled smile softened his austere expression. He turned to me. “Josie.”

Was it just me, or did his gaze linger on me a little longer than usual before he turned and walked toward the circle of chairs set up near the front of the store.

“Show him the painting,” Charlie hissed.

“I will,” I hissed back. I looked down at it and realized I’d accidentally pulled the painting in too close to my chest when I’d come through the door and gotten paint on Charlie’s shirt. Dang it.

Everyone was leaning close to Mrs. Mabel, who was our resident tea-spiller. “Dylan Savage is back in town.”

Gene nodded. “I saw him out running this morning when I opened the store.Shirtless.”

Mr. Willingham nodded too, but then said, “You were shirtless?”

“No. Dylan was shirtless,” Gene said.

“Who?” Mr. Willingham took his glasses off and used his tie to wipe them clean.

“Sheriff Savage’s son,” Mrs. Mabel said.

“Okay, yes. David,” Mr. Willingham said, but with the kind of tone that showed he had no idea who Mrs. Mabel was talking about.

Mrs. Mabel waved at me and Charlie and continued, “I had him for all four years of high school in my English class.” Mrs. Mabel taughteveryonein Winterhaven for all four years of high school English, but she stated it as proudly as if it had been unique.

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