Page 64 of Duke It Out
She colours for a moment then starts pulling petals from one of the daisies, letting them fly off on the breeze. “Sorry,” she says, wrinkling her nose. “Yeah, there’s not much to do in the evenings, so?—”
“Are we boring you?”
“Oh god, no—” She looks at me for a moment. “You’re teasing me, aren’t you?”
I raise a brow and allow her the faintest hint of a smirk. “So, what are you working on?”
She drops the flowers and rubs both cheeks with her hands. “I don’t know how much Annabel told you.”
“You know Annabel. She tends to talk so much that one survives by pretending to listen.”
This makes her laugh.
“I wrote a book and submitted it to publishers. When it got turned down, I just stopped. Like that was my one and only shot.”
“That surprises me.”
“It does?”
I look steadily at her. “You’ve stuck at the diaries no matter what’s been thrown at you. God knows I haven’t made it easy.”
She gives me a sideways look as if she’s not sure how to take the compliment.
“From what I gather from the creative industries, it’s a case of keeping going with the bit between your teeth until someone listens. I’d have thought you’d be quite good at that.”
“I think you’ve got a better opinion of me than I do of myself.”
I laugh. “I think that’s generally the case. Human nature, and all that. So, what’s changed?”
“In what way?”
“You’re writing again. Something new?”
“The second book in the series. Janey wanted to know what happened next.” She looks up at the sky as the bird ofprey calls into the silence. “The thing is I kind of thought life was going to stop at thirty-four, because my mother died at that age. That probably doesn’t make any sense.”
“You’d be surprised.” I pick up a loose stone and turn it over in my hand.
“So now here I am, and there’s just me. My grandmother brought me up and she died three years ago. I felt a bit unmoored—” She laughs. “I can’t imagine you know how that feels, when you’re responsible for all of this.”
I huff out a laugh. If only she knew. I’m one diary entry away from all of this ship veering out of control with nobody willing to take the helm.
“So now you’re going to have another go with another publisher?”
She shrugs. “Right now, I’m having fun writing, and despite my agent’s best efforts to force me into a corner and write what the market wants, I’m going to see what happens.”
There’s a long moment of silence.
Eventually I push myself back to standing. “Come on. You should see the view from the top of the ridge while we’re here. You can see all the way down to the shoreline.”
We’re back by late afternoon. The house looks deceptively peaceful from the drive, but I know that inside the frenzy of preparation for the ball will be reaching a crescendo. One week to go before some sort of normality can reign, and I can get back on with the job in hand.
“So Finn won’t be here for the ball?”
It feels like it’s the only thing on everyone’s bloody mind. I pull up the Defender round the back of the house and take the keys out of the ignition, turning to look at her for a moment.
“It’s not really Finn’s thing.”
She smirks. “I kind of got that impression.”
