Page 25 of A Recipe for Love
‘Really?’
He paused. ‘My grandmother does not try to persuade people. She’s more for telling them what to do outright.’
‘She doesn’t like me.’
‘She doesn’t know you yet.’ He feared that Bella was absolutely correct. ‘Are you having second thoughts?’
She grinned. ‘Oh, I had those ages ago. I’m on to about seventeenth thoughts.’ She reached a hand out and he leaned across to take it. ‘All the thoughts are the same though. All of this is crazy but you and me works, doesn’t it?’
‘It does.’
‘Good.’ She squeezed his hand. ‘What about you? What have you been doing?’
‘My grandmother’s crash course in estate management.’
Bella winced.
‘Your ankle hurting?’
She shook her head. ‘My brain is hurting. Is estate management up your street?’
‘It’s what I was raised to do.’
Now she sat all the way up in the bath. ‘That’s not what I asked.’
‘No.’ He closed his eyes for a second. Bella was a fish out of water here, and she’d already been thrust into the heart of his grieving family. He should be looking out for her, not burdening her with his worries. ‘It’s fine. How about you? I’m sorry about…’ He pointed at her swollen ankle.
She shrugged. ‘So maybe there was a tiny moment where I thought the landscape was out to get me.’
It must have felt that way. Even with her sitting right in front of him, he was still struggling to picture his feisty, modern, impulsive Spanish beach girl fitting in at Lowbridge. And if Bella didn’t fit, what did that mean for him?
She flicked water at him from her fingertips. ‘I’m not going to be beaten, though. I will charm this place into loving me.’
His disbelief must have flickered across his face.
‘I’m serious,’ she insisted. ‘You saw. By the time you found me I had a whole flock of adoring sheep fans following me around. I’m a modern day…’ she paused. ‘Little Miss Muffet?’
He shook his head.
‘Didn’t she have sheep?’
‘No. Spider, and it freaked her out.’
‘Who was the one with the sheep then?’
‘Little Bo Peep?’
‘No.’ Bella frowned. ‘The lamb girl?’
‘Mary had a little lamb?’
‘Yes! Eating out of my hand they were.’ She grinned. ‘Today some sheep. Tomorrow your grandma. You’ll see.’
Adam wished he shared her confidence, but where Bella apparently saw only sunlight and new adventures, Adam saw dark clouds.
‘So, like, can you go to college to learn to be in charge of a big posh estate then?’
Adam managed a smile at that. ‘You can. I didn’t, though.’ Much to his grandmother’s displeasure.
