Page 85 of The English Queen

Beth giggled. “Remarkable.”

“Don’t rush into anything,” Robbie said. “You have a long life together. Don’t sweat the small stuff. Sometimes, you go to bed angry. It’s being human. Don’t hide things from one another. Oh, and the big one, don’t assume the other is being a complete tosser without getting confirmation that is the case.”

“I think Vanna said it much more succinctly, dear brother. She said, ‘don’t assume the worst without verification’.”

“You can tell what we have worked on.”

“It’s good advice. Sometimes, he is hard to read. Inversely, he says I’m the most infuriating woman he has ever met and that’s a compliment.”

“What?”

Beth shrugged. “He loves when I goad him. He would rather be frustrated than bored. It’s a high compliment.”

“You two are odd, but it works.”

“Yeah, it works.”

“Thank you for being there for us,” Beth said. “For not like… freaking out. For being champions of us. It was weird at first and you had your concerns but… it all worked out. I hope you will treat me like a peer. I know it’s weird.”

“Duncan is struggling with it. But I will try my best. Of course, if you ribbit at me, we’ll just backslide.”

Beth laughed. “I will always ribbit at you. I could be 100 and I still would. And what’s worse? My children are going to torture you with it, too.”

“Torture is the wrong word. I’d find it altogether darling. Of course, the day you have a baby is the day I feel patently ancient.”

“You’re younger than my husband, Robbie. Get over yourself!”

“Well, if they ribbit at me, I will be lucky, either way,” Robbie said as the song ended. “Go find your husband.”

“I will,” Beth said.

She kissed his cheek and left.

Robbie wondered where the fuck the time had gone.

?????

“Can you tell me one thing, Louis?” Beth asked.

She soaked up the sun. laying out on the bow of her family’s yacht. They could see the blue waters of the Caribbean in every direction.

“What?” Louis looked over from his book, confused.

“How did you do it?”

“Do what?”

“Send the letters,” Beth answered.

“A variety of ways. This still fascinates you, Bethany?”

“Of course, it does.”

Louis chuckled. “Okay, I will tell you. If I was local, a courier. If I wasn’t, I’d send a courier to our embassy, they’d send it as diplomatic mail overnight in a sealed envelope before handing it to another courier who would run to get you flowers before the drop off. It was a total abuse of government resources. I regret nothing.”

“You wooed me by abusing your power?” Beth pretended to be offended.

“I had one card to play like I said, mijn maanstraal, right?”

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