My eyes skitter off my brother and find themselves wholly taken by my ceiling. “I won’ttormenthim.”
“August.”
“I’m a perfectly regular and easy-to-live-with person. One might say I am also alovely individual, even.”
“August.” Wynnter’s dry look suggests he would not be the one to say such a thing, but surelysomeonewould. December, perhaps.
“I have a stellar idea,” I present, lovely-y. “Don’t you think we should let poor, sad Dominic decide for himself what he’d like to do?” Pretending to be my most civil, I turn and smile sweetly at the lone prince, lashes fluttering. “What say you, poor, sad Dominic?”
Tortured—even though, notably, I haven’t done anything—Dominic says, “I couldn’t impose on you like that.”
“I make pancakes for breakfast sometimes,” I inform him. “Not pathetic instant oatmeal and cereal likesome other people. Warm, fluffy pancakes. With lots of real maple syrup, butter, chocolate chips, and whip cream.”
Dominic’s lips part.
“I could even be convinced to place a strawberry on top. For health.”
His brows knit. “Why would you want to put up with a stranger who is clearly having a string of the worst luck of his life?”
Why?
Silly man.
“Because—” I study him. “—I find it fascinating.”
His Adam’s apple bobs. “It?”
“Your story.” Bringing my hand back to my heart, I bow to the royalty before me. “It would be an honor to watch more of it unfold up close. I believe it has the potential to be…very educational.”
When I peer up at him through my lashes, I discover that he’s starstruck.
The regal grace and beauty surrounding him pauses time for fractions of moments. Finally, warmth enters his eyes, and a certain peace overcomes him. With practiced fluidity, he returnsmy bow. “If you’re sure, I’d be grateful to find myself in the kindness of your charity.”
“I’m quite sure.”
When we both straighten, I ponder the shift in his outward demeanor—from distressed to calm with an underlying confidence that I would have assumed out of character just minutes ago.
How…peculiar.
Who knows what I’ll find when I dive deeper in.
Chapter 6
?
I am, yet again, finding myself crushed beneath the weight of my own stark insufficiency.
Alister
I could live here forever. August’s house is warm and bright and cozy. Yellow accentseverything. Sunflowers and lemons pull deep dark wood shades together with the cream and comfort of her padded furniture. Books and shelves in immaculately organized condition tuck themselves into every nook and cranny and crevice.
Her home, in a few words, is a fairytale come alive or a summer oasis given form.
And now that she’s welcomed me into it, I am one step closer to becoming a part of it forever.
Yet I am also still so, so far away.
Wincing, I review my spreadsheet on my laptop while I’m securely seated in the corner of August’s couch against the wall. It’s the first time I’ve been on my laptop today, yet instead of bothering to check on my work things, I am scouring my notes on how to craft August’s perfect romance. What I have before me is a culmination of what her binder requested paired with the common themes and male lead habits I’ve been researching since my order of her books started to arrive.
