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“Don’t argue with her,” Max agreed. “You won’t win.”
“She might. She’s a woman. She knows how to argue.” Esme set my plate on top of hers. “It was only a month ago you were saying that you weren’t interested in spending any time with her, yet you’re snogging her face off on a regular basis.”
Oh.
My.
God.
My cheeks burnt at her words, and almost every muscle in my body tightened. I squirmed in my seat, rubbing my heel across the top of my foot like I had a bad itch there that I couldn’t quite get rid of, but it wasn’t an itch.
It was just good old embarrassment.
“Must you be so immature?” Max asked, seemingly completely unbothered by his grandmother’s words.
How was henotembarrassed by that?
The last time I’d felt like this, my brother had walked in on me masturbating.
Not my finest moment.
Esme grinned. “Yes. I just wanted one of you to confirm it, and her cheeks just did.”
I pressed my lips together.
Oops.
“Grandma,” Max said.
“Maximillian,” she retorted. “I was just pointing out that everyone knows you’ve got a weird little thing going on, so there’s not much point in hiding it.”
“Has it occurred to you for a second that we’re not hiding it as much as we are simply keeping our private lives private?”
Esme paused.
“We’re both public figures, although I’d argue that Ellie is more commonly known than I am,” he continued. “A romance author who writes about the aristocracy being seen to be ‘dating’ a duke would be nothing short of a headache, don’t you think?”
Esme puckered her lips and tapped her thumb against the table. “I suppose I never considered that.”
“Of course you didn’t,” Max continued. “More to the point—”
“It’s nothing serious,” I said. He was just going to dilly-dally his way to the point. “We’re… Well, I suppose you could say that we’re quite good friends now, but it’s really not any deeper than that.”
Esme narrowed her eyes at me. “Did he make you say that?”
Laughing, I shook my head. “No. I’m aware of his position on relationships. When it comes down to it, we really are just friends.”
“Hmm. If you say so.” She picked up the dirty dishes and turned, then looked over her shoulder back at me. “But like I said to him once, friends don’t fuck, Ellie.”
I raised my eyebrows, smiling. “They do in my books.”
“Yes,” Esme agreed with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “And then they get married in the last chapter.”
Ah.
Yes.
Well.
