Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 66387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 332(@200wpm)___ 266(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66387 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 332(@200wpm)___ 266(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
“Wow,” Nina says, stopping to pull off her backpack. The lake is before us, snuggled up against a wall of a mountain, with several enormous waterfalls that fall to the lake below.
“This is brilliant,” I agree. “Well worth the hike to get here.”
“I’m going to dip my toes in,” Nina announces. Nick starts to disagree, but I shake my head.
“There’s no one here,” I say softly. “And we’re all nearby.”
Liam nods in agreement, and we watch as Nina strips out of her socks and shoes and then wades to her knees in the water.
“It’s cold,” she cries. “So freaking cold.”
“It’s glacier run-off,” Liam says. “It never warms up.”
“Fascinating.” I follow her lead, taking off my trainers and socks and following her into the water. “Oh, it takes your breath away, doesn’t it?”
“Oh, yeah, but it’s warming up now. Or I’m getting used to it. Or my legs are going to fall off.”
“We can’t have that, darling.” I lean in to whisper in her ear. “I quite enjoy having these legs on my shoulders while I do wicked things to you.”
“I quite enjoy that myself,” she says, trying to mimic my accent.
“You sound Australian,” I say with a laugh. “Not British.”
“I’ll get it down eventually.” She shrugs a shoulder and climbs onto a boulder that’s completely surrounded by shallow water. “Let’s sit up here and have lunch. Except our lunch is in my backpack onshore.”
“I’ll be right back.”
I fetch her pack and walk back out to the boulder, climb up, and sit next to her. “Don’t look now, but the others are eating, too.”
“Seriously?” She whips her head around and grins when she sees Nick and Liam biting into sandwiches. “I packed the food for them and told them they’d better eat it because we’re hiking and burning too many calories to be stoic and strong.”
“So you threatened the staff. Lovely.”
She laughs. “No, I told them to eat. It’s silly that they don’t eat when they’re with us.”
“No, it’s not.” I set my crisps aside and catch her chin in my fingers. “They’re protecting us. It’s not silly because they’re doing their job.”
“What are they protecting us from?”
“Assassination attempts, over-eager fans, kidnapping.” She’s stopped chewing and is staring at me with stunned, wide eyes.
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m not. I get death threats every day, Nina. And someone almost snatched Ellie once when she was very little. Sometimes, it’s more innocent than that. Fans want to hug, touch. And if they’re particularly brave, they try to grope or kiss.”
“Ew.”
“Exactly. We have security nearby to control those around us so we can live our lives.”
“Well, that’s great. But I don’t want to be one of those people who ignore them. Pretends like they aren’t there. They’re human beings, and if they’re going to be near me all of the time, I want to be friendly with them.”
“You can be friendly, but there is a line. They’re not our mates. They’re employees.”
“I understand that.” She chews thoughtfully. “Speaking of that, we’ll probably need to hire a housekeeper. I’ve always cleaned my own place, but the new house is way too big for me to keep up with.”
“I certainly don’t expect you to clean the house.” I pop a crisp into my mouth. “Certainly Jenna or Willa must know someone.”
“I’ll ask them. I spoke to Jenna last night about managing my old house, and she said she’d be glad to. So, I’ll have someone go in and give it a good scrubbing, make sure everything is as it should be, and she’ll take it over from there.”
“I’ll go with you to walk through it,” I offer. “And I know Liam had one of his men drive the boat down the lake to park it in the boathouse of the new place.”
“That boathouse is ridiculous,” she says, shaking her head. “I just need one little slip.”
“Well, if family visits in the summer, we’ll have several boats on hand for them to use. Callum is especially fond of the water.”
“Really?”
“Yes, he’s in the Royal Navy and is more comfortable on the water than most of us are on land. So, we’ll get use out of the boathouse.”
“Not to mention, it has its own apartment,” she says. “I went down there this morning to look around, and I was surprised to find it. There’s more space in that house than we will ever use.”
“It’s an investment,” I remind her. I want to also remind her that we may someday fill it with children, but we’re not there yet.
Nina’s loosened up a lot with me over the past few weeks. She doesn’t tense up when I touch her or use terms of endearment. She’s quicker to laugh, and she doesn’t watch every move I make with wary eyes.
I’ve gained her trust.
One day, I hope to earn her love.
But I know that mentioning babies right now isn’t the way to do that.