Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 121460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Brodan’s expression softened and he cuddled me into his side. “I just … I’m a bit overwhelmed by the facts.”
“This whole venture would require time and money, and it’s out of your comfort zone … but you’ve done it before. A few things this year have pushed you out of your comfort zone. Look how those turned out.”
At my teasing, he smirked. “Aye, they turned out quite nicely, didn’t they?”
Thinking this was my moment, the perfect moment, I opened my mouth to say it. To tell him. But the words got stuck, and before I could drag them out, Brodan pulled me down beside him on the couch. “Now the other thing we’d need to decide is if we’d open the distillery to the public. I want your opinion on a few things. Here, look …”
Just like that, my moment was gone.
Or I’d choked on it.
Pushing my frustration aside, I forced myself to engage in the conversation.
34
Monroe
I noticed nothing out of the ordinary that morning when I got my coffee from Flora’s, but I was distracted because I hadn’t told Brodan I loved him yet. For the past few days, I’d allowed myself to be waylaid by other things, and it was pure nonsense on my part. I loved him. I loved Brodan. There was no denying it, so what was the point in not telling him? Ugh, I had to get it together.
Tonight, I promised myself. I would tell him tonight come hell or high water.
Having made that decision just in time for the kids coming in that morning, I was more cognizant of my surroundings, and I noted that, not only did colleagues I passed in the hall look at me strangely, but parents beyond the waiting children were grouped together, whispering and staring.
I thought maybe I was being paranoid … but nope.
They were definitely a lot of parents eyeballing me as I welcomed the kids inside the building at the sound of the bell. Once the kids were settled, I shrugged off the strange feeling until a teaching assistant from P4 came into my class to ask a question on behalf of her teacher. She stared hard at me, eyes a wee bit round and dazed.
What on earth?
Finally, when I walked into the staff room at break and all talking ceased upon my arrival, my indignation rose. I strode toward Ellen. “Right, what’s going on?” I asked her.
She raised an eyebrow at my tone. “What are you talking about?”
“Everybody staring at me and whispering. Have I done something?”
Ellen looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “Monroe, I really have no idea what you’re talking about.”
She genuinely didn’t seem to.
Someone cleared their throat behind me, and I turned to see Summer Smith, the young P2 teacher, holding out her phone. She gave me a sheepish smile. “I think this might be why.”
Frowning, I took her phone, and as soon as I read the screen, my stomach plummeted. It was an article on a national tabloid’s website with the headline, “Star Finds Love in the Highlands,” along with a great big bloody photograph of Brodan kissing me passionately on Castle Street, near the cottage. Smaller images followed of us walking down the street arm in arm. I looked tiny next to him. It was almost funny. In one of them, I was laughing at something he’d said, looking straight ahead while he gazed down at me with such tenderness, my breath caught. Anyone looking at that photo would know he loved me.
It took me a moment to drag my eyes from the photograph to the article. I sped-read the story, and dread filled me as they named a familiar social media influencer as their source for the original story. I clicked on the link, and her profile opened.
Harriet Bloody Blume.
I’d met her last summer, and she’d tried to get me to spill details about the Adairs.
Seeing the picture of Brodan and me on her grid, I clicked it and opened a video in which she sat with books in her background. Uncaring that everyone in the staff room could hear, I listened as she spewed lies.
Panic built up from my gut until my heart raced way too hard. Sweat slickened my palm as I listened to the vicious wee cow tell her five million followers, and thus the world, that I’d talked to her exclusively. And someone—say, Brodan—might believe her because she had details about our relationship. She knew we were friends since school. She knew I’d loved him and that he’d left. She knew I felt abandoned by him. And now she knew we were dating and living together in the cottage on Castle Street. That I spent Christmas and New Year’s with his family. That we were serious.
How did she know all these things?
“She’s lying,” I whispered, feeling a comforting hand on my shoulder. “I didn’t tell her any of this. She’s lying.”