Royals (Royals #1)(61)

“Darling,” she drawls, “does anything about this look like the twenty-first century to you?”

“Fair enough,” I reply. “This is a bit BBC miniseries.”

Flora laughs then, and for the first time, I see that there might actually be a cool person beneath the whole haughty princess thing. Is anyone in this family what they seem like?

I follow her to the little table set up right behind everyone, putting down the plate and thermos, and I’m about to turn away when she catches my arm and says, “Daisy.”

When I face her, she slides her sunglasses up. Even though we’re all outside today, no photographers in sight, her makeup is perfect, hazel eyes lined with gray, lashes thick and black. “Thank you,” she says, and then rolls her eyes at herself.

“I can’t remember the last time I said that and meant it,” she adds. “But I mean it. I appreciate you keeping this between us.”

I smile and give her arm the most awkward pat known to man. “No problem. I’m just glad you don’t hate me because of Miles.”

Those pretty lashes flutter. “Miles?” she says, and then she gives one of those perfect, trilling laughs again. “Oh, no, I didn’t like you because of the entire situation.” She waves a hand over me, and I wonder if she means the American thing, Ellie, or my general me-ness.

“But now I see that you’re nothing like what the papers made you out to be. If you were after Seb or fame or anything like that, surely you’d try harder.”

“Thank you?” I reply. “I think?”

Shrugging, Flora dusts off her hands and looks over the table before reaching for a bottle of champagne and pouring herself a glass. It’s only around ten in the morning, so I pass when she offers me a flute, too.

There’s another boom from all the guns, more clay pigeons raining down, and while I don’t shriek, I do jump hard enough that Flora looks over at me, startled.

“I’m just gonna . . . not . . . be here,” I say awkwardly, jerking my thumb back toward the row of jeeps up the hill, and Flora nods.

“Toodles!” she says with a little wave of her fingers.

I wave back, but I cannot bring myself to say “Toodles.” I don’t even like thinking it, to be honest.

When I get back to the jeeps, Miles is the only one there, leaning against the side of one, biting into a sandwich. I perch myself on top of the folded-down tailgate of the jeep and pick up another thermos, turning it in my hands.

“Why aren’t you shooting?” I ask him, and he shrugs, folding his sandwich back up in wax paper.

“Not one of my favorite activities,” he says. He puts the sandwich down, then shoves his hands in his pockets, and for a second, I think we’re just going to sit there in total silence until we actually die of the awkwardness.

“Flora’s not giving you a hard time, is she?” Miles asks, pulling me out of my thoughts. I turn to see Flora at the bottom of the hill, joking with Gilly, and lift one shoulder.

“I think we might actually be becoming friends? Or at least not enemies.”

Miles makes a little noise in the back of his throat and takes off his cap for a second to scrub a hand over his hair. “She’s not so bad, Flo,” he says. “Or at least not as bad as she’d like people to think.”

I look back at him, wanting to ask about her, about them, but before I can, Miles nods at one of the jeeps. “Do you wanna go for a drive?” he asks, and I blink at him.

“With you?”

His lips quirk. “Unless you’d prefer the company of one of the sheep.”

That makes me smile in spite of myself.

And then he adds, “Hopefully there will be a good story in the papers about us sneaking off on this shooting trip. Glynnis will be thrilled.”

Oh, right. We’re spending time together because of how it looks, not because we actually want to.

I think of the other night at the ball, that weird little moment that passed between us, and then I grind that thought to dust under my mental boot.

“Good plan,” I tell him, hopping off the tailgate. “Let’s go be illicit.”

I don’t know if anyone sees us leave, and as we drive away, it occurs to me that I probably should’ve told Ellie we were going. But by the time I think of that, the jeep is already rattling over the hills, the wind blowing hard enough in the open top that we can’t talk.

The Highlands spread out before us, rolling fields, snow-capped hills, and I take a deep breath, grinning at the sheer prettiness of it all. It’s wide open in a way that makes me want to . . . I don’t know, run around with my arms thrown out or something.

The jeep slows as we approach a fence, and I look at Miles, curious.

He smiles back at me, then nods at the gate.

The jeep rumbles to a halt, and I can’t stop the sound of delight and surprise that escapes me. It’s embarrassingly close to a squeal.

But there, at the fence, is a shaggy red cow, his massive horns curling up from his head, long hair covering his eyes, and he is the actual cutest.

I hop out of the jeep, approaching the fence carefully, but the cow only munches on grass, clearly not that concerned with me.

“Ellie said you still hadn’t seen one,” Miles calls, and I turn to smile over my shoulder at him. “I hadn’t,” I say, and I reach out—very cautiously, those are some massive horns—and give the cow a little pat on his head, that long reddish hair rough under my fingertips.