RIPLEY
A few days later, as I’m working on the back deck and reviewing orders from plant shops in the area that carry our flowers, a voice whispers,“Psst.”
It’s Haven, and I set the laptop down and head to the railing. She’s been shooting here all day at the farm, and there’s clearly a break right now. Most of the crew is near the rows of Impress Purple and the white bench at the top of the path. New Chris and Haven have been talking on the bench in an important scene since all Very Important Conversations are had on benches.
“What’s going on?”
She glances around the vast lawn, checking for eavesdroppers before she mutters, “Check your texts.”
This is top-secret level. I spin around and grab my phone from the chair, clicking open her message sent five minutes ago.
Haven: Remember when we played that game with Linc Turner?
With curious eyes, I look up at my troublemaking sister, sensing where she’s going. Her eager smile gives her away. I tap out a fast reply.
Ripley: You mean the one where I broke up with him for you because the asshole was a cheater?
The second her phone pings, she nods excitedly. “Yes.”
I growl. “Who hurt you and where is he?”
Shaking her head, she replies at the speed of light.
Haven: The opposite! Is there any chance you could, you know, leave my hotel in a sort of noticeable way tonight? So any photogs or fans will think I’ve left?
My jaw comes unhinged, and I mouth, “You naughty minx.”
If a shrug could sayyes, I am, hers does. Without wasting a second, I write back.
Ripley: Does this mean you want to have a date with William at your hotel or out of your hotel?
Haven: Both, hopefully! We want to go to Duck Falls and do a bookstore blind date—it’s where you go to a bookshop and pick a book you think the other person will like.Then have dinner someplace kind of quiet and out of the way. He sent me flowers this morning to ask me if I wanted to go on a date with him.
That sounds fantastic. I smile so big as I meet her gaze, not even waiting to text back, instead asking quietly, “Are you going to go public?”
“It’s so early,” she says, a nervous smile twisting her lips. “But would it make it easier for you if I did?”
My brow pinches. “What? No! What do you mean?”
“Do you want me to go public so people know I’m not with Chris? Maybe then you won’t have to deal with all the trouble of having a bodyguard.”
I blanch for so many reasons. First, she and William have only gone on a few actual dates. I don’t want to pressure her to go public to make my little life easier. Plus, what if she and William don’t last long? Then she’s having to acknowledge a breakup in the public eye. Best they be solid before she does announce a relationship status. Besides, the shoot’s over soon, and even if she soft-launched her romance tonight, I’d probably still need a bodyguard for the rest of the shoot given how Haven’s star has risen quickly over the last year. I also really,reallylike having a bodyguard, it turns out.
I grab her wrist and squeeze it. “Nope. What I want, though, are all the details of your date with the hot Irish bookstore owner.”
“And you’ll get them,” she says.
Then Tabitha calls out, “Haven Addison.”
My sister rushes back to the set, waving to me as she goes.
That night, we prep for the full switcheroo, enlisting our bodyguards in it too, so we can sell the ruse to any photographers hanging around outside The BookHouse. Banks is off tonight, so one of his backups is covering me, a sturdy guy named Marcus who Banks knows from the Marines too.
“This might be all for nothing,” Haven says as we settle onto her bed to polish my nails. “Sometimes the press is here at the hotel. Sometimes random tourists are, and they take pics of me.”
“It’s definitely not for nothing. Did you see those set pics the other day?” The film’s PR department released more photos from the shoot.
“I did. It’s so surreal,” Haven says, then shifts again to the matter at hand. “You really don’t mind?”
