Highland Fling - A Funny Chick Lit Romance (COMPLETE)

Do You Like Me, Gaby?

 We end up stuck at the stall for the rest of the afternoon and into the early evening, the email sign-ups coming in thick and fast. Every time I try to ask Jack the questions, what did you need to check, and which direction do you want to go in, another prospective tourist butts in. "'Scuse me, but do we get to see Castle Leoch on this tour?" or "Do I need to learn Gaelic to understand Jamie properly?" My customer service skills fly out the window as I am desperate to return to the previous conversation. Beside me, Jack sighs, plasters on a fake smile and replies, Yes, Castle Leoch otherwise known as Doune Castle IS part of the tour, and no, no Gaelic necessary. By the time, it gets to seven o'clock, I want to collapse on top of something warm and comfortable. And with someone. I beg fate not to let me be mistaken about what I thought Jack meant.

At last the crowds drift away. They file out the park and stalls begin to pack up. Cars parked everywhere, the car park, the fields set up for over-flow and the streets rev up engines as too many people attempt to leave at once. I suspect Lochalshie is about to experience a once-in-a-lifetime event—a rush hour and a traffic jam. Stewart returns, more welcome this time as he has Jolene and Katya with him and they offer to pack up the stall for us. Katya repeats her thumbs up and I smile back, happy to forgive her for her earlier meddling.

Jack grabs my hand. "Want to escape?"

I nod fervently, exhaustion banished at once.

"C'mon then," he says, pulling me in the loch's direction. "Let's talk paintings and misunderstandings."

At the far side of the loch, I spot Stewart and Jolene, Scottie doing his wildly excited diving for ducks thing, and I send up a prayer that I won't need to rescue him again. Jolene waves, Stewart doing the same when he turns to see what his girlfriend is doing.

The whole place is adjusting back to normal. When Caitlin and her entourage left two hours ago, the vloggers, bloggers and journalists vanished soon after. I'm glad. They all spent shed-loads of money while they were here which is brilliant, but I've decided I'm a local now, English and not having lived here that long status notwithstanding. I prefer Lochalshie when I look around it and recognise everyone I see, especially this one, the kilted, red-headed Scot who wants to know why I never bothered finding out the truth from the source.

"You could have asked me," he says, taking hold of my hand again. He could do that a thousand times, I decide, and I'll never tire of it. The wind lifts tiny locks of copper hair and the question's curious, rather than accusing.

"What?" I say. "If you were still in love with a beautiful woman whose painting you clung onto for dear life?"

"I thought you were interested in that American dude," he adds. "Or you were going back to your ex. The WhatsApp group kept talking about it, and I didn't want to..."

"You could have asked me!" Ditto, hmm?

I tell him about my mother and her belief that you should never ask a question if you don't want to know the answer. He grins and I watch the movement, one I've memorised over the short time we've been together. It starts slowly, a lift to the corners of his mouth, as if he's trying it out for size. The uplift settles and then widens until the smile lights up his whole face. It touches his eyes and they sparkle.

"Do you like me, Gaby?"

Oh. Not fair.

I decide he doesn't get it all his way. "I tried asking you a few questions," I say, turning away so we're not eye to eye any more. Dark clouds hover, the ever-present threat of rain. Who cares? Elements do your worst, I tell the skies. You can rain on me forever more and I won't care. I am ninety percent sure of what is happening here—there's nothing as certain as death or taxes is another of my mother's sayings hence my ten percent left aside as a cautionary gesture—and the bubble of happiness inside me is impenetrable. "And you were dead rude."