Jane of Austin by Hillary Manton Lodge

Author:Hillary Manton Lodge
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2017-06-13T04:00:00+00:00

19

If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty.

—JAPANESE PROVERB

Jane

“So, you’ve been looking at places to open a new tea store?”

“Tea salon,” I corrected Sean while restraining a smile.

“Tea salon,” he echoed, his voice set at a comedic pitch.

“And yes, we looked. I don’t know.” I sighed. “There are spaces available, but the foot traffic is bad, or it’s too close to a Starbucks, or just plain terrible. There was a space, you know, at Hyde Park that we missed out on. I just…” I shook my head. “Maybe we can make one of the other spaces work. We might have to.”

“How long would it take to open?”

I leaned back against the sofa at his aunt’s place. “Hard to say. It would depend on where we land, on the permits, on how long it takes to get it looking right. Now that Margot’s settled into school and ballet, I need to talk Celia into getting a booth at the farmers’ market.” I cleared my throat. “I mean, I could do it myself, but Celia’s better with people than I am. Anyway, if we could start building a local clientele, that would be a good thing.”

He reached for my hand and toyed with my fingers. “How important is it for you to stay here?”

My spine straightened. “What?”

“The guys and I are talking about going on tour.” Sean laced his fingers through mine. “We’ve been registered to perform at South by Southwest for months, so we’re locked into that, but we might road-trip in between.”

“Oh,” I said, unable to hide the disappointment from my voice

He lifted my chin with the ends of his callused fingers. “Hey. Don’t look like that.”

“Like what?” I asked, trying and failing to sound chipper.

“Look. I was asking because I thought…I thought you might want to come too.”

My eyes widened. “With you?”

“Yeah.”

“On the tour?”

He leaned forward, drawing me into a languid kiss. “Yes.” Another kiss. “We should be touring, but I hate the idea of being away from you that long.”

“Me too.”

“So you’ll come?”

I winced, biting my lip. “Maybe? I don’t know. Margot’s getting settled in…”

“It’s just a few months. Margot’s a big girl.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Margot’s sixteen and moving across the country has thrown her for a loop. She hasn’t had the most stable life, not with how things shook out with our parents.”

“Come on. You’re her sister, not her parent.”

“I’m her legal guardian, actually. Celia and I share guardianship.” I took a deep breath. This was new territory with Sean. “Look, it’s a nice idea, but the timing is tricky, and I don’t have the money to travel like that.”

“You’re tagging along. It wouldn’t be expensive at all.”

“Food, travel, hotels alone…”

“We’ll work it out.”

I squeezed his hand. “I don’t want you to have to pay my way. And anyway, the timing…”

“What if we were married?” he asked.

My heart thudded in shock. “What?”

“Would you mind me paying if we were married?”

“I…I mean…,” I stuttered, failing at the task of trying to formulate a reply.

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