Page 151 of The Moment You Know

DAVID: Wait. Would the word ‘betrothed’ be used on a ranch? It doesn’t sound right.

DAVID: You’d obviously have to research that.

PAIGE: Mixing genres. That’s actually genius.

DAVID: It could be called The Duke and the Cowgirl.

PAIGE: I’m actually laughing so hard my eyes are watering.

DAVID: I’ve got another one. Want to hear it?

PAIGE: Give me a minute.

PAIGE: Okay, hit me.

DAVID: A spoiled countess named Matilda is being forced by her father, the Count of Fairfax, to marry a duke three times her age. She rebels and runs away to the wilds of Scotland, where she ends up broke (maybe ‘penniless’ is better?) and has to take employment as a governess to the two wild children of a widowed laird.

DAVID: We’ll call him Lachlan.

DAVID: At first, Lachlan and Matilda hate each other because she’s English, spoiled, and a bad governess, and he’s bossy and Scottish. They argue and fight a lot, which is basically foreplay for them, and leads to her losing her ‘innocence’ during steamy hate sex … and results in Matilda getting knocked up.

DAVID: Actually, for this time period, it would result in her being ‘with child’. My bad.

PAIGE: Good catch.

DAVID: Well, crap. I was wrong about Matilda’s father being a count. He would actually be an earl. So … the Earl of Fairfax.

DAVID: Historical accuracies are important. Otherwise the story might not be believable.

PAIGE: Yes. The target audience will expect complete accuracy.

PAIGE: So what happens after Matilda finds herself ‘with child’?

DAVID: Well, for the sake of drama, maybe she keeps the news to herself, and as her pregnancy hormones kick in, she starts acting crazy and cuts Lachlan off from sex. He naturally gets frustrated and starts to look elsewhere for ‘release’ so that when she finally does go tell him the good news, she finds him in a bit of a compromising situation, with his hand under the petticoats of one of the castle wenches. Upset, Matilda returns to England without saying goodbye, which pisses Lachlan off. He’s even more pissed when one of the castle maids tells him Matilda is ‘with child’.

DAVID: This is the maid in charge of the laundry, so she knows Matilda hasn’t had her monthly cycle in a while.

PAIGE: Oh, my God. I’m seriously dying over here.

DAVID: Anyway, when Lachlan calms down, he realizes that he loves the governess and must get her back. So he then follows her to England, but it takes him several weeks since he’s the laird and can’t leave his clan whenever he wants because there’s always clan business to attend to. It also takes him a little while to find where Matilda lives (no internet), but finally finds her at the church where she’s about to wed the old duke (he’s agreed to pass the child off as his own, since he’s too old to ‘sire’ any). Lachlan then demands the wedding be stopped, on the grounds that she’s carrying his child and not the duke’s.

DAVID: Now, the people in the village weren’t pleased that the countess was with child when she came home, but had accepted it because the duke was powerful and rich, so no one would cross him. But the laird’s announcement destroys Matilda’s reputation and she’s immediately cast off by the humiliated duke and disowned by her father.

DAVID: It would be great if Matilda had a fight with her father, where she flips him off or tells him to eat a bag of dicks, but that wouldn’t be historically correct, so … they could still have a fight, but it would have to be more dignified.

DAVID: Lachlan whisks the disgraced, non-countess back to Scotland so they can be married in front of his clan, who’s glad she’s no longer of English nobility, since they hate the English.

PAIGE: Holy shit.

DAVID: I think the second story might be better. Stories revolving around Scottish men are all the rage right now. Especially if they’re running around in kilts. By the way, I googled Outlander and that’s how I know about Scottish men in kilts being all the rage.

DAVID: Wait. I just thought of an alternate ending with a little extra drama: Matilda actually ends up getting married to the old duke before Lachlan arrives, which leads him to demand satisfaction and a duel at dawn the next day. Lachlan kills the old duke during the duel, Matilda has the fight with her father and gets disowned, and then she and Lachlan go back to Scotland to live happily ever after.

DAVID: What do you think? It could be called The Highlander’s Countess.

PAIGE: Okay, I’m dying again. And catchy title, by the way.

PAIGE: Maybe YOU should consider writing a book. Or two. I would totally read both of these stories.

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