Page 9 of The Rose (The Godwicks 2)

“If you want me to,” he said. “Do you want me to?”

Lia didn’t answer.

“Well?” he asked.

“Let me get back to you on that.”

“Open your gift. Then you can tell me if I can keep flirting with you or not.”

Too intrigued to say no, Lia crossed the hall to the morning room. She found his gift in its plain brown wrapper. She tore off the paper, lifted the lid and pushed the gold foil tissue aside.

“Oh,” she said, unable to mask the delight in her voice.

He’d given her a copy ofThe Wind in the Willowsby Kenneth Grahame, her favorite novel of all time. The cover was a deep forest green with the Greek god Pan engraved on the front in gilt. This wasn’t simply a copy of her favorite book of all time—this was a rare first edition of her favorite book of all time.

“How did you know?” she asked him.

“It’s my favorite book, too,” he said.

“It is?” She didn’t know anyone who read it anymore, except children.

“I love the part where Ratty and Mole set out by boat at night on a search-and-rescue mission for the missing baby otter, and they accidentally end up—”

“Yes, on Pan’s Island,” Lia said, running her fingertips gently over the golden lines of Pan on the cover. “I love when they find Pan himself sitting there with the otter asleep at his feet.”

“And Ratty and Mole are overwhelmed by wonder and love,” August said.

“Yes, right.” She smiled like a child. “That’s my favorite part, too. I could recite the whole passage, I’ve read it so many times.”

“Surely not,” he said, a smile lurking at the corner of his mouth. He was teasing her, she knew it, but she didn’t care anymore. He’d knocked her guards down with one little gift. Without her meaning to do it, the words of her most precious story tumbled out.

“‘He looked in the very eyes of the Friend and Helper,’” Lia recited, “‘saw the backward sweep of the curved horns, gleaming in the growing daylight; saw the stern, hooked nose between the kindly eyes that were looking down on them humorously, while the bearded mouth broke into a half-smile at the corners...’”

Lia paused and flipped open the book to the exact page, handed it to him so he could read along and see that she didn’t miss a single word.

“‘All this he saw,’” she continued, “‘for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered.’

“‘“Rat!” he found breath to whisper, shaking. “Are you afraid?”’

“‘“Afraid?” murmured the Rat, his eyes shining with unutterable love. “Afraid! Of him? O, never, never! And yet—and yet—”’”

“‘“O, Mole, I am afraid!”’” August finished as he closed the book with a gentle thud and passed it back to Lia. She took it carefully from him and held it to her chest. Then he raised a hand to her face and, with a flick of his thumb, wiped a tear off the arch of her cheek.

“I stand corrected. You know yourWillows.”

“Oh, sorry,” she said. She put the book back into the tissue paper and hid it away in the box like she did with so many of the things that brought tears to her eyes. “Daddy used to read that book to me every night. Every summer day when I was little, we’d walk in the woods, looking for Pan’s Island.”

“Did you find it?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “But finding it wasn’t so much the point as looking for it with Daddy.” She laughed to stop herself from shedding another tear. “Anyway, if I’d found it I wouldn’t be here. I’d still be there.”

“You’ll find it someday.”

She wasn’t sure why, but when he said that, she almost believed him. Must have been his Greek accent.

“Thank you very much,” Lia said. She was determined to take control of this conversation again. “This was very kind of you, Mr. Bowman.” He arched his eyebrow. “Sorry, August.”

He looked to the left, looked to the right. He crooked two fingers at her, beckoning her to step forward to hear a secret. She leaned in so close she could have kissed him. He bent his head and put his lips to her ear.

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