my best friends, but your girlfriend can’t do a Southern accent to save her life.” Granger tried to give Skye a disapproving glare but it only made her laugh harder.
“I. Will. Get. It.” She managed to gasp between giggles. “Bless my heart!”
Granger’s head snapped to look at her. “That wasn’t half bad. What did we do differently between you laughing nonstop and my teaching?”
“Not your teaching, your colorful disapproval,” Skye said in her best Southern accent.
“Well, you had one shining moment of glory and then it was gone,” Granger grumbled.
Trent chuckled and knelt on the seat in front of Skye and looked over the back at them. “We could get her drunk. Every woman I know gets a strong Southern accent when they’ve been drinking, no matter where they’re from,” Trent said to Granger.
Granger shrugged. “It’s worth a shot. Although, to be fair, you’re only around Southern women when they get drunk.”
“True, but it could be an experiment.”
“Then let’s get her drunk as a skunk,” Granger agreed.
“Drunk as a skunk,” Skye tried to drawl but really only emphasizing the K sound. Oh boy. This was going to take a while.
“Stop thinking about it,” Ryker’s deep voice broke into their conversation. “When you try hard is when it sounds horrible. You have to find the natural music to your voice. The way it ebbs and flows and rounds out. You drop the harshness and then let it run free.”
Trent wanted to lean over and hug his cousin, but Ryker wasn’t ready for that. However, it appeared that he was ready to take a step forward.
Skye nodded and tried again. “Ebb and flow. Rounded edges to the words. Okay.” Skye began to hum a little and then looked up at Ryker, who was now standing in the aisle. “Druunk as a skuunk,” she said, taking off the harsh K sound and letting the U roll through her mouth.
Ryker gave her a slight nod of approval and Granger stood up and pretended to bow to Ryker. Skye laughed and soon they were all feeding Skye lines from the movie script to practice. By the time they landed, Trent had felt a change in more than just his and Skye’s relationship, but in his and Ryker’s as well. It was time to enjoy the present and look forward to the future.
26
Skye didn’t look around the house or land as she and Trent toured Mrs. Cramble’s property. Instead, she watched Trent the entire time. She wanted to gauge his reaction to see what he really thought about it. They’d been home for two days and Skye had let Morgan handle the PR storm that the trial spawned while she got settled in Shadows Landing.
Agent Shaw had told her while they couldn’t close the threatening letters case yet, they were confident that after Jim’s and Lenny’s upcoming interview with the FBI, they would be able to. Jim and Lenny had both escaped to their houses in the Hamptons to hide from the fallout. Of course, Skye owned the house Lenny was hiding in. She’d just never used it. It had been purchased as an investment and, as she was finding out, Lenny used it as his personal estate. Tomorrow morning he’d get a rude awakening courtesy of the private security teams Aiden Creed had arranged for her. They were going to all her properties and removing anyone and anything not belonging to Skye.
Most of Jim’s female clients had left the agency. While they were signing with a new female agent on the scene, Skye was holding off for now. She had the Marie Lockend audition coming up and she was lobbying hard for a part in Gemma Davies’s newest film adaptation. Olivia was recuperating and still giving them hell from home. She’d insisted at looking over any contract Skye got between now and the time Skye got a new agent.
But now all of Skye’s focus was on Trent and what he thought of the Cramble house.
“This is fantastic. I haven’t been back here since I was a teenager and we’d sneak through yards to get home.”
Skye felt the excitement bubbling up inside her. “So, it’ll work for what you need?”
“It’ll more than work. I can open the back of the old detached garage and have a view of the river while I work. There’s even enough room to build a state-of-the-art warehouse to store the finished pieces and my wood.”
Skye lost her battle to the bubbles and did a happy dance. “Great! I’m going to put