Chapter 4

　　Setting me up with an old man Tommy? Tut Tut!

　　Rose had no intention of being harpooned into a date with some aging land owner, she had met the Laird in visits as a child and was pretty sure even then he had been married with children. Not her cup of tea at all. But then tastes among church going older women we’re bound to be completely out of whack with the tastes of a twenty-eight -year-old girl from Edinburgh.

　　‘Well thank you anyway, don’t go out of your way.’ She was trying to thank him, but he was already waving her off with a shaking head, which meant he was ignoring her refusals. He slid into his little van and with a beep of the horn pulled out to U-turn and left with another wave out of his side window.

　　Rose waved back, a feeling of complete deflation running over her now she had returned to rural silence. She hadn’t minded the quiet and peace the last couple of weeks, but now she was craving people after that interaction. She was intrigued about this dance too and she was not about to go to a ball, in however many weeks, knowing not a soul of her new community.

　　Rose turned back to the cottage and pushed open the door, walking inside just as Muffin peaked out to check all was clear, before snorting with a nose in the air as though he had personally chased off the visitor. He turned his little white bushy butt and trotted back off to her room, lately he’d been hoarding bones under her bed and loved nothing more than to lay in the dark underneath and chew on his prized possessions.

　　Moving further inside, after she closed the door, she pulled open the long envelope, dumping her other mail on the table in the hall and revealing a cream, elegant invitation with gold and brown scroll. It was announcing the event at Munro manor and was very classy. She frowned at the name Robert Munro under the Laird title and sighed, hoping to god the matchmaking wouldn’t continue at a public event as she really had no desire to date an older man at all, and judging by memory this one had to be in his late sixties by now.

　　The event was to raise funds for a local charity, they wanted to help build a new wing on the hospital and extend the children’s ward to include long term care rooms for children with more serious illnesses. How could Rose refuse that?

　　She put it on the top of the fridge, lightly running her fingers over the luxurious paper and already mentally going through the dresses in her wardrobe. She had never been to a dance that was so formal sounding before; she wondered if she would have anything at all to wear that wouldn’t look out of place in that big house.

　　She picked up a mirror and looked over her appearance almost automatically, while still mulling it over and shook her head. Sweaty and mucky, dirty fingernails and hair piled on top of her head in a haphazard mess.

　　This wouldn’t do for a town trip.

　　She turned, dropping the mirror and headed to the bathroom to run a bubble bath in a bid to remove the sweaty smell of desperation. A little spruce up and a trip to town to meet her new neighbours would help. If she played it cool and mingled, then they might not even notice that she was trying to find herself some new friends before it became glaringly obvious that she had none.

　　You know, make the first move, meet the locals. No longer be the stranger at the dance, but someone familiar. Less likely to get stared at.

　　Her internal pep talk was helping to quell the tight knot of apprehension at putting herself out there for the first time in years, hopefully by the time she came home it would have no need to even exist.