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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
India Holton
Read between
June 17 - June 25, 2025
plume
wiles,
Iniquity
he very much wanted Beth to talk—about birds, or anything, really. He’d luxuriate for as long as he possibly could in the precise, polysyllabic tones of her voice and the interesting things she had to say.
abseiling
There simply wasn’t enough space in the room, although at this point Devon suspected there wasn’t enough space in the entire world for him to comfortably breathe, knowing that Beth Pickering existed.
reverie
impishness.”
dubious
“Pedagogical
“If I go to birding university,” she asked as he continued down, “will I meet more handsome men like you?” Devon laughed. But Beth, reaching the ground, called up, “You should hope not! Handsome men are all too often scoundrels!” “You think I’m handsome, Miss Pickering?”
ballast.”
alabaster
assuaged—now
I miss the me I was with him.
He lifted his gaze, and as their eyes met again, it felt like coming home.
“She’s my professional rival but I always seem to end up flirting with her.”
He hadn’t expected to see Beth again. But when he’d arrived at Paddington Station, there she’d been, buying a ticket, looking as frazzled as he felt—but also gorgeous, gorgeous; how had he ever thought her merely pretty?
She was every superlative in every ridiculous emotional dictionary printed in a man’s heart.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, poor lad,” said the woman to the left of him, patting his knee. He smiled. “A celestial being, in fact. Beautiful, with eyes like the sky.”
Devon stared out the window, thinking about reuniting with Beth catching the caladrius, kissing Beth presenting the caladrius to the IOS committee, and sinking himself into Beth’s warm soft depths like a man experiencing a little death and temporarily visiting heaven winning Birder of the Year and the best reward of all, Beth’s love tenure.
Home, he thought with a silent sigh.
he wanted to be the kind of man this bookish, brilliant woman might come to like. So he just sat quietly.
He grinned. “Ruthless woman.” “Ruthless enough to shout for a custodian to drag you out of here and have you arrested for trespassing and—and—academic espionage.” It was a lie. She was flirting with him. Did this mean she liked him?
“Prevarication
When she stopped at a door and began rummaging through her satchel for the key, it was all he could do to not lean seductively against the wall, smile, and call her beautiful out of sheer habit.
insouciant.
“You smell like lavender,” he murmured. She blinked, thrown off-balance, but did not retreat. “It calms birds.” It was doing the opposite to him.
“Villain,” she said lightly. “Angel,” he retorted.
“Conjecture on the potential connubial eventualities of our currently emergent relational situation in all its frangibility would be inadvisably precipitate and, to any perspicacious individual, contraindicated by prudence. Wouldn’t you agree?” “Er…” The landlady’s expression fell slack.
The man might be a villain, but he was a decent, good-hearted villain, and she could honestly no longer think otherwise. He listened to her, always made her feel welcome, and now here he was caring that she might be hurt.
Messrs.
dastardly
Her attraction to this man was so deep, it was practically geological.
licentious
avaricious
(reconnaissance),
What I learned from birds in love: turn your heart into a dance.
baser
déclassé.
Apart from these dreamy figments of her lover (her lover! squee! echoed a gaggle of delighted thoughts,
A woman felt she could do anything if she had pockets.
Feted
God, he loved her. Loved her so much he kept bringing God into it,
countenance
disconcerted
“It requires very little analysis,” she said, “for me to conclude that your proposal has copious merits, and that acceptance would be the most profitable response on my part; therefore, please do take remittance of it.”
