Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127368 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 637(@200wpm)___ 509(@250wpm)___ 425(@300wpm)
Reluctantly, Portia slid out of bed. She rushed toward the bathroom.
I scooted over to the edge of the bed, staying under the covers.
Christine sat down with me, eyes to my temple.
“Everyone’s saying lovely things about you,” she murmured, turning to the box, flicking it open. “I would have liked to have met you before you were bleeding and given a fright.”
That almost made me laugh.
She turned to me. “It’s not bad, but I’ll have to clean it and that might not feel good.”
“Do what you gotta do,” I invited.
Portia returned, having helped herself to my merino duster.
Christine was right. With Portia and Jane watching like hawks ready to swoop in for the kill if Christine put a gauze swab wrong, Christine cleaned the wound with alcohol and it hurt like heck. Then Jane moved in to add some fingers as they held it together and plastered it over with two strips.
Christine came back with a clean gauze she’d squirted sterile solution on, and she gently washed the blood away from my temple, eye and cheek.
“There you go, fit as a fiddle,” she decreed when she was finished.
Not even.
“All right, now that’s done,” Jane announced efficiently. “Let’s get you to bed. Up with you.”
I stared at her, confused, seeing as I was in bed.
And I was never sleeping again in my life.
“Come, dear.” She held a hand to me. “We’re moving you to the Hawthorn Suite.”
“What?” Portia asked.
“What?” I parroted.
“You can sleep in there, with Ian,” she stated. “Which I’m certain will be his decree. Or in the Robin Room with your sister, or in my room, with me. Your choice, but my guess would be Ian will circumvent it when he returns to us if you don’t pick the first.”
That would be my guess too.
“You do need to move. With Lou gone, you’re all alone in this wing,” Portia noted.
“I can have one of the girls prepare Magnolia,” Christine offered. “It’s got an adjoining door to Hawthorn.”
“That might be all right, but I’m uncertain she should be alone,” Jane replied.
I was certain.
No way in fuck did I want to be alone.
“I’m sixty-one, not ninety-one. I didn’t grow up in the fifties,” Jane stated bafflingly in my direction. “I know what’s going on with you and my son. It’s the way of things now as it was in my day, for goodness’ sakes.”
Okay.
All right.
I mean, really!
What the hell?
“We’ve only kissed once!” I cried.
“You stayed with him last night,” Jane pointed out.
“I was freaking out.”
She raised her brows.
Point taken.
“And he made me,” I added sulkily.
“Let’s not cause undue shuffling about,” Jane decided. “We’ll wait until they’re done…doing what they’re doing.”
That would be finding some piece of shit who, for reasons unknown, dressed up like Dorothy Clifton, came into my room, closed the curtains, woke me by touching my cheek, and then, when I was going to turn on my lamp and their jig would be up, knocking my hand out of the way and running when I lost it and crashed to the floor.
“Maybe some sherry?” Jane suggested to Christine.
“Right away,” Christine replied, closing the first aid tackle box.
“Be sure to bring a glass for yourself,” Jane invited.
“Oh, I was going to,” Christine said as she got up and walked out.
“Daphne doesn’t drink sherry,” Portia shared.
“She will tonight.” Jane looked to me. “Don’t worry, dear. It’s dry. I don’t like the sweet stuff either.”
I collapsed against the headboard.
Jane floated around turning on lights.
Portia crawled back into bed with me.
Thus, sometime later, there we were, Jane, Portia, Christine and me, sipping awful sherry, when Ian prowled in wearing a face like thunder.
“Why did no one invite me to the party?” he drawled, but the joke was underlined with a thick vein of fury.
Still.
That made me smile.
“You might wish to go to the kitchen, Christine,” he suggested. “Dad and Stevenson are right now sacking Brittany. Someone will need to make sure she’s fully packed when she’s kicked out because, if she leaves something behind, she sure as fuck won’t be coming back.”
Christine appeared horrified for a split second before that morphed to anger, and she stormed out, taking her sherry glass with her.
“What’s this?” Lady Jane asked, and I had pulled it together (it was having some time, and I hated to say it, but the sherry helped), but I shivered at her tone.
Now I knew where Ian got it.
Dangerous.
“She was pretending to be asleep, but she hadn’t had time to fully change, and Jack found the wig shoved in a broom closet,” Ian told her.
“The wig?” Jane asked.
“She dressed up like Dorothy Clifton and came in here to frighten Daphne,” Ian said.
“Oh my God! Why would she do something like that?” Portia cried.
Ian looked at her but didn’t answer.
Jane set her glass aside, and with a mask of fury, wordlessly, she left the room.