“I’ll risk it.”
“As I’ve enough trouble keeping my two boys from bashing each other, I’m taking them in before they see their uncles acting the maggot. We’re grateful for the peat, Harken. Mahon’s busy stacking it behind the cottage. I’ll save you a plate if you want it, and one for Morena as well, as I’m going to feed my hooligans soon.”
“Thanks for that, but we’re fine.”
“Go, get off your feet,” Keegan ordered her. “You’re big as Harken’s prize cow.”
The fist she planted in his belly only made him grin.
“Come see me when you’ve the time,” she said to Breen, and smiled sweetly at Marco. “And you of course. We’ll take Bollocks to play with the boys for a bit, as he’s always welcome. But not you,” she added, and this time drilled a finger in Keegan’s belly.
Calling to the boys, she walked off.
Keegan shouted after her, “If men had to go about the making of more of us, there’d be the fewer.”
That made her laugh and send him a sparkling look back.
“Nice save,” Marco observed.
“Well, she’ll get off her feet, won’t she? Come, get your bow. Harken’ll work with Marco.”
“Why don’t you and Morena come over to the cottage and have dinner with us? And apple pie.”
Now Keegan sent a look over his shoulder at Marco. “That’s bribery, brother.”
“I wish I’d thought of it,” Breen muttered, and picked up the bow.
CHAPTER FOUR
She slipped into routine like a pair of warm slippers. It wouldn’t last, she knew that, but for now no dreams haunted her sleep, no threat lurked around every corner.
They’d come back. It would all come back. So she hugged the routine and all the bright spots close.
Could a spot shine brighter than helping her friend pick her wedding dress?
“I’ve three,” Morena began. “My mother sent them by dragon-back, because she wouldn’t be denied. And the truth is, doesn’t trust me not to wear whatever I can find in my own wardrobe. Which I wouldn’t because I know very well it matters, and wouldn’t I want to look a treat on such a day?”
“You’re her only daughter,” Breen pointed out. “I’m surprised she didn’t send a dozen.”
“Left to herself it would’ve been that, or one only, with her sure I’d be glad not to fuss with the matter myself.”
“Take this”—Marco offered her a flute of champagne—“and get yourself into one. Need help?”
“No, I want you to see it all at once. And give me nothing but truth.” She took a sip, a breath, then a second sip. “All right then, we’re off.”
She started toward the downstairs bedroom, where she’d put the choices. “Are you sure Keegan and Brian aren’t coming back soon?”
“Keegan said near to midnight if at all,” Breen called out. “It’s just us.”
“Is this fun or what?” Marco handed Breen a flute.
“The best.”
And she wondered should the day ever come, what her own mother would do about a wedding. Would she even come? And would she want her mother there?
She didn’t have an answer to either question.
“All right then, here comes the first. Only truth now.”