Part 15 (2/2)
”I dreamed up a bruise. Actually, a few of them,” she added ruefully.He frowned. ”Maybe you were tossing and turning, banged into the nightstand, or something. Or maybe even got up and banged into the furniture.”
”Without waking you?”
He shook his head, staring out at the lawn reflectively. ”I was sure out of it last night. Exhausted. And sleeping like the dead.”
”Ah, well, you were sure great in the dream. Just tone it down a little next time, huh?” She didn't believe that she'd been dreaming for a single second. But she didn't want this to turn into a knock-down-drag-'em-out argument.
And she didn't want him blaming it on her family, Huntington House, or the whole Wiccan thing going on with her relatives. Better to let it lie. Maybe he deserved a night of dead-out sleep, even if he moved in it as if he were far more than wide awake.
”So, hey! Where did you go this morning?” he asked her.
At this point, she was definitely not going to tell him anything whatsoever about Andy Markham and his bizarre theories about demons and Satanists.
”I took a ride, looked at old sights, that's all. Why didn't you call me on the cell phone?”
”I did.”
”Really? I never heard it ring.”
”Maybe you weren't paying attention. Too busy seeing the sights.”
”Honestly, I just didn't hear it.”
”I would have seen those sights with you, you know.”
”I didn't want to wake you.”
He nuzzled her neck. ”You can wake me anytime,” he murmured suggestively.
Apparently, she thought, she didn't need to wake him. She refrained from saying so.
”You needed the sleep.”
”I don't need sleep now.”
She smiled, thinking in a brief moment of pure bliss that she loved the sound of her husband's voice. Just his words, his whispers, could slip beneath her skin. She could hop up, right then, and happily drag him back into the bedroom.
But, of course, she couldn't. Not at this time.
”We're due at Aunt Martha's in...” she paused, looking at her watch, ”thirty minutes.”
His lips moved with playful eroticism over her throat, to her ear. ”Won't Aunt Martha wait?”
”Aren't you hungry?”
”You bet, my love.”
She laughed. ”For Aunt Martha's incredible meat loaf and mashed potatoes?”
”Sure... later.” ”She's furious when you're late for a meal.”
He laughed. ”Give me fifteen minutes.”
”Fifteen minutes?”
”Hey, you got the long ones, and the short ones. When I get old, you know, we may be down to five minutes.”
She laughed. ”We have to be there on time!” she said firmly.
He rose, setting her on her feet.
”I'll think old right now. We won't be late for lunch.”
She needed to be with him. Wide awake, teasing, laughing...
Tender.
”It's seriously a fifteen-minute ride.”
”And we won't be sixty seconds late. I swear it.”
They weren't late. They arrived at exactly two. Aunt Martha had come to the porch in a timely fas.h.i.+on, and was there to greet them.
”Punctual! I love my guests to be punctual!” she said cheerfully.
”Yes, ma'am. We wouldn't have dreamed of being late, under any circ.u.mstance whatsoever!” Finn lied, with a very straight face.
Megan was tempted to punch him, but he grinned at her like the cat who had eaten the canary and she was tempted to laugh out loud.
He would have gladly skipped the afternoon all together.
”Come in, come in, then! Lunch is ready, we've just got to take it from the oven to the table,” Aunt Martha said, preceding them into the house, and leaving Finn, at the end, to close the door behind them all.
The home was a masterpiece of antique and Victorian charm. Some pieces were colonial, some Edwardian, and some Victorian.
The lace doilies here and there added a touch of both the old, and the charming. Oddly out of place on a desk in a little room just off the grand dining room with its heavy, richly carved, mahogany table, was a state-of-the-art computer.
Aunt Martha herself was a bit of a strange amalgamation. Megan's mom had always told her that Martha had been old as long as she could remember, but despite her age, her blue eyes remained sharp and twinkling. She had a slender, straight body without a touch of arthritis or even the hint of a stooping at the back. Her mind was like a razor.
”So, young man! My fine young musician!” Martha said, setting down the last of the food and taking her place at the table. ”I hope you like meat loaf.”
”Love it.”
The food was pa.s.sed around the table.
”And how about the community here? All the goings-on? Pa.s.s the peas, please, Megan, dear.”
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