Page 73 of Third Time Lucky

“She’s going to try and hire your sister,” I warn him lightly.

“Feeling any better this morning?”

I glance around before lowering my voice. “I’m feeling a lot of things. Embarrassed. Emasculated. A little dehydrated.”

Elliot chuckles. “All that, huh?”

“You asked.”

His fingers brush my elbow and I shiver. “There’s no reason for any of that. Except the last one. We did have a lot to drink.”

There’s the opening I expected. “We weren’t ourselves, I know.”

“We weren’t?”

I look over at him in surprise. “Were we?”

“Maybe you weren’t.” Has he moved closer? “You did say something about werewolves, and that I was a two-point-five, so I suppose we could call a foul. But I thought we both wanted what happened to happen.”

“We did. I did. You did?”

Elliot smiles. “I’d say that covers it. I’m hoping I, You and We might want to do it again.”

I’m about to answer when I hear, “Who wants the bear claw?”

Elliot flinches and takes a quick but subtle step back. Away from me.

Disappointment lands like a physical blow, but I manage to keep my feet. For a second there, I thought I’d been wrong.

“I want it.” I turn on my bare heel and walk swiftly toward the kitchen, hands outstretched in hunger. “Gimme. Gimme. Gimme.”

Rue and Adria think I’m brilliant, and even Joan smiles, but Tani tsks and tries to take my prize away. “A princess doesn’t beg. No tiara for you.”

“Good thing you are what you eat.” I snag the bear claw, taking a giant, growling bite that has the Adria cackling in delight.

Rue, on the other hand, looks worried. “They never beg? Not even if they’re really hungry?”

“A princess doesn’t need to beg. They simply have to ask for what they want in no uncertain terms. Allow me to demonstrate.” She heads toward the box and looks at me with one hand out, palm up.

“Jelly me, if you please.”

“Yes, princess.”

Did I mention? I’m so damn glad she’s here.

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