Page 139 of Life and Death
“You were saying?” she asked.
“Um, that you are a very, very terrifying monster?”
She grinned. “Much better.”
“And that I amsocompletely in love with you.”
Her face went soft, her eyes wide, all the walls down again.
“Beau,” she whispered.
“Can we come in?” a low voice asked from the door.
I flinched and probably would have smacked my forehead against Edythe’s if she hadn’t been so much faster than I was. In another fraction of a second, she’d pulled me up so that I was sitting on the sofa and she was next to me, her legs draped over mine.
Archie stood in the doorway, Jessamine behind him in the hall. Red started creeping up my neck, but Edythe was totally relaxed.
“Please,” she said to Archie.
Archie didn’t seem to have noticed that we were doing anything unusual. He walked to the center of the room and folded himself onto the floor in a motion so graceful it was kind of surreal. Jessamine stayed by the door, and, unlike Archie, she looked a little shocked. She stared at Edythe’s face, and I wondered what the room felt like to her.
“It sounded like you were having Beau for lunch,” Archie said, “and we came to see if you would share.”
I stiffened until I saw Edythe grin—whether because of Archie’s comment or my reaction, I couldn’t tell.
“Sorry,” she replied, throwing a possessive arm around my neck. “I’m not in a mood to share.”
Archie shrugged. “Fair enough.”
“Actually,” Jessamine said, taking a hesitant step into the room, “Archie says there’s going to be a real storm tonight, and Eleanor wants to play ball. Are you game?”
The words were all normal, but I didn’t quite understand the context. It sounded like Archie might be a little more reliable than the weatherman, though.
Edythe’s eyes lit up, but she hesitated.
“Of course you should bring Beau,” Archie said. I thought I saw Jessamine throw a quick glance at him.
“Do you want to go?” Edythe asked. Her expression was so eager that I would have agreed to anything.
“Sure. Um, where are we going?”
“We have to wait for thunder to play ball—you’ll see why,” she promised.
“Should I bring an umbrella?”
All three of them laughed out loud.
“Should he?” Jessamine asked Archie.
“No.” Archie seemed positive. “The storm will hit over town. It’ll be dry enough in the clearing.”
“Good,” Jessamine said, and the enthusiasm in her voice was—unsurprisingly—catching. I found myself getting excited about the idea, though I wasn’t even sure what it was.
“Let’s call Carine and see if she’s in,” Archie said, and he was on his feet in another liquid movement that made me stare.
“Like you don’t already know,” Jessamine teased, and then they were gone.
“So . . . what are we playing?” I asked.
