kitchen table and cupping her face in her hands. “That’s not at all what I said, love.”
“Oh.” Her sister gave a relived little smile. “I must’ve gotten confused.”
“What I said is that I went on a foul-mouthed rant, stole a ton of marshmallows—” Hannah nodded at the bag on the table “—and threw one into my boss’s mouth. And then I quit my job. Or maybe he sacked me. It was hard to understand him, what with the… you know, the marshmallow.”
“The marshmallow,” Ruth repeated.
“Yes.”
“In his mouth.”
“That’s right.”
“The marshmallow you threw into his mouth.”
“Mmhm.”
Ruth stared for a moment, clutching her Spider-Man mug of tea for dear life. Then, abruptly, she shouted, “Evan!”
Like a particularly handsome Labrador, Ruth’s enormous boyfriend came happily into the kitchen. The layout of Evan’s place still made Hannah feel strange. Since he and Ruth had been next-door neighbours, this flat was a mirror image of the one Hannah had spent so much time in over the years.
The one where Hannah now lived, for very low rent, since Ruth was only using it to store her massive comic book collection.
Evan leaned against the doorframe, gave Ruth a look of sickening adoration, and asked, “Yeah?”
“My sister,” Ruth said calmly, “has been possessed.”
“See, that’s what I thought,” Hannah said.
“So, you agree. You think you’ve been possessed.”
“It is a possibility,” she admitted.
“We should call Mum. She’ll know what to do.”
“Sweetheart,” Evan said gently. “I don’t think—”
“Shush. I only called you in case the demon breaks out and tries to murder me.”
Evan sighed. “And what, exactly, would I do to defend you from a demon?”
Ruth gave him a withering look. “Punch it in the face or something. Show some initiative, please.”
Hannah popped a marshmallow into her mouth to muffle her laughter.
“In all seriousness,” Ruth said—which was the only indication that she hadn’t been utterly serious before— “I am concerned. This is quite unlike you.”
“What?” Evan asked. “What’s happened?”
“Hannah quit her job. And stole these delicious marshmallows.”
Evan’s jaw sort of… dropped. In fact, it appeared to be in danger of falling off his face completely, which would be a shame. It was a handsome face—if one liked charming, bearded blondes.
Which, Hannah supposed, most people did.
“Oh,” Ruth added, with a sort of horrified glee. “And she threw a marshmallow into her manager’s mouth!”
Evan appeared to be choking. Possibly on his own disbelief.
“How many people are you going to tell about this?” Hannah sighed.
Ruth rolled her eyes. “Just Evan. And Laura—”
“Please do not tell our archnemesis that I assaulted my boss with a marshmallow.”
“She’s not our archnemesis anymore,” Ruth said. “I’ve been texting her. We had coffee. We’re friends.”
“Ruth. She has hated us both for the past two years.”
“It was a misunderstanding.” Ruth waved a hand about. She was disturbingly laid-back these days. Hannah suspected that 50% of this new attitude was down to Evan’s handsomeness, and the other 50% was down to his obvious devotion.
Now, Hannah was not a jealous person, exactly—but Lord, it would be great if she, too, could find someone to shag the stress out of her. Of course, that would require her to find a human being who didn’t irritate her 90% of the time, which had proven difficult thus far. And someone who could actually do half as good a job in bed as she did with her own hand, which had also proven difficult.
But she held out hope. Sort of. Sometimes. Maybe.
Nathaniel Davis didn’t irritate you. And his hands are much bigger than yours.
Hannah didn’t even flinch at that unruly thought. She was used to her mind misbehaving.
Instead she said, “Tell the world if you must, but don’t tell mother.”
Ruth rolled her eyes. She was an epic eye-roller. “Why? She’s not going to spank you.”
“Oh, be quiet. She’ll worry.”
“She absolutely will not. You do all the worrying in the Kabbah family. Mum is physically incapable of worrying.”
“I think she worries secretly,” Hannah said.
Ruth looked openly skeptical.
“Just don’t tell her, okay? I don’t want…” she trailed off, far too embarrassed to say the real reason. I don’t want her to be disappointed in me.
Hannah hated disappointment more than anything on earth. Even the threat of it made acid froth in her stomach. The idea of her mother’s soft, dark gaze turning distant, despondent even…
Oh, now she felt nauseous. Maybe a marshmallow would help.
“I don’t know what you’re so worried about,” Ruth said. “It’s not like you’ll be sent off to the workhouse.”
Evan, who had drifted off toward the fridge and was now rifling through it, said, “We don’t