"We're hungry," Juli announced. "We haven't eaten since your party."
"The twins aren't used to a liquid diet, and hunger pangs woke them up," Elspeth said apologetically. "They checked the kitchen, but Aunt Marguerite didn't get to buy groceries as planned because they brought Greg back. So they woke me up to see if I thought it would be ail right for them to order in something to eat."
"But the pizza place and Chinese restaurants don't open for a couple more hours and Aunt Marguerite lives far enough out that no one else will deliver," Jeanne Louise took up the explanation. "So I suggested we wake Thomas up to see if he'd drive them to a restaurant for breakfast, and then maybe a grocery store."
"How did you end up being there?" Lissianna asked Jeanne Louise with confusion.
"They got Elspeth's room mixed up with mine and woke me by mistake." Jeanne Louise shrugged. "When they explained they were looking for Elspeth, I tagged along."
Lissianna grunted. That explained why everyone was up but Mirabeau, but before she could ask, Mirabeau announced, "My room's between Jeanne Louise and Elspeth's. All the racket woke me up."
"And when they came to see me about a ride, I suggested we check and see if Greg was hungry, too," Thomas announced, explaining their presence around the bed.
"Oh." She turned to glance at Greg.
"He's starved," Mirabeau announced dryly.
"You can read his mind, too?" Lissianna asked, recalling her conversation with Thomas the night before.
"He'd just told us that he was starved before you woke up," Mirabeau explained, then added, "But, yes, I can read him."
Lissianna frowned at this news, then let her gaze sweep her other cousins. "Can the rest of you read him too? Surely I'm not the only one who--'?"
"I can read him," Juli announced. "He thinks you're beautiful in the morning, even with bed head."
Lissianna raised a hand to her hair with dismay and could feel it was a knotted mess.
"He's wondering if you have morning breath," Vicki added with a giggle.
Lissianna snapped her mouth closed, afraid she probably did.
"He's glad to know you aren't dead and thinks that for a bunch of bloodsuckers we're a rather nice family." Elspeth smiled at Greg. "We like you, too."
"Thanks," he muttered.
"He wants to see you cured, but he'd rather someone else do the actual therapy because he's interested in you in ways it isn't ethical for a therapist to be interested," Jeanne Louise announced, showing that she, too, could read him. To Greg she said, "I admire your ethics, but this isn't really your standard case is it? I mean, surely you can't be held to the same ethics as you would if she'd come to your office as a patient?"
"I--Er..." Greg shook his head. "I come from a pretty close family, but this is just a little bit much."
"Give him a break, girls," Thomas said with amusement. "The poor guy isn't used to this stuff. Besides, I can read his mind, too, and he isn't kidding about being starved. He hasn't eaten since Friday afternoon. He also has no intention of trying to escape, so I suggest we take him and the twins to a restaurant that serves all-day breakfast, then pick up some groceries on the way back."
"Thomas, I don't think that's a good idea," Mirabeau said quietly.
Thomas glanced at her, and merely said, "You can read his mind. Read it, Beau."
Mirabeau hesitated, then turned her gaze to Greg, and Lissianna found herself glancing at him too, but when she again tried to read him, she came up against a brick wall of nothingness. This time she wasn't just confused by her inability to penetrate his thoughts, she was also somewhat alarmed. Everyone else could read him. Why couldn't she? Her conversation with Thomas about his possibly being her true life mate came to mind, but before she could consider it too deeply, Mirabeau said, "You're right, Thomas. He can go, too."
It seemed that whatever she'd seen in his mind had been enough to convince Mirabeau it was safe to take him out, that he wouldn't try to escape.
"We have to shower and change then!" Juli was suddenly in a panic.
"And do our makeup," Vicki added, and Lissianna watched the pair run for the door in their baby dolls, then glanced at the others, only then noticing that they were all still in their nightwear.
"Meet back here in half an hour?" Thomas suggested, heading for the door.
Elspeth snorted as she followed. "You have got to be kidding. It'll take that long for the twins to decide what to wear. You'd better make it an hour."
"What about Greg?" Jeanne Louise asked, bringing everyone to a halt. When they turned to look at her, she pointed out, "He's slept in his clothes and might want a shower and change of clothes, too."