built-in drawers on four sides, a wall of shelves for shoes, upholstered benches to use for lacing shoes or taking off boots. It seemed clear that the interest in art that motivated me to matriculate for that degree was still alive and well. The closet walls were covered in a contiguous hand-painted mural of a garden setting that looked like it had been done by a Dutch master. It was the perfect background for my clothes and shoes. Which were already moved and in place, though lonely looking in the enormous space. Excellent! Lots of room to expand my wardrobe. Velvet hangers begging to be covered by new clothes had been thoughtfully provided. I couldn’t help wondering how Romeo would like a trip to London.
It was an even bigger surprise to find two such closets, mirror images of each other, across the short hall from one another. Likewise, there were two bathrooms, each with state-of-the-art jacuzzi and a walk-in shower.
The only word that came to mind was overwhelmed. If I counted the number of front-facing windows in the living room, study and master bedroom, the total was nine. When compared to the number of front-facing windows when viewing the house from the outside, which was four, there would be a serious math problem. But I was learning to not question the impossibility of magic.
The kitchen was at the back of the house and populated with the appliances I’d come to adore during my stay in Hallow Hill, including a red AGA stove with six compartments. To the left of the kitchen was a wide archway that looked directly into a large, open room with a composite floor. The walls were painted in a gorgeous mural depicting narrow Cumbrian roads, hills, sheep, and manor houses. Romeo sat happily in the middle, basking in small spotlights set at just the right angle flatter the deep red and gleam of his finish.
“Romeo!” I exclaimed.
“Yes, madam?”
“How do you like your new room?”
Romeo rolled down the windows so that I could hear him clearly. “It suits me perfectly, madam.”
I looked between Lochlan and Keir with a huge grin. “Well, there you have it.”
Keir leaned toward me and said under his breath, “You can be a little on the strange side, Rita.” After the briefest pause, he added, “It’s one of the things I love most about you.”
I stopped myself from making too much of that declaration, telling myself that Keir hadn’t just professed his love for me. It was a common expression used to express feelings about everything from dogfood to weather.
“It’s hard to argue with results,” I said. “And you heard for yourself how appreciative he is.”
Keir shook his head with a smile and looked at Lochlan to gauge his reaction. Lochlan’s good nature was unshakeable. He might not outwardly indicate a negative reaction to anything. Ever.
There was no formal dining room in the house, but there was more space allotted in the kitchen for six-person lunches next to a fireplace that looked like it had been taken straight out of a sixteenth-century tavern. Dolan had made me a replica of Arthur’s round table after Fie began calling my luncheons legendary. And it looked like it had been made for the room.
On the other side of the kitchen was a quarter bath, a larder, the laundry, a storage room that was empty except for my two tired suitcases that were overdue for retirement, a largish mud room with a rear exit containing a dog door. And one last room on the other side of that.
“What is this?” I asked Lochlan.
“Let me ask.”
While Lochlan was gone I played with the dog door closure, sliding it up and down, imagining my own dogs coming and going to the space outside. The picket fence ran around the house, but it was nothing more than decoration. There would be no stopping my magical wolfdogs from doing what they wanted, other than a desire to please me. I hoped they came with a desire to please me. I was going to need Lochlan to spell out the return policy.
Lochlan returned. “She says it’s Keir’s room.”
Keir laughed out loud, clearly as delighted as a person can be.
After making my way out the back and around the house to the front, I looked at Maeve and said, “It’s mind blowing. I wouldn’t change a thing.”
She shrugged as if to say, “Duh.”
“In my room I’d like an entire wall of monitors so that I could watch twelve different sports events at once,”