Murder [and Baklava] (A European Voyage #1)- Blake Pierce Page 0,3
A chaotic breakfast with the kids had just come to an end, and the two girls had stampeded into the family room.
This was the sisters’ first real chance to talk this morning, and Tia was not taking the news of London’s indecision at all well. Now as London picked at the remaining syrupy scraps on her plate, Tia popped up from her chair and started clattering around the kitchen.
“I’ll do that for you,” London called. “Just give me a minute.” Through some feat of domestic black magic, the sink and countertops seemed to be full of more dirty dishes than the washer could possibly contain.
“Oh, I’m used to taking care of it,” Tia chirped. “You just finish your breakfast. This all becomes automatic after a few years.”
They were both trying to avoid noticing Tia’s seven-year-old towheaded son, Bret, who was standing beside the table staring silently at London.
“What else did you tell him?” Tia asked as she whirled by, grabbing some dirty dishes that had somehow wound up on a kitchen chair.
What did I tell him? London wondered. She gazed around the room, still ignoring the silent boy.
It was hard to remember exactly. Last night seemed like kind of a blur. London wondered whether she’d actually gone into a state of shock after Ian had proposed to her.
“I think … I told him … I was very …”
Tia’s eyes widened while London searched for the exact word she’d used.
“Oh, no, London. Do not tell me you said you were ‘flattered.’ That would be wrong on so many levels. ‘Flattered’ would suggest that you doubted Ian’s sincerity. And on top of his many other virtues, Ian is sincerity itself.”
London thought sincerity seemed an odd word for it but …
He was sincere, in his way.
Anyway, London agreed with Tia about the word “flattered.” No matter how stunned she’d been at the time, surely she hadn’t said she was “flattered.”
“I think … I said … I was touched.”
“‘Touched’?” Tia said, snatching up some forks that seemed to have magically appeared on the floor. “You said you were ‘touched’? What’s that even supposed to mean, anyway? ‘Touched in the head,’ maybe?”
London shrugged.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Just ‘touched,’ that’s all.”
“What about thrilled? Delighted? Honored?”
The way London remembered it, “thrilled” and “delighted” were hardly the adjectives to describe how she’d actually felt. As far as “honored” was concerned, it wasn’t completely inaccurate. She had actually taken it as compliment that a guy as thoroughly solid as Ian wanted to include her in his precise and elaborate plans. But “honored” would have sounded so … what, exactly?
Victorian, maybe.
The very idea of a proposal was too old-fashioned for London’s disposition. But at least Ian hadn’t gotten down on one knee and whipped out the expensive ring. After all the business talk, her nerves might not have been able to take that.
Tia opened her mouth to scold London some more, then winced at the sound of an especially loud bang.
She called out, “Girls, that’s enough of whatever war you’ve been fighting.”
Stella and Margie whined loudly in near unison.
“Awww, Mo-o-mmm …”
“Aunt London and I are trying to talk,” Tia added. “And we can’t even hear ourselves think.”
The girls obediently shut down their game, but London knew better than to hope for any enduring peace and quiet. She felt a chill run up her spine, and realized that eerie wide-eyed stare from little Bret was getting to her. She couldn’t help thinking he looked like a kid from another old science-fiction movie, The Village of the Damned.
In fact, all of Tia’s children looked to her as though they, like the alien spawn in the movie, could make walls melt with their minds if they really tried. They had all inherited their father’s bland blondness.
Abandoning the clutter that remained in the kitchen, Tia poured fresh coffee into their cups and sat down across from London.
“Adults are talking, sweetie,” Tia said to Bret.
“OK,” Bret said.
He didn’t move.
“That means you’re supposed to leave, sweetie,” Tia said to him.
He looked at her as if she’d snatched away a favorite toy.
“But I hardly ever get to see Aunt London,” he said. “She’s always away, going somewhere really far off.”
London felt a stab of guilt.
He really misses me, she thought.
The fact that the feeling wasn’t exactly mutual added to her pangs of conscience.
“Aunt London comes around whenever she can, sweetie,” Tia said, tossing London a look of disapproval. “She visits us several times a year.”
Bret still didn’t move.
Staring at London with rapt admiration, he said, “My