Not Without Juliet - By L.L. Muir Page 0,30

a sister. Didn’t we tell you we thought you might have a twin? In the tunnels. Remember?” Lorrain grinned down into her face as if she deemed her news to be the most wonderful surprise. But if it was a wonderful surprise—if Jilly truly had a sister, twin or not—then why did Loretta look like she had bad news?

Did Lorraine say twin?

“Twin? A twin s...sister?”

Jilly’s mind stuttered as badly as her mouth. She remembered just a flash. A feeling. Her own image, in a mirror, looking up and smiling at her. She’d always remembered what she looked like as a small child, but maybe it hadn’t been a mirror after all.

Then there was another memory. A white room with a low table in the middle. She and the girl with the smiling face. She was wearing a maroon jumper. They were wearing maroon jumpers? Little cups of water on the table, each holding a crayon. They were taking the papers off and soaking the bright sticks—trying to color the water. Then grandma came in and spanked her for ruining the crayons. She remembered that spanking, but she always remembered it as an observer, seeing herself being swatted on the butt. But it maybe it hadn’t been her butt.

Why hadn’t she remembered before? And why would her grandmother never have told her about a sister? And a twin? Why would she tell her nothing more than her parents died in a car wreck and there was no one else?

Jilly took a deep breath and let her anger with her grandmother wash away from her. She didn’t want to upset the little life inside her with the spite she felt for the old woman. She shook her head and held out her hands. She had to get up.

Montgomery pulled her to her feet.

“Where is she?” She brushed the rocks from her rear end, then the dirt from her hands. “When was she here? Is she still here? Are you sure she’s my sister? What was her name?”

She looked around the car park. No other cars. No cars parked up at the house either. Then she noticed Monty. He was glaring at the Muirs and taking deep breaths, like he was building up enough air to start yelling at them. And that never did any good. She put a hand on his arm and pulled him close, both to restrain him and for a bit of needed support.

“Juliet, I believe,” said Loretta, then she bit her lip.

Juliet? Juliet. Juliet.

Jilly said it a dozen times in her mind, but it didn’t ring any bells.

“Where is she?” she asked calmly. All happy thoughts vanished when she’d read their guilty faces.

“Dinna worry yerself, Jilly dear. She’s hale and healthy, we’re almost sure of it,” said Lorraine.

“Where?” Monty’s patience was gone.

“Well, the last we saw her was when we put her in the tomb. Then of course we had to hide ourselves, what with that man chasing her.” Loretta put an arm around her sister and patted her shoulder, as if they’d been through some terrible experience.

Jilly smelled a rat, like she usually did when those two started over-acting.

Montgomery squeezed her hand. “A man was chasing her?”

“Yes,” said Lorriane. “Now we don’t want to worry you, Jilly. Not in your condition. But the man was carrying a gun.”

“I wouldn’t call him a gunman, sister, just because he carried a gun,” Loretta offered.

Lorraine frowned. “I didn’t call him a gunman.”

Loretta waved away the argument. “Of course ye didn’t. I’m just saying I wouldn’t call him a gunman, that’s all. Some men just look the type. He didn’t look the type.”

“Heavens to Betsy, sister,” Lorraine chided. “Ye can’t expect Jillian to stay calm if ye go on spouting the word gunman.”

“Spouting? Why ye—” Loretta’s face turned red.

“Shut it!” Montgomery had pulled out his best Gordon Ramsay impersonation to get everyone’s attention, and it worked. Even the insects shut up. “Now then, the pair of ye will disappear for a moment whilst my wife explains this condition of hers.”

With bulging eyes and thin, tightly shut lips, the blue clad pair walked off, but stopped about ten feet away.

Jilly burst into silent tears as Monty’s arms came around her.

“Ye were about to tell me ye carry my son, were ye not?” he asked.

“I was not,” she said with a hiccup.

He pulled back. “Then I misunderstood?”

“I was going to tell you we’re going to have a baby. It might be a girl, you know.”

He laughed and lifted her into the air, then