All of us frowned as we thought back.
Grace finally shrugged. “If you did, it was while I was in the bathroom.” She looked down at her tummy. “And I was in the bathroom last night. A lot.”
“Oh gods,” Katie whispered.
Grace rummaged through my cabinets until she found my mixer. After she’d finished beating whatever she was making, she turned it off and fixed us all with a grim stare. “Those things are relatively mild compared to what happened while you lushes were sleeping it off.”
Listening with one ear, I got out several mugs and poured us all a huge cup of coffee.
“The entire southeast forest was burned to a crisp,” she said.
My hand stilled. “Excuse me?” I said quietly, a horrible realization rearing up. I’d slept right through Sterling’s experiment to send the drone up. “Oh gods.”
“Yep,” Grace said. “Portia and I went to try to convince them to stop, but those guys are amateur scientists with a burning desire to debunk everything. We couldn’t stop it so we hightailed it out of there. We knew something was going to happen, but we didn’t know what.”
“Are they okay?” I asked as I handed mugs out to everyone.
“One tree was left standing. Their dryad managed somehow to get them all inside of it.”
“Morgana,” Helen and Katie said at the same time.
Grace nodded. “I do not know what they had to pay to get her to do that.”
I took my coffee and perched on one of the island stools next to Katie. “What’s going on with the storm?”
Grace shrugged. “It’s larger. Angrier. It started to rain again. If it doesn’t stop soon, things are going to start flooding.”
“Portia is going to have to deal with the Comey sisters. Someone needs to get them involved to help combat this,” Helen said. “I’ve been working on a few things, but I’m not ready to go full scale war yet.”
“War?” I echoed. “What does that even mean?”
“Portia seems to think this whole thing has to do with her. Grace says we can expect a whole lot worse. But what I’m concerned about is Portia’s failure to do much of anything about it. She’s gathered us like some weird Charlie’s Angels team, but she hasn’t done much else,” Katie said.
Grace frowned. “There’s more.”
I took a long pull of my coffee. “Isn’t that enough for one morning?”
All three of the women gave me a grim look. “It isn’t about Portia,” Katie said.
“Oh?” There could be only one person this was about.
“After the events of last night, Sterling moved up his wedding.”
My heart plummeted. “Oh,” I said casually.
“I talked to Portia about it. Apparently, Sterling’s parents are back in town. They saw what happened last night and feel like Sterling is being distracted with less important things than producing an heir. So… this was his parent’s doing, from what I understand,” Helen said. “Or at least that’s what she told me this morning.”
“Well,” I said. “Sterling is a grown man. No one can make him do something he doesn’t want to do. If he’s moving his wedding up, he’s either chosen to succumb to pressure, or he wanted to do it. Either way, it no longer involves me.” I tapped my fingers on the counter in a nervous gesture.
“The wedding is in three weeks,” Katie said quietly.
“You got a waffle maker in here?” Grace asked, abruptly changing the subject.
I pointed at one of the lower cabinets. Katie put a hand on my shoulder. “Sorry, Maron. If it’s any consolation, we all think he’s a real tool.”
I nodded, unsure of my ability to speak right now. “Yeah, he is,” I said.
We didn’t speak again until Grace set two fluffy waffles in front of each of us.
