When she’d set her sights on Italy, she’d rather counted on Dante being on an archeological dig elsewhere, though. She already knew that she couldn’t use her gift to influence his thoughts, drat the man. He’d seen right through her head games—or he was thick as a brick.
The area did have cooking schools, and she’d love to attend one, but she didn’t have that kind of cash. It had taken her entire savings account and everything the family could scrape together to send her here.
Thinking on minimal sleep and a six hour time difference wasn’t productive. She should hit the sack, but childish giggles in the hall meant trouble. The dolt didn’t know what he had in those kids. Their open minds were quite brilliant.
Wondering who and where their mother was, she eased open the heavy door and studied the hall. There, in the shadows, wearing thin nightshirts, the twins crouched on the marble stairs, peering down between the stone railings.
Growing up in a family as weird as hers, Pris imagined all sorts of possibilities, but accepting that most families were normal, she joined them. She could hear Dante muttering below and caught flashes of the denim shirt he’d been wearing at dinner. What was the man doing?
She’d been accused of reacting without thinking, but what was there to think about?
Pris took the stairs down, the twins on her heels. They caught the giant imbecile in the act of balancing the quilted coat from the wardrobe and what appeared to be a stack of table linen while maneuvering his crutch into the immense front room. What did one call a room like that? It was big enough to be a ballroom. Or a grand hotel lobby.
He glared at them and continued on his appointed path.
Her nemesis was a large man, as tall and muscled as her cousin Evie’s team of demented military rejects. Worse yet, he was even more good looking than the male models who’d been escorting Lady Katherine. Dark hair with a slight curl—check. Square jaw—check. Rugged cheekbones—check...Oozing testosterone—lethal.
Unfortunately, he had a poor opinion of women who took matters into their own hands, which was great. She’d irritate him as he did her.
“You are seriously strange.” She usurped the stack of table linen.
Hanging on to the coat, he lurched on his intended path toward a sofa with gilded, delicately curved legs that would never hold him.
“You don’t have sleeping bags or air mattresses or cots or anything in this gothic palace?” Pris refused to lay the linens like sheets on the delicate antique.
The twins dashed over to bounce on the upholstered sofa, raising clouds of dust in the dim light of a single lamp.
“If I were in my flat in Rome, I’d have all the above. Those things weren’t invented in the 1800s and thus do not occupy this hellhole.” Finally speaking, he glared at the twins, who didn’t seem to notice.
“This is where communication matters. Don’t expect me to read your mind.” She gestured at the twins. “Upstairs. Show me the blankets.”
Amazingly, they took off in the direction of the stairs. She followed. At least they understood English.
Dante had stacked his weird bedding on a chair and fixed himself a drink by the time she returned with arms full. Behind her, the twins dragged a narrow foam mattress. “On the floor or on that antique? Will it even hold you?”
He glanced at the narrow sofa with distaste. “Probably not, but I don’t think I can manage the floor.”
Forming a simple image of a lounge chair, she projected it to the kids. “Any big chairs down here?”
They screwed up their little foreheads in thought, then dashed off again. She didn’t normally intrude on other minds like that, but children were delightfully simple. The resulting headache was almost worth the attempt.
“Shouldn’t they be exhausted and sleeping?” Dante asked irritably, setting down his drink and attempting to arrange the foam on the narrow sofa.
“I suspect they’re night owls, accustomed to prowling while your exhausted mother sleeps. They really do need a nanny. How bad is the leg?” Pris talked while watching the twins to see their direction.
“Bruised tibia, maybe cracked, minor damage. It will heal on its own if I keep it iced and stay off of it for a while. Staying off is the problem. Why are you really here?”
The twins shouted from the rear of the house. Ignoring his question, she followed the noise to the open kitchen doors. They were wrestling with an old—rusted—iron lounge chair on wheels. Pris assumed it once had a cushion. It was now no more than uncomfortable mesh, but it might work.
It might work better with a little oil, but she managed to get the corroded wheels rolling the short distance into the kitchen so she could shut the doors. By that time, Dante had lurched his way back to join them.
He snorted, lifted the thing in one hand, and moved it against a wall out of the traffic pattern of the kitchen.
“Tell them they did good,” Pris whispered as the twins puttered around the chair, probably stirring the spiders.
“Thank you, Alex, Nan, you are geniuses,” he said in a gravelly voice that could indicate disuse as much as it might show emotion.
“Can we have a dog?” Nan asked instantly, proving they could talk when interested.
