* * *
Dewi
Peyton called Aisling back into the office. “Let’s please start over,” he said. “Dewi Bleacke-Ethelbert, please meet Aisling Walsh.”
Aisling nodded and held out her hand. “Dia duit!”
Dewi had started to reach to shake her hand but stopped. “Did you just fucking call me a witch?”
“What? Are ye daft? No! I—”
“Dewi,” Peyton wearily said. “It’s an Irish greeting.”
“Iheardher call me a witch with myowngoddamnedears, Peyton!”
“Badger! Duncan!” he screamed.
Seconds later, the men appeared in the doorway.
He pointed at them. “Aisling, say it to them, please? Because Dewi’s not going to believe me.”
Aisling looked at them. “Dia duit!”
Badger and Duncan looked at each other in confusion. “Okay,” Badger said. “What’s the problem, then?”
“Tell Dewi what she said,” Peyton told him.
“She saidhello. My Gaelic’s rusty, and she’s got an Irish accent, but that’s what I heard.”
Duncan nodded. “Same.”
Dewi’s face heated. “It sounded like she called me a witch.”
Duncan and Badger looked at each other and burst into laughter. “You didn’t teach her any Gaelic, did you?” Duncan asked Badger.
“Gaelic? I was lucky to teach hermanners!”
“You. All.Suck.” Dewi pushed through them and stomped upstairs, slamming the bedroom door shut behind her.
Then she sideways flopped onto the bed, grabbed a pillow…
Andscreamedinto it.
“Dewi—”
“AaaahhhHHHHHH!” she screamed, flopping over at Ken’s voice, where he now stood in the closet doorway. Then she fell back, laughing…
Except then she realized she was sobbing in Ken’s arms, because he’d crawled into bed with her and was now holding her.
About ten minutes later she lay there, blowing her nose on his bathrobe and finally able to speak again.
“What the fuck is wrong with me?” she asked.
He nuzzled her head, something he’d been doing a lot of while he patiently held her. “You woke up exhausted, too early, with no coffee. Some strange woman in our house who sounds like an escapee from the set ofDerry Girlsscared you and threw your own coffee mug at you, I showed up naked with a gun and she catcalled me, and then your mean old big brother wouldn’t let you shoot or disembowel her. And you’re tired of being pregnant.” He kissed her forehead. “That cover the bases?”
She sniffled. “Yeah.Andhe’s forcing me to hire her.”
“I think he already hired her, sweetheart.”Nuzzle nuzzle nuzzle.“And I’m not saying you aren’t justified in feeling upset over that, but murdering her is a little overkill. No pun intended.”
