There was a wealth of questions contained in the word but Rhys wasn’t about to answer any of them. For all his outer jocund swagger, he’d learned caution the hard way early in life. He downed the rest of his beer. “Are ye ready to go?”
Jack looked worried but nodded. “I am if you are.”
“Then let us go.”
Scarlett
The next evening
“Everything still looking all right with the baby, Willa?”
The neonatal nurse pursed her lips and shook her head at Scarlett with a hint of a smile. “When are you going to name this child, Ms. Thomas, so we can stop calling her baby Hepburn?”
“That seems to be the question of the hour. Perhaps we’ll just name her Baby and solve the problem,” Scarlett teased back.
Perhaps she should’ve countered by asking when the nursing staff would stop addressing her as Ms. Thomas and begin using her married name. She’d gotten on friendly terms with the nursing staff over the past couple of weeks. They’d all managed to move beyond her fame and treat her like a real person, a rare and wonderful occurrence she appreciated dearly. But she was still a celebrity to them and they must have assumed Scarlett wouldn’t forsake the name that had brought her to fame.
“Tell that hot husband of yours to think of something better if you won’t,” Willa shot back. “Poor child needs a real name.”
“We’ll work on it,” Scarlett assured her.
Laird was waiting patiently in the hall, rocking from foot to foot. Relaxed but ever diligent. Willa was spot on with her assessment. He was hot. A tempestuous volcano with a molten core. The bright French blue of his dress shirt somehow turned his normally gray eyes the same shade. The tailored cut hugged his shoulders and skimmed him down his broad chest to his narrow waist. With one hand in the pocket of his jeans and the other hooked on the collar of the charcoal woolen jacket tossed over his shoulder, he looked like he’d just stepped out of a photo shoot forGQ. Deliciously sexy.
And she got to be the one who took him home each night.
“Ms. Thomas?”
“Hmm…what?” Scarlett blinked and turned back to Willa. “Did you say something?”
Willa chuckled. “I was just answering your question, but you keep looking all you like.”
A flush warmed her cheeks. “What were you saying?”
“Just that the baby’s fine. Doing just fine. She’s growing like a weed.” Willa rocked the infant against her broad bosom and smiled down at her. “A few days more and you’ll be taking her home.”
“From your lips to God’s ears, Willa.”
A few more long, excruciating days and she could take her family back home. Away from the nightmare of the twenty-first century. Away from the crowds and the reporters who still stalked her day and night. Despite Tyrone’s efforts to whip them back, he couldn’t tame the beasts.
Back to the peace and quiet of Dunskirk. To the cold castle, the stinky stables and garderobes she’d never belittle again. So help her, she’d even wear one of those ridiculous headdresses and shut up about it.
“Any other troubles?” Scarlett asked. “No more reporters have gotten in?”
“Not since the one a couple of weeks ago. Security has stepped up nicely.”
“Great,” she said. “In that case, I thought I might leave a little earlier than normal tonight, if you think that’s okay? My friends have offered to watch Hermione and I want to surprise my husband with a little date night.”
A wide smile filled with pleasure stretched Willa’s lips. “Absolutely. If I had a husband like yours, every night would be date night.”
Scarlett’s smile was genuine. “Most of them are. Until lately, at least. I think we could use a night away from the hospital.”
“Of course you could! Where are you going?”
“Oh, I have a surprise in mind for him he’ll never forget.”
Laird
“What is this place?”
