Oh, and I can’t forget the mustard yellow draperies at the windows.
“Is the rest of the house…like this?”
“Wait until you seebothgreen bathrooms,” she says, almost excited.
“And the wood paneling,” I say. “Does it…continue?”
“It’severywhere,” she confirms.
Jesus. “You are married to a billionaire,” I say to her. “You’re worth millions yourself. And this is what you bought?”
“Declan will hate it, don’t you think?” she asks with a wicked smile.
This is nothing like the penthouse Declan O’Grady lives in.
I wonder if Declan has ever even seen this shade of yellow.
“I think that is pretty likely,” I agree.
She sighs happily. She’s wearing a loose, soft-looking matching pajama set, her hair is tumbling around her shoulders,and she has no makeup on. With her small frame and without her expensive makeup and clothes, she could pass for ten years younger than she is.
“What is up with you and Declan?” I ask her.
She rolls her eyes. “You’re really going to knock on my door before five in the morning and ask me to talk about my husband?”
“That actually wasn’t my intention, but now that we’re on the subject,” I say.
“We are not on the subject.”
“Why did you marry him if you dislike him so much?”
Her eyebrows arch. “Who says I dislike him?”
“Every action you take, and things you say about him.”
She waves her hand. “Come on, it’s a marriage of convenience. We got married because our grandfathers wanted us to. It’s not like we were crazy about each other and can’t live without one another.”
I study her for a long moment. I’m close with both of my sisters, and I feel like I know them well, but they know me better than I know them. There is more to this whole story with her and Declan, but I can’t tell what it is. Does she feel more for him than she’s letting on? Is she happy?
Of course, I know that they got married because our grandfathers made a deal long, long ago. I also know that everyone in both families, including Declan and Astrid, expected that their siblings—in our case, our older sister and, in Declan’s, his younger brother—would actually be the ones to get married to combine the two family bloodlines and appease the patriarchs. I was there when Declan burst into his younger brother’s wedding and declared that there was only one option left: him and Astrid marrying.
But Astrid went along with it. She tried to argue for maybe two minutes, then she agreed and said the vows. She packed her stuff, got on Declan’s plane, and flew to Portland with him.
So what’s going on now?
“Want some tea?” she asks.
“Caffeine?” I ask.
“Nope. But I’ve got one that works great for energy and inflammation and good fortune.” She winks at me.
She knows I think a lot of her tea, herbs, essential oils, and yoga practices are a little woo-woo. She got into a lot of natural healing and alternative medicine after her injury and surgery. She constantly tells me that I need to try it, and I did get desperate enough to have her show me some meditation and how to use some oils after I’d been doing rehab on my knee for three months with much less progress than I’d expected.
But here I am, still not fully healed.
“Sure. Who doesn’t need good fortune?” I ask.
“That’s the spirit.”
