Her sister gave a wan smile. “You’ve had too much to do for years. It’s time for me to take on my fair share. You know it is.”
“You have done your fair share,” Beatrix said, taking her sister’s hand. “You have. I’m sorry I ever made you feel as if you haven’t. But the money we won’t get back if you withdraw—that’s six months of savings. You have to give me more time to find a job,please.”
Lydia shook her head. “The deadline is tomorrow. I can’t wait.”
With no other arguments to marshal, Beatrix said, “Rosemarie won’t stand for it.”
“She says it’s my decision.”
“Lydia—”
“Bee, this is the only option we’ve got. I won’t let us starve.”
Beatrix tried to catch her breath, an echo of the panic attacks she thought she’d conquered. She was powerless to help Peter, to find work, to stop any of this from happening?—
No.
“I’ll be back,” she said, and dashed for the road, her sister calling after her, “Bee? Bee!”
The trip took about fifteen minutes. Striding in the now total darkness, she rehearsed what she would say and avoided the occasional car. But when she arrived at Senator Gray’s house, she found it as dark and empty as Peter’s.
She sank onto the porch, unable to face the walk back. Of course he wasn’t there. The legislature was in session—what had she expected? She was just considering whether there was any gain in waiting when a pickup truck came around the bend in the road and, to her joy and anxiety, pulled into the driveway.
Straightening her spine, she walked to meet Gray.
“Miss Harper?” He slammed his door and frowned, which seemed a bad omen, but quickly added, “What’s wrong?”
She swallowed a laugh that would surely sound insane. What wasn’t wrong? “I saw your ad for a legislative aide and wondered—what happened to Mr. Vance?”
Gray’s frown deepened into a full-out scowl. “He skipped out on me without so much as a two-weeks’ notice, that’s what happened to him.”
“Why?”
“To ‘spend more time’ with his family.” Gray gave an expressive snort. “The man isn’t even married!”
“The wizards got to him?”
“Obviously.”
She tamped down the reflexive fear this prompted, the apprehension that her sister really could be at risk. She knew where that fear took her. She would not be so easily led down that road again. Voice steady, she asked: “Did they threaten him, do you think?”
He shook his head. “No, he seemed happy—they probably paid him off. Now I have to find a replacement on top of everything else! With seven-and-a-half weeks left in the blasted session!”
Beatrix breathed in and slowly exhaled. “Hire me.”
Gray rolled his eyes. Not a promising beginning. “I assure you, Iwillfind an aide and keep pushing on the legislation. Don’t think you have to babysit me, Miss Harper.”
“I don’t,” she said. “I want you to hire me because I think I’d do an excellent job.”
This time, he laughed. Worse and worse. “Miss Harper, there has never been a lady legislative aide, and I doubt there ever will be. This is a job for a man.”
There was a great deal she wanted to say to that. With effort, she merely said, “Oh?”
Gray shifted from one foot to the other. “Well—yes.”
“Why, exactly?”
“It—it justis.”
