Drake Sisters 02 - The Twilight Before Christmas

reprisal.”
    Hannah stretched her legs out in front of her and gave Sarah a sweet smile. “You never know what a humbling experience can do for someone’s character.”
    “I’m getting your tea for you, but I hope this is a big joke, and I won’t hear about it later at the store.” Sarah turned away quickly to keep Hannah from seeing her laughter.
    Abbey squeezed Hannah’s hand. “You didn’t real y do anything to Sylvia, did you?” There was a hopeful note in her voice she couldn’t quite hide.
    “Drink your tea,” Sarah said. “And eat some cookies. You’re too pale. Matt and Damon are making us dinner tonight.”
    “Did I miss anything important while I was making Jonas carry my deadweight up those long and winding stairs?”
    “Only Matt wishing on the snowglobe,” Joley said. “And we’re al fairly certain what he wished for.”
    “You’re so brave, Kate,” Hannah said. “I could never be with a man so absolutely frightening. They have those cold eyes and those scary voices, and I just want to curl up and fade away.” For a moment tears shimmered in her eyes. She looked over the rim of her teacup at Kate. “You thought I was so brave to go out into the world and be seen, while you chose to stay out of sight and share your wonderful stories with the world, but you’re wil ing to try with a man to have a real life with him.”
    “I haven’t made up my mind yet,” Kate admitted. “I’m afraid he’l wake up one day and realize what a coward I am. You’l find someone though, Hannah.”
    Hannah shook her head. “No, I won’t. I don’t want some man snarling at me because I forgot to put the dishes in the dishwasher, or angry because I had to fly to Egypt to do a photo shoot. And I could never live with a man who always seemed on the edge of violence, or even capable of violence. I’d be so afraid I’d be paralyzed.”
    Kate laid her hand on Hannah’s knee. “Matt isn’t capable of violence against a woman. He’s protective, there’s a difference.”
    “That’s how everyone describes Jonas, as protective, but he’s real y a bul y. He’l order his wife around day and night.”
    “If Jonas ever fal s in love with a woman, I think he would move heaven and earth to make her happy,” Kate said. “He looks after al of us, and we’re sometimes very aggravating. He has a job to do, and he works hard at it. We often make his job much more difficult. And it must be very disconcerting to be so connected emotional y to us. He senses when we’re in trouble or hurt, and unfortunately we’re in trouble quite often.”
    Hannah sighed. “I know. He’s just so annoying al the time. I closed the window in the entryway; too much fog was drifting in, and it scared me.”
    She forced an uneasy laugh. “I never thought I’d be afraid of the fog.”
    Kate stood up and looked around the house. “What do you mean too much fog was drifting in?” She stared out the window toward the sea. “You saw it? You weren’t dreaming? What did it look like?”
    Sarah stood up too and began to move uneasily about the room, checking the windows.
    “It looked like fog,” Hannah said. “I came down the stairs and, to be honest, was a little unsteady, so I sat on the floor in the entryway for a couple of minutes. I could see fog drifting in through the open window. It appeared to be normal fog, a long wisp of it, but the fact that I could see it in the house upset me. So I closed the window.”
    “Nothing can get into the house, Sarah,” Abbey said. “It’s protected. You know that the house has always protected us.”
    Sarah shook her head. “Mom told us we needed to know the ancient language of the Drake sisters, and we al shrugged it off with the exception of El e. She also told us we needed to renew our safeguards every single time we came home, but did we do that? No, of course not—we’ve become complacent. Mom has precog, we al know it. It was a foreshadowing, but we didn’t take her instructions seriously.”
    Abbey put a hand to her throat. “Do you think the entity was influencing me to use my voice on Jackson as wel as at the committee meeting?”
    Sarah nodded. “There’s a good chance of it. We have to be very careful. None of us are handling this very wel . We’ve never faced such a thing before.”
    “And I never want to again,” Kate said fervently.
    “Dinner,” Matt cal ed from the kitchen. “Come eat. And bring Hannah with you. Jonas said she had to eat