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Soon,thevoicesinthebathroomstopped.Instead, she heard a lot of splashing. Like the amount of splashing two people might create if they were having — fun — with each other in a claw-foot tub as big as a swimming pool.
Mary started making plans for Van when they got home that had nothing to do with oak and tools. She slipped into the workshop.
“Van, hurry up,” she whispered. “We have to get out of here.”
“Okay, okay!”
Hurrying turned out to be the wrong thing to do. Marywincedataseriesofcrashes.Vanwassuddenly knee-deep in tools, power tools, and boxes of nails and screws. She made a note to herself to remind Van of this when they got home. If he’d left things strewn all over the floor, they wouldn’t have been in neat piles that could topple.
Van cursed.
Dreading what she would see, she turned back to look at the bathroom door. It was opening. Mary groaned. She caught a glimpse of Cyn. Of course Mary caught a glimpse of Cyn. Who else would it have been? The cleaning lady cavorting with the plumber?
Cyn was swathed in a black silk robe that made her look every inch the graceful, stunning, ageless woman she was. She glided to the workshop doorway.
“Hi, Cyn,” Mary muttered.
“Aunt Cynthia,” Van muttered.
“Well, I have visitors.” Cyn was urbane, as always. “What are the two of you doing here?”
“Tools,” Van mumbled.
Cyn’s eyes glittered with, to Mary’s astonishment, a sparkle of fun. “I’m just as glad you’re here. I think it’s time my gentleman friend and I came out of the closet. Or the bathroom, as the case may be.”
Mary crowded into the doorway next to Van, excited about the great reveal since Cyn wasn’t upset. Her smile, in fact, was as serene as a forest pond at dawn. As mysterious too.
Cyn half turned toward the bathroom and swept her arm out in a grandiose gesture of introduction.
A man stepped out into the hallway, looking on guard as he looped his arm around Cyn’s waist.
“Uncle Brock?” Mary gasped.
“Van, my dear,” Cyn said with aplomb, “I believe you haven’t actually been introduced to my very dear friend, Brock Samuel.”
“Oh, dear,” Mary whispered.
“Very dear?” Van mumbled. “Your very dear? Friend? Oh. Yes. Well. It’s a pleasure — ” He reached out his hand to shake with Brock.
Brock reached out. He stopped. His burgundy silk bathrobe, a perfect accompaniment to Cyn’s, started to gape open. Van yelped. He pulled his hand back as though he’d reached out to grasp a red-hot fireplace poker.
From behind the closed door up the hall, Lancelot contributed a single, extended howl to the scene. Mary thought he sounded miserable, but over what? Guinevere chimed in with a whine. Mary didn’t know what she was whimpering about either.
Mary started to go check on the dogs, but decided they were probably just picking up on the tension twanging among the humans. She couldn’t drag her attention away from Cyn and Brock.
“I think perhaps we’ll continue this conversation another time, shall we?” Cyn said. She glanced down and saw Brock’s hand nearest her was free. That is, it was not in use holding his bathrobe together. She entwined her hand in his. “Come along, my darling.” She swept down the hall with Brock to her bedroom.
Mary looked at Van. Van looked at Mary. They both glanced into the bathroom, where a tub-side table displayed a book of poetry, a bottle of champagne, two flutes and a half-full plate of truffles and strawberries.
Mary added a few details to her plans for Van once they got home.
Chapter Thirty
What if ...
B
ROCK SHIFTED IN THEspindly chair beside the bed, but he let himself stay slumped. Luckily, he did fit better than Van did in the delicate antiques Cyn had filled the boy’s apartment with. Brock didn’t feel lucky about anything right now, though. He was too uneasy. He didn’t like it that the kids had found out about him and Cyn.
