01 Do You Believe in Magic - The Children of Merlin (22 page)

The house had an actual,
honest-to-God library. And a music room with about every kind of
instrument you could imagine. Each doorway revealed new treasures
as Maggie trailed Kee down the hall toward the guest suite. When
they got there, Maggie found that somebody, maybe Mr. Nakamura, had
brought up her backpack. Maggie wondered why a family this rich
didn’t have a whole staff to do for them. Maybe they had a
housekeeping service.

Kee pointed out the bathroom and
told Maggie to come down when she was ready.

The privacy was welcome. At
least she’d have some time to gather herself before facing them all
again. She walked to the window. It looked out over Catalina. A
freighter was making its slow way north. The big bay was dotted
with triangular sails tipping into the wind. The room itself was as
big as Elroy’s shack and elegant, with Chinese carpets in blue and
beige. What looked like an old tapestry with scenes from a medieval
hunt, full of men on horses and dogs and a stag, hung on the wall.
Its faded tones matched the room exactly. And the bed had more
pillows than she’d ever seen, in all the colors of the carpet. This
was what Tris came from.

And she didn’t. Maybe she’d fit
in a little better if she took a shower and changed her shirt. That
was about all she could do.

The shower felt delicious. The
water pulsed into the enclosure of marble and glass from two shower
heads. An assortment of shampoos and gels sat in a little rack in
the corner. The towel was huge and white and fluffy. But all she
could think about was that Tris would be there when she went down
to “supervise” the making of dinner. Even now, as she soaped
herself, remembering how he’d looked coming out onto the deck, her
body got hopelessly out of hand. She cut short her shower before
she started trying to relieve the tension herself. That might help,
or it might push her over some edge where she had no control at
all.

She was going to have to avoid
looking at Tris entirely if she didn’t want to risk being reduced
to goggling insensibility. A few minutes ago she regretted that he
might not be there. Now the prospect that he would be was
frightening. The Tremaine kids at least had turned out to be pretty
nice, except for the imposing Kemble. And Drew was a little too
perfect. Still, she wouldn’t care about facing the family if she
didn’t have to worry about betraying her hopeless feelings for its
black sheep at every turn.

She changed into her red rodeo
shirt with the pearl snaps, and regretted that she only brought the
jeans she was wearing (with the hole in the knee) and a change of
underwear. And boots. Not much choice about the boots. It was
either the ones for dress or the ones for working. That’s what she
owned. She hadn’t even brought her dress boots. She dragged a brush
through her hair and snapped the elastic band around it. That was
as good as it would get.

At the top of the stairs, she
heard laughter drifting upfrom below. When she got to the kitchen,
Kee was doubled over and had flour in her hair. Lanyon was red in
the face, ditto for hair. Tammy was shrieking like the
fourteen-year-old girl she was. Tris’s broad back was seated at a
bar overlooking the workspace, where he could rest his cast on a
kitchen chair someone had provided. His shoulders were shaking,
too.

Drew was grinning, though she
didn’t appear to be actually incapacitated. “Maggie! You’re just in
time to make this crew straighten up. They can’t possibly be so
silly in front of a guest.” That meant Jane wasn’t considered a
guest? “Sit there, next to Tristram, and keep him company.” She
turned on Lanyon. “You! You are cutting vegetables with Devin. Hop
to it.”

Lanyon gave a salute, which
cascaded flour over his eyebrows and convulsed Tammy and Kee in
peals of laughter all over again. Maggie slid up on a stool she
surreptitiously moved a little away from Tris. Couldn’t be so
obvious as to sit at the other end of the bar, but she didn’t dare
be too close to him. She might just spontaneously combust.

“You got your just deserts,
Lanyon,” Tris called. He had a beer called Pilsner Urquell in front
of him. What the heck kind of beer was that?

“I was a victim,” Lanyon said
with mock severity. “It’s not nice to make fun.”

“You should talk!” Kee said. She
turned to Maggie. “Lanyon is the practical joker of the family.
We
are all his hapless victims.”

“Tris, tell the one about
Lanyon’s ferret and the barrels of used oil,” Tammy pleaded.

“A long, sad tale,” Tris
mourned. But he launched into it with relish as Jane quietly put a
glass of white wine in front of Maggie. She apparently hadn’t heard
Drew’s fear that Maggie drank only beer. “My brother’s devious plan
was meant to ruin my livelihood.”

They all hooted. Apparently,
Lanyon might be a practical joker, but it wasn’t malicious.

Tris shook his head in mock
weariness. “It was January, which makes the oil especially
viscous....”

Maggie watched as Jane murmured
directions to the crew. She was so modest and apologetic they
didn’t even realize she was organizing them. Drew had Tammy in hand
and they were making salad or something on the back board. Kee was
making pies over near a huge Subzero refrigerator. Devin and Lanyon
chopped vegetables with the zeal of pirates at the center island.
Jane browned batches of chicken in several large skillets. And Tris
fit right in. No matter what he’d led her to believe. Even if he
had difficulties, this was where he belonged.

They may have thought he hit
her, but they obviously cared for him.

As Tris’s story unfolded, Kemble
appeared. Tris broke off. “Mother?” he asked. He tried to make it
gruff, but Maggie knew him well enough now to hear the anxiety in
his voice.

“She’s fine,” Kemble reassured
him. “She’ll be down for dinner. Father’s with her.”

Maggie felt Tris deflate.

Kemble cleared his throat. “Are
you to the part where José...?”

“Not yet,” Tammy interrupted.
“We’re just up to Tris opening the washroom door.”

“Well, then you’d better get
cracking, brother,” Kemble said. It was sort of an order. But
Maggie thought Kemble meant it to thaw the tension between
them.

Tris glanced around and realized
he didn’t have any choice. He heaved a sigh. “Well, the ferret
darted out. And two of my guys started screaming in
Spanish....”

Jane gave Kemble a list and
whispered something about assembling spices. The way Jane kept
glancing up at him.... Was she blushing? Maggie thought he must
make Jane nervous or something. For a bossy kind of guy he took
directions surprisingly well from the shy girl.

The room filled with wonderful
smells as the Tremaine show rolled on. Now that she wasn’t the
focus, Maggie was mesmerized. This was what a family was. Everybody
pitched in because Mrs. Tremaine wasn’t feeling well. They all
cared about each other, even Kemble and Tris in their own way.
Tammy finished her assignment and was taking candid pictures of
everybody with her very pink cell phone, which drew protests from
Drew that she didn’t want horrible photos of her recorded for
posterity, and lessons in composition from Kee. The room felt so
alive, so ... full. This was what she’d never had.

“Uh, can I set the table?”
Maggie asked. She wanted to be some use.

“Sure,” Drew said, opening a
drawer and beginning to collect silver. Maggie saw her put back
some forks.

“I know you put the fork for the
pie above the plate,” Maggie said dryly. “I took Home Ec.”

Drew reddened. “Of course you
do.”

Maggie scooped the silver onto a
platter and carried it into the dining room. Jane followed with a
stack of plates covered with large flowers. They looked
hand-painted. Maggie and Jane set the table in silence. Jane got
glasses out of a huge, rustic buffet. Jane was a restful sort of
girl.

“Guess I shouldn’t have been
testy about Drew making assumptions,” Maggie muttered.

Jane smiled. She really had a
lovely smile. “Drew is very sure of herself.”

“Must be nice.”

“Right up until you aren’t sure
anymore.” Jane straightened. “Well, maybe that will never happen to
Drew.”

Dinner was well on its way when
Jane and Maggie made it back to the kitchen. Four chickens and
vegetables were roasting in their sauce in the ovens of the big
Viking range, two blueberry pies were in a wall oven, and the
kitchen was nearly cleaned and presentable. Mr. and Mrs. Tremaine
appeared in the family room behind Tris and Maggie.

Kemble was still putting dishes
in the dishwasher. “Go make drinks in the front room, Devin, and
fill our esteemed elders in on the general status. Lanyon,
background music.”

“Right.” Devin tossed his sponge
on the counter and dashed out, Lanyon right after him.

Mrs. Tremaine did look pale. Her
husband was hovering anxiously, obviously concerned. “Brian, I’m
fine
,” she said firmly. “Don’t you have some merger to
complete or something?
”

“Finished yesterday,” Mr.
Tremaine returned. “Only agenda item is to take care of you.”

“Lucky me.” Mrs. Tremaine
pretended to be bitter. But she looked up at him with such love in
her eyes that Maggie was actually startled. That! That right there
was what created the possibility of a family like this. These
people knew love.

“Why don’t you all adjourn to
the front room and see that Devin doesn’t poison the elders?” Drew
said. “Jane and I will finish up here.”

From the front of the house,
soothing strains of classical music floated out from the unseen
piano. Everyone trailed out. Maggie leaned into Tris. Dangerous,
but she had to know. “Your mother isn’t seriously ill, is she?”

Tris looked like he’d just
killed the canary, his expression was so guilty. “She’ll be all
right. She , uh, overdid it and... and fainted.”

“It was really warm here today,”
Kee said. “Maybe it was heat stroke.”

Kee’s innocent expression was
feigned. Strange.

When they got to the big living
room with the grand piano near the windows, Devin was whispering to
the two Tremaine parents. Maggie couldn’t hear what he was saying
but she saw Mr. Tremaine glance over to her.

Uh-oh.
Devin was probably
telling them the cowgirl had designs on their son, after the stupid
display she’d put on when Tris showed up on the deck. She’d have to
be very careful tonight. Not even a glance to Tris. Kee, Kemble,
and Tris gathered around Lanyon’s piano. Maggie lined up on the
other side of Kemble, as far away from Tris as possible. Tammy
skipped up and wormed her way in under Tris’s arm. He gave her a
hug.

“Play something we can sing,”
Kee ordered.

“In honor of Tris’s return?”
Lanyon asked, a wicked look in his eyes. The piano segued
effortlessly into a rousing rendition of “Bad to the Bone.” Kemble
smirked.

Kee gave Lanyon a withering
look. “Something we can
sing.”

Lanyon tried “Born to Run,” but
went on to some New Age mood piece at Kee’s frown. “Maybe we should
let our guest choose,” he suggested.

“Me?” Maggie tried not to squeak
with dismay and failed. “I ... I mainly know country music. You
wouldn’t know any songs like that....”

“Oh, yes he does,” Kee promised.
“Lanyon knows pretty much every song there is.”

“What kind of country do you
listen to?” Lanyon asked. He’d shifted into something that sounded
a little bluegrass. “Classic? The new stuff?”

“A ... little of everything....”
Maggie stuttered.

“Quick, who’s your favorite new
artist?” Lanyon asked sharply.

“Chris ... Chris Young?” Why had
she admitted
that
? The kid had surprised her.

Lanyon broke into “Rainy Night
in Georgia
.
” “Young has the best version of that song ever.
Even Tony Joe White said so, and he wrote it. The one on the album
is the guy’s first and only take. The band was just playing around
and asked him to try it.”

Maggie blinked. “You ... you
do
know everything.”

“Only about music,” Kemble said.
“About most things he’s remarkably ignorant.”

“So there,” Tammy laughed,
leaning her weight on the piano and scuffing her feet.

“Do you, or do you not, all know
the words to ‘Rainy Night in Georgia’?” Lanyon challenged.

Tris surprised Maggie by
starting in with the first verse just as Lanyon riffed to the
beginning.

Talk about your baritones....
The man had a voice that sounded like sin and aged whiskey. There
had to be a lot of testosterone in there to get a voice like that.
Maggie’s knees sagged. Her elbows on the piano barely held her
up.

“Come on, girls, give him a
hand,” Lanyon urged.

Kee grinned and joined in.
Maggie managed to get in on the middle of the next line.

Lanyon arched a brow at Kemble,
who laughed and turned to walk over to the bar, saying, “Not my
style, little brother.”

So the five of them sang the
whole thing, and everybody pretty much did know all the words with
some prompting for Tammy. Brina was clapping from the couch as they
finished. “That was beautiful,” she said, beaming. “Sing some
more.”

Kemble handed his mother a glass
of chilled white wine from a bottle he got from somewhere under a
bar in the corner. She accepted gracefully. Maggie could see where
Drew got her natural elegance. Mrs. Tremaine was everything Maggie
wasn’t.

“Taylor Swift,” Tammy urged,
bouncing on the balls of her feet. “I
love
Taylor
Swift.”

Tris shrugged. “Got to count me
out there.”

“Me too,” Kee agreed.

“I’ll duet with you,” Maggie
offered. “I know some Taylor.”

Lanyon, of course, knew a lot of
Taylor. Tammy’s voice was sweet and soprano, so Maggie did a little
lower harmony. As they came to the end, everyone clapped and Tris
whistled.