“You must enjoy it in here,” she said, touching a cymbidium orchid leaf. “I broke a pitcher over his head this morning.”
For a moment, Edan’s mouth dropped open, then he gave a snort of laughter. “I’ve gone after him with my fists more than once. Do you really mean to try to civilize him?”
“I hope I can. But I can’t keep on striking him. There must be other ways.” Her head came up. “I know nothing about you, or how you relate to him.”
Edan began repotting an overgrown passionflower. “He found me in an alleyway in New York where I was staying alive by eating from garbage cans. My parents and sister had died a few weeks before from smoke inhalation in a tenement fire. I was seventeen, couldn’t hold a job because I kept fighting,” he smiled in memory, “starving, and had decided to turn to a life of crime. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, the first person I chose to rob was Kane.”
Houston nodded. “Perhaps his size was a challenge to you.”
“Or maybe I was hoping I’d fail. Kane flattened me onto the street, but instead of sending me to jail, he took me home with him and fed me. I was seventeen, he was twenty-two, and already on his way to becoming a millionaire.”
“And you’ve been with him ever since.”
“And earning my keep,” Edan added. “He made me work for him all day and sent me to accounting school at night. The man doesn’t believe in sleep. We were up till four this morning, so that’s why we were still in bed when you arrived.
“Ah!” Edan said suddenly, grinning broadly as he looked through the glass walls. “I think the barber’s been here.”
With much curiosity, Houston looked through the glass. Coming down the path was a big man wearing Kane’s clothes, but instead of the long dark hair and beard, he was clean-shaven.
Houston looked at Edan in wonder, and he laughed as Kane walked through the door.
“Houston!” he bellowed. “You in here?”
She stepped from behind an elephant’s-foot tree to took at him.
“Ain’t bad, is it?” he said happily, rubbing his clean jaw. “I ain’t seen myself in so long I’d forgotten how good-lookin’ I was.”
Houston had to laugh, for he was indeed handsome, with a big square jaw, fine lips, and with his eyes with their dark brows, he was extraordinary.
“If you’re
through lookin’ at Edan’s plants, come on back to the house. Tbere’s a lady in the kitchen cookin’ up a storm and I’m starvin’.”
“Yes,” she said, walking out of the glasshouse ahead of him.
Once outside, he caught her arm. “I got somethin’ to say to you,” he said softly, looking at his boot toe, then at some place to the left of her head. “I didn’t mean to jump on you this mornin’. It was just that I was asleep, and I woke up to see a pretty gal there. I wouldn’t a hurt you. I just guess I ain’t used to ladies.” He rubbed his head and grinned at her. “But I imagine I’ll learn real quick.”
“Sit down here,” she said, pointing to a bench under a tree. “Let me look at your head.”
He sat quite still while she searched his hair for the lump and examined it. “Does it hurt very much?”
“Not at the moment,” he said, then caught both her hands. “You still gonna marry me?”
He’s much better looking than Leander, she suddenly thought, and when he looked at her like this, odd things happened to her knees. “Yes, I’m still going to marry you.”
“Good!” he said abruptly and stood. “Now, let’s go eat. Me and Edan got work to do and I got a man waitin’ for me. And you got to watch them idiots with the furniture.” He started back toward the house.
Houston had to half run to keep up with him. He certainly does change moods quickly, she thought, as she held her hat on and scurried.
By afternoon, she had rugs down in three rooms and had two of the attic rooms cleared. The furniture that was downstairs was in no order and she had yet to decide where each piece went. Kane and Edan closeted themselves in Kane’s office with their visitor. Now and again she heard Kane’s voice over the movers’ noise. Once he looked into the library at the gilded chairs and said, “Them little chairs gonna hold up?”
“They have for over two hundred years,” she’d answered.
Kane snorted and went back to his study.
At five o’clock, she knocked on the study door and, when Edan answered it, she looked through the blue haze of cigar smoke to tell Kane she was leaving but would return tomorrow. He barely looked up from his paperwork.
Edan walked out with her. “Thank you so much for all you’ve done today. I’m sure the house will be what it should be when you finish.”