Vi gaped.
“I know!” Victor groaned. “She cried. I’m a fool.”
“Victor,” Violet started and then closed her eyes. Her brother didn’t need her to tell him that he was, in fact, a fool. He also didn’t need her to point out that he’d been as involved in those baby-making moments as Kate. Or the fact that he only wanted the children to stop, when they were so eminently fertile, because he was terrified of losing Kate to childbirth.
“After she cried?”
Victor didn’t answer.
“You aren’t normally so likely to put your foot in your mouth.”
Violet’s twin nodded. “It scared me. What happened to Rita. She fell on the stairs, Vi. But what if she had the baby early and bled too much? I could survive losing Rita, as much as I care about her, but I couldn’t survive losing Kate.”
Violet could well imagine. They were, both of them, far too inclined to imagine up something horrible. They could make it so real. It helped with their writing, and it was a real problem after something alarming, in the middle of the night, or when there were odd noises to decipher. How easy it was to hear monsters in the walls when you could imagine the shape of the claws, the sound of their growls, and the exact color of their eyes.
“Did you apologize?”
Victor nodded. “At least a thousand times.”
“She forgave you,” Vi said, certain it was true.
“She did.”
“Then?”
“I can’t shake the guilt, Vi.”
Violet laughed and then patted him on the head again. “Your suffering is just what she needs.”
“But you’ll buy jewelry with me all the same?”
“I will,” Violet agreed easily. “Come, come. Let’s find Kate a bucket of apologies to match the ones you’ve already given her.”
Victor groaned and then said, “How do I make her believe that I’m sorry, Vi?”
“Surely this isn’t the first time you’ve made her cry?”
“I don’t know,” Victor muttered. “She’s sneaky like you are.”
Violet laughed. “Probably why you adore her.”
“Jewelry?”
“I’m not going to tell you how to persuade your wife to forgive you, but I would suggest that you start with something a little more in her line.”
“She likes jewelry?” Given that it was a question, he scoffed at himself. “I should know that, right?”
“Victor.” Vi lifted a brow and put her hands on her hips. “Quit being a ninny. It’s painful.”
He moaned. “What do I do?”
“You are not this slow.”
“Jack buys you jewelry.”
“I adore jewelry and wear too much.”
Victor grinned at her. “Sometimes you do clang a bit.”
“But I’m shiny when I do.”
“You are,” he said, holding his arm out to her. “Like a chandelier.”
She gasped and elbowed him.
“Or like…a peacock feather.”
Vi groaned and elbowed him harder.
“Or a spider’s web with dew.”
“I hate you.”
“On a sunny morning,” he added and then giggled like a schoolgirl when she huffed. “Vi, the walking spider’s web.”
“With dew,” she added dryly, rolling her eyes.
“On a sunny morning.”
When they were in the auto, Violet said, “Think now, brother mine.”
He shook his head. “I can’t. I keep replaying making Kate cry.”
“Think,” Vi snapped. “Quit being a baby. You laid some blame at Kate’s feet that is at least half yours. It was a delicate time, and you feel badly.”
“I do,” he agreed.
“Mostly because she doesn’t cry in front of you.”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t make her cry.”
Vi lifted a brow at him.
“I do?” The squeak in his voice made her laugh, but she nodded firmly, so he’d understand.
“I—”
Violet waited. Vi had cried often enough when they were living together that he should have been aware. Kate wasn’t some automaton.
“She’s too kind to me. She probably doesn’t want her emotions to come into our tiffs, and I suppose—”
Vi lifted her brow, waiting.
“Well, many couples fight over money or where they live, or family, but Kate and I don’t need to argue about those things. We’re spoiled, Vi.”
“You are,” Vi agreed. “We both are.” Violet patted his leg as he muttered to himself.
“She’s easy, isn’t she? She just wants books, to be with family…she puts me first so easily.”
Vi let him talk it out, and he mostly just muttered from then on while they drove through London. Finally, he got to it. “She doesn’t want jewelry.”
“Maybe you could leave the twins with Jack and I and take her somewhere for a few days.”
Victor paused, and she could see the instant rejection in his eyes, but he waited long enough to process that feeling. “We could use some time, the two of us.”
“You could,” Vi agreed.
“And no one would take care of them better than you and Jack while we were gone. We’d come home to spoiled babies.”
“You would.”
“Once Nanny Jane is done looking after Rita and if Kate says it’s all right.”
Violet laughed. “Look at you. Already making progress.”
“I’d have said that before, Vi,” Victor crossed his arms over his face, and he was about one quarter inch of lower lip from full pouting.
She patted his leg as if he’d done something just right.
“Stop it,” he grumbled.
She lifted a brow at him. “Where to, brother mine?”
He sniffed, eyed her sideways, and then frowned lightly as he said, “The bookstore.”
“There we go,” Vi laughed. She patted him again, and he shoved her hand off.
“You’re being condescending.”
“Only because Kate held back,” Violet laughed. “The universe needs balance.”
“You’re a horrendous brat,” he told her.
Their favorite bookstore appeared to be a hole in the wall until you walked inside. Then, the scent of books, the curving staircase, the windows that poured in enough light to curl into a chair and ravenously consume books was all they needed, though Vi had suggested more than once that coffee would also be in order. It seemed the bookstore owner did not feel the same.
Back before Jack and Kate, Violet and Victor had spent many an afternoon in the store and much of their pathetic pin money. Now, they spent an excess there and weren’t quite able to keep their reading time in step with their to-be-read pile of pulp,
