“Me,” Lara answered, moving over to the three people ready for us. One was Nora’s, but the other two were… I had no idea. “She wants a trim and some layering, dead ends only, please. Also, waxing, and silver polish on nails and toes given she has an array of dresses.”
“Can I nap?” I asked, glad when they told me I could for toes and nails, but not hair as my head could move.
And, if I could sleep through waxing, then I needed more sleep as I was suffering from severe exhaustion.
Okay then.
I listened as the others talked about this and that, nodding along as Nora filled us in on the bachelor party from what Sebastian told her. Basically, the place I’d found was the score of the month, and they’d made a good first dent in the wild boar problem.
“I apologize for Henry,” Matilda said when there was a lull in the conversation. “He was raised—”
“He doesn’t like me,” I cut it, giving her a look to stuff it. “Don’t pee on me and say it’s raining. He doesn’t like me and I don’t care. I’d prefer we got along like I do with Sebastian, but I won’t lose one moment of sleep that he doesn’t. Thank you for saying that, but it’s really fine. If he could just keep his mouth shut and not start trouble, that would be great.”
“He won’t,” she promised.
“I hate to weigh in on what you don’t want to talk about, but I agree with your knights that you spoiled them all, and too much,” Nora said after a bit when she held out shades of nail polish to Lara. I was going first for everything since I had ghosts to deal with, so they weren’t messing around with me. “You gave them everything up front—”
“Yeah, I get it, Nora,” I sighed, wanting to stop thinking about it, which was hard when everyone kept bringing it up. “They got the milk before the cow and now they don’t want the cow.”
“Wait, you…” Lara trailed off and shook her head. “Either I was too drunk, I wasn’t saying it right, or you were too drunk to hear me. I was saying that’s how I was raised, not what I believe. It used to be that you didn’t give away the milk because they wouldn’t buy the cow, which is a crude and horrible way of saying don’t fuck guys because they won’t keep you.”
“Oh, yeah, I totally was messing that up then,” I chuckled darkly. “I really don’t want to talk about this though. I spoiled them because they spoiled me. I have no idea what to do or how—”
“Forgive them,” Matilda cut in.
“Oh, it’s that easy?” I threw right back, giving her an unhappy look. “Like with a different noble with a J name?” She flinched and I nodded. Yeah, easy to say from there. “I believe I pushed you to do the same, but respected when you said you weren’t touching that stove.”
“Yes, well, while I appreciate that, the situation was a bit different and he’s never tried to fix it. Darius is. We all mess up, but wanting to fix it and make amends is the sign of when to forgive.”
“I’m not sure there is anything to forgive,” I growled, glad she was working on my feet as I balled my hands into fists. “Darius disapproved. I can be upset how he handled it, but what’s to really forgive? I’m upset he walked away. Fine, he spun out, I forgive him for doing that as I understand it. That doesn’t magically make everything okay. Jaxon’s the same. Fine, he’s forgiven. Now what?”
Unfortunately, no one had the answer either.
I got my trim with layering, along with making plans for how to do my hair later. They all talked about makeup and shades to do me up as well, and I left it to Lara and Maggie. They wouldn’t let me look stupid, and much more talk about it and I was going to race off to find a wall to bang my head against.
I did nap while they did my nails and toes and no, I could not sleep during the waxing. Dear fuck, that wasn’t fun. The eyebrows were annoying, but it was downright painful to get my under arms and private everything waxed. And, it didn’t faze the woman at all when she was just spreading my legs and getting intimate with me, basically. Okay then.
Weird.
I went off to handle ghosts, knowing Nora and Matilda would greet all the guests as my mothers-in-law and get them settled. All I had to do was shower after and let myself be made up. I could handle that.
Probably.
Jaxon and Darius came along with Vitor and Moon, who were guarding me, as I fixed the hospital in Albuquerque. Next round was some more solar panels from gobs of energy beads that were piled up in Salt Lake City. And finally, putting some of New Orleans back online now that we were trailing the corrupted out of there to Houston.
So much spinning around, I was waiting for my head to pop off.
“I thought you were mad at me?” I asked Jaxon when we returned to the castle.
“No, I’m upset, but not at you.” He shook his head and pulled me to my tower, not speaking again until we were in my room. “We’ll fix this. We can get through this too.”
I nodded, not wanting anymore problems, but in the back of my mind, I was wondering how much longer I would be able to just “get through” things instead of enjoy life. Was there a limit or line where it just stopped being worth it and a person shut down?
Hadn’t I already, maybe, crossed that line to
