"Thomas loves me. He's just forgotten."
"Thomas has an excellent memory," Victoria countered. "I doubt he's forgotten much at all."
"I can think of something he hasn't forgotten," Jane put in.
Tiffany looked up at her expectantly. "What?"
"You boinking his buddy thirty seconds before Thomas had a meeting with him this past summer," Jane said with a sweet smile. "I know for a fact he hasn't forgotten that."
Iolanthe made herself a mental note to discover the definition of boinking at her earliest opportunity. By the way Tiffany's ears turned red, she suspected that the activity was one the woman shouldn't have engaged in.
"How did you know that?" Tiffany gasped. "It wasn't that way at all!"
Victoria stood up and slapped her hands on the table. "I've been bamboozled. I cannot believe you convinced me that Thomas had gone off the deep end. I think you'd better pack your bags."
"I will not!" Tiffany said, stamping her foot.
The sound was so strange, Iolanthe bent to peer under the table. Why, the wench had spikes pointing down from her heels. How did she walk about in those things?
"What are you looking at?" Tiffany snapped. "Haven't you ever seen a pair of stilettoes?" She raked Iolanthe with a contemptuous look. "I doubt it. Look at you in those unfashionable clothes."
"Thomas bought these for me," Iolanthe said stiffly. "And I find them much to my liking."
"Ah-ha!" Tiffany said, pouncing on that like a cat on a hapless mouse. "I knew it. Are you some country bumpkin he knocked up? You'll never have him, you know. I'll make sure of it."
Iolanthe acted before she thought. She pulled Duncan's knife from the back of her jeans. She flipped it and caught it several times in silence, then caught it a final time by the hilt and looked at Tiffany in feigned puzzlement.
"You'll stop me from what?" she asked. "I fear I didn't hear you."
Tiffany stood up so swiftly that her chair fell over backward and met the floor with a mighty crash. She backed away with a look of horror on her face.
"I'm being assaulted!" she screeched. "Call the police!"
"Shut up, Tiffany," Victoria said wearily. "Go pack your bags. I'll drive you down to the hotel. You can stay there until I can find someone to take you to the airport."
"She'll murder me!" Tiffany said, pointing a trembling finger at Iolanthe. "I need protection!"
"Your tongue ought to serve you well enough," Iolanthe said pleasantly. "Not even a banshee would dare accost you when you screech out your commands."
Tiffany began to stomp her feet in frustration. Iolanthe watched in fascination, marveling at the sound of Tiffany's shoes on the flagstones of Jane's kitchen. Then she watched as Tiffany threw up her hands and stormed from the kitchen.
Iolanthe looked at Jane. "Thomas is not here?"
"He went climbing," Jane said. "I think he needed the distraction."
Iolanthe nodded. "I understand. When did he leave?"
"Yesterday. He'll probably be back in a day or two."
"A bit of a climb sounds like a fine idea, actually." Iolanthe smiled at Victoria. "Good day to you, Victoria McKinnon."
Victoria watched her with her mouth slightly open. "You're Iolanthe."
"I am."
Victoria seemed to be incapable of intelligible speech. Iolanthe merely smiled at her, then looked at Jane.
"Will you let him know I came?"
"He'll be overjoyed."
"One could hope," Iolanthe said. She waved to Jane, looked a final time at Thomas's sister, then turned and left the kitchen. Perhaps Thomas had it aright, and getting out in the wilderness was the thing to clear one's head. She pulled the door shut behind her, tucked her knife back into the waistband of her jeans, then shoved her hands into the pockets of her coat.
She smiled to herself as she walked up the meadow. Poor Thomas, to have such a one as Tiffany hunting him. That he might want to be hunted by her wasn't a thought that bore entertaining. The woman was definitely not for Thomas. Iolanthe couldn't have stood more than a handful of moments in her presence. She sincerely doubted Thomas could have borne a lifetime with her.
Perhaps she would tease him about it when he came to find her. That she was certain he would was likely something that should have given her pause, but she didn't stop to consider it. He would come for her. Hadn't he said as much?
She wandered higher up behind the keep. She'd done so often in her youth and always found peace there. That she was doing so in jeans and boots was almost odd enough to make her uneasy.
How would she have known if she'd suddenly been slipped back to her time? It wasn't as if she could have merely looked about her and told the difference. Trees were trees, and these resembled to a great degree the same kind of trees she'd grown to womanhood with.
She found, quite suddenly, that the thought of what she would leave behind was enough to steal her breath from her. That she should have acquired so many things dear to her heart in such a short time was frightening. Jamie, Elizabeth, and their little boy Ian? All the rest of her kin and kith?
And Thomas?
She wrapped her arms around herself and stared into the sun hanging so low in the southern sky. Nay, she had come too far to lose what she'd found.
She heard a footstep behind her and stiffened in surprise. Had Thomas changed his mind and come home? The moment the thought crossed her mind, she found the idea of it irresistible. Maybe he'd had one of his fey fits come over him to tell him to end his climb. Maybe he'd known she would be here, and he had come to pledge his heart to her and ask for her hand.
But how quietly he had come! She would have to commend him on his tracking skills. Duncan would have been impressed.
She turned, a compliment at the ready.
Only it wasn't Thomas she was looking
