The Complete Novels of the Lear Sister Trilogy

by Julia London

  It was more likely, given her thirty-one years of experience thus far, that just as she’d feared, Flynn really had been horrified, and worse, he really did think Myron was her boyfriend. Okay, all right, so Myron had been her boyfriend once, but he wasn’t her boyfriend now, and seeing him through Flynn’s eyes, well . . . Rachel thought she might as well crack open the cookie dough and mainline it, because Flynn wasn’t coming back.

  Except that, thanks to her new status as pauper, she didn’t have any cookie dough.

  She checked her horoscope in the paper instead. Some ideas seem new and interesting but are better left unexplored.

  Great. That made her feel so much better about the witchcraft thing. Not.

  With a sigh of resignation, Rachel tossed the horoscope aside and went to dress for her weaving class.

  She donned a black, ankle-length skirt and a tight-fitting, low-cut gray sweater that made her look thin, she thought, bound her hair up in a massive knot at her nape, put on the amethyst earrings she had picked up on the Isle of Skye during a research trip that had gone nowhere, and her brand-new Donald J. Pilner embroidered boots.

  Okay, so she’d charged brand-new, extremely expensive boots at a point she was desperate for money. But she had the autopsy job, and if push came to shove, she could borrow the money from Robin or Rebecca. At least she hoped she could. But she really needed those boots to make her feel better.

  Around her shoulders, she draped the lavender shawl she’d finished Saturday after her bath. At least her dabble in witchcraft wasn’t a complete loss—she had a beautiful shawl to show for it. But she wasn’t giving up. Not yet, anyway. And in an act of semi-desperation, she dabbed a little Mexican vanilla behind one ear. Really stupid, but it wasn’t like anyone was going to be sniffing around and asking if her perfume came in a bottle with the Pillsbury Doughboy on the label. Besides, she found the smell of vanilla to be very calming.

  When she arrived at class with the box of yarns she would discuss, most of her students were already gathered. Sandy was regaling a very shocked-looking Mr. Gregory with her latest bout of diverticulitis, Chantal and Tiffinnae were arguing about the progress Tiffinnae had made on their weaving thus far, which was pretty close to none given their penchant for talking and bothering others who were trying to weave, and Jason was sitting quietly with a stack of what Rachel supposed was travel brochures—she made a mental note to mention them to the class.

  She said hi, walked to the front of the class, and put down her box. There was a message taped to the chalkboard for her—it was from a school secretary and it said Dave and Lucy were running late, and one new student had signed up for class.

  “Woo-hoo, girl!” Chantal said as Rachel read the note. “Don’t you got it going on!” Rachel looked up. Chantal was mimicking some sort of bird walk, going round in a little circle, dipping her head as she admired Rachel’s shawl.

  “You like it?” Rachel asked proudly, and very theatrically tossed one end over her shoulder. “I made it this weekend.”

  “You made that?” Tiffinnae exclaimed.

  “I mean, I sewed the edges and the fringe.”

  “What is that? Silk?” Tiffinnae asked.

  “Chenille,” Rachel said. “I’m going to talk a little bit about it and all the different threads and yarns and how they’ve evolved through the years.”

  Neither Tiffinnae nor Chantal looked very thrilled by the prospect, and Mr. Gregory actually groaned—at her or Sandy, she couldn’t say. Rachel arranged her visual aids and notes, and while she was reviewing her remarks, she heard the door open and glanced up; it was Dave and Lucy. She smiled, gave a little wave at the same time she looked away. When at last she was ready, she glanced up at the classroom clock, saw that it was time to begin, and took her place behind the podium. Only then did she look up, smiling at the class . . . and felt the hard leap of her heart.

  It worked!

  It was nothing short of a miracle that she stopped herself from dancing a little end zone dance. There he was, sitting in the back row next to Jason, wearing a navy blazer and a starched white button-down shirt tucked into a pair of jeans. On his feet was a pair of very European-looking boots. His hair, nice and thick, just brushed the top of his collar, and his smile, which was brilliantly white, made his skin look bronzed. Bronzed. And even more interesting, he appeared, at least from where she was standing, to have a black eye.

  “Looks like we got us some new blood,” Chantal observed.

  He must have come in behind Dave and Lucy, but never mind that; the whole class was looking at her, then looking at Flynn.

  “Ah!” Rachel exclaimed brightly, silently cursing the little shake in her voice, not to mention the brilliance of her vocabulary.

  Chantal twisted in her chair (as best she could, seeing as how she was a couple of sizes larger than the chair) and peered at Flynn. “What’s your name?”

  “Flynn,” he said cheerfully, leaning forward on his desk. “Flynn Oliver.”

  “Where’d you get that shiner?”

  “Beg your pardon?”

  “The black eye, she means,” Tiffinnae helpfully clarified.

  “Ah. A bit of a contretemps, I’m afraid.”

  Chantal blinked and looked at Tiffinnae. Both of them looked at Mr. Gregory, who shrugged. Then Chantal asked, “You from England?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact.” As Chantal kept staring, Flynn cleared his throat a little. “Ah . . . London, actually. But I, ah, was reared in Butler Cropwell.”

  Dave, perhaps feeling a little sorry for Flynn, jumped right into the opening. “Is there some rule where the new guy gets the third degree?” he asked, and glanced over his shoulder at Flynn. “I’m Dave. This is my wife, Lucy.”

  “How do you do,” Flynn said politely, and Chantal and Tiffinnae dipped their heads together to snicker.

  “That’s Chantal and Tiffinnae,” Dave continued, taking on the role of host. “And Sandy and Mr. Gregory. And that’s Jason sitting next to you,” he said.

  Flynn looked at Jason, who did not look up from his intent study of the table next to the loom.

  “So you’ve decided to tackle weaving?” Dave continued with a laugh.

  “If it’s quite all right with the instructor, yes.”

  Everyone looked at Rachel. “Of course!” she said, a tad too enthusiastically. “Welcome to our class!” But wait—what was he doing here? As in, how could he have possibly known she taught a weaving . . . Oh, right, right. She’d told him she taught a class the night of the tampons. Not a weaving class, but . . . but everyone was staring at her. “All righty, then!” she said, and looked down at her notes, shook her head a little. With a smile plastered on her face, Rachel lifted her head. “Before we get to work on the looms, I’m going to talk a little more about yarns.”

  Sandy instantly responded by sitting up in her seat, pen and paper ready to take notes. Flynn settled back, that ever-present smile on his lips.

  “Last week, we talked about the origins of weaving, and how far back we could trace it.”

  Mr. Gregory’s hand shot up. He was very enthusiastic about history, Rachel had learned. “Yes, Mr. Gregory?”

  “You said no one actually knows when the process began, given that few remnants survive, but that there is evidence of cloth being made as early as seven to eight thousand B.C., and that the earliest evidence of large tapestries being woven in Europe is just before the twelfth century, of which, by the way, you promised a picture.”

  Damn, he was good. “I have it right here,” she said, and fished a picture of a tapestry out of her box and handed it to Chantal, motioning for her to send it around. “So who knows what tapestries were typically used for in medieval Europe?”

  “Rugs?” Dave tossed out.

  “No, but close,” Rachel said.

  “Furniture coverings?” Sandy guessed.

  “Smaller tapestries were used over furniture at times. But I’m talking about the large tapestries that depicted romance an
d gothic themes. There was a more common use for them.”

  The students stared at her blankly. Rachel glanced at Flynn. “Ah . . . perhaps our new student knows the answer?”

  That suggestion seemed to surprise Flynn. He sat up a little straighter and glanced around. “Tapestry?” he repeated.

  Rachel nodded.

  “Right. Of course. They were . . . bed coverings.”

  “Well . . . no.” Rachel winced inwardly at having put him on the spot. “I suppose they could have been. But they were actually wall hangings. Weavers would create these gigantically thick tapestries to hang along the walls of big old castles to keep drafts out of the rooms.”

  “How we supposed to know that! None of us ever been in a castle!” Chantal groused, and glanced at Flynn over her shoulder. “You ever been to a castle?”

  “Ah . . . actually, my mum took me to visit Windsor Castle when I was a lad.”

  “Windsor. That’s where the queen lives,” Tiffinnae informed them all.

  “No she doesn’t, she lives in Buckingham,” Mr. Gregory said with a sniff of disdain.

  “Actually,” Rachel said, “I believe she travels between Buckingham and Windsor, and even up to Balmoral in Scotland, and a few other places. Is that right, Flynn?”

  Now everyone was looking at him, and Flynn flashed a perfectly charming smile. “Ah . . . actually, I haven’t had access to her itinerary, so I can’t really say for certain.”

  “You sure you’re English?” Chantal demanded.

  “Excellent question. I should inquire of my parents.”

  That earned a laugh from everyone in the room—except Jason, naturally.

  “Perhaps if I talked a little about tapestries,” Rachel suggested, and launched into her notes.

  By the end of her talk, when it was apparent everyone had had their fill of looms and yarns, Rachel gave them time to work on their projects before the end of class. Dave and Lucy quickly took Flynn under their wing—Rachel even spied him weaving a little as she helped Jason, who, she was sorry to see, had retained absolutely nothing from last week.

  “Man, am I glad this is over!” Chantal announced to the room at large when the clock struck nine. “I been smelling cookies the whole time and I’m damn close to gnawing my left arm off.”

  “I smelled them too,” Sandy said, nodding. “I can smell it a mile away because I’m allergic to chocolate.”

  With a roll of his eyes, Mr. Gregory sighed heavily as he strolled out the door. Dave and Lucy were right behind him, Lucy sadly shaking her head and remarking how unfortunate it was that Sandy had so many problems. Sandy, close on their heels, enthusiastically agreed, and was beginning a discourse on yet another of her illnesses for Lucy’s benefit.

  And of course Chantal and Tiffinnae were taking their own sweet time, stealing glimpses of Rachel while making yum-yum sounds at Flynn. When they had at last gathered their things, Chantal warned Rachel, “Now don’t go doing nothing I wouldn’t do!” And with that, she and Tiffinnae exited stage left, falling over each other with loud laughter.

  Rachel could only hope that her face wasn’t glowing siren red like it felt at the moment, and glanced uncertainly at Flynn.

  Oh Christ, she’d forgotten Jason, who reluctantly got to his feet and picked up his stack of travel brochures. Oh no—she’d been so rattled by Flynn’s surprise appearance that she’d forgotten that, too. For a moment, Jason stood awkwardly, looking at Flynn from the corner of his eye, nervously handling his brochures.

  “Jason, I’m so sorry!” Rachel exclaimed, and walked back to where he was standing. “I meant to ask you to show the brochures to class. Can I see them?”

  Jason looked sidelong at Flynn and shrugged. “Nah . . . that’s okay.”

  “No, really. I’d love to see them. Please?” she asked, putting a hand on his arm. But Jason couldn’t take his eyes off Flynn, and unthinkingly, Rachel looked beseechingly at him.

  Flynn instantly seemed to understand and came to his feet, peering curiously at the brochures Jason held. “What have you got there, travel pamphlets? I’d love a peek, if you’d not mind. I’m constantly racking the old noggin for an idea of where to go on holiday.”

  Rachel smiled gratefully.

  Jason looked at Rachel and said, “Okay.” And he proceeded to spread them out on the top of the table. “These are for England and Ireland,” he said, pointing to brochures that said Ireland, 2000! and 1999 Self-Drive Tours of England: The Cotswolds. “I really like these because they have good pictures,” he said, opening one and showing them a lovely photo of a thatched-roof house somewhere in England. “And these,” he said, picking up three more, “are for Spain. I got ‘em a couple of years ago, but I don’t think I really want to go there. Anyway, there’s some pretty cool buildings . . .”

  As Jason talked, Rachel took a seat on the end of the table, watching him. She’d only spoken to Jason a couple of times, but she knew there was something not quite right about him. She had a sense that he was a boy in a young man’s body, someone who perhaps dreamed of great adventure but did not have the capacity or courage to seize it.

  There was a look of genuine compassion on Flynn’s face. He listened to Jason, asked questions, made comments about the brochures. A smile slowly spread across her lips. He was a gorgeous, nice man.

  When Jason was through with his brochures, he sort of stuffed them under his arm, looked at his feet. “Okay. I guess I’ll go now. Next week I’ll bring my books.”

  Rachel had no idea what books he meant, but nodded all the same. “That would be great.”

  With the barest hint of a smile, Jason walked out of the room, head down, without looking at Flynn. When he had slipped out the door, Rachel turned a bright smile to Flynn. “Thanks,” she said. “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “Do what? I really do like looking at brochures.”

  “And what about weaving? Are you really interested in that?”

  He laughed sheepishly, thrust a hand through his hair, dislodging one thick strand that fell over his eye. “Truthfully?”

  “Truthfully.”

  “I’m not entirely certain it’s my cup of tea . . . but I will admit to a certain perverse fascination with all this talk of warp and woof . . . and I’m completely bewitched with warp and woof instructors.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “Absolutely. I have squads of dirty magazines and videos featuring warp and woof instructors and their looms.”

  Oh God, here went the red siren face again, and Rachel laughed, rubbed the nape of her neck. “So . . . how did you find me?”

  “Rachel!” he laughingly protested as he reached for the corner of her shawl and felt the weight of it. “You can’t possibly ask me to give away my secrets! I consider myself quite lucky that I found at least one place from which you can’t easily flee or hook up with some other guy to avoid me altogether without causing talk,” he said with a grin. “And I should hope that you’d reward my diligent efforts to find you by agreeing to a coffee.”

  Rachel smiled; Flynn glanced at the corner of the lavender shawl he held between finger and thumb. “That’s really stunning, you know,” he said, lifting his gaze to her eyes. “Just . . . a stunning color. It’s marvelous on you. Frankly, you’re stunning.”

  She blushed so furiously she forgot to be excited that her color spell had obviously worked.

  “So, then, will you allow me to buy you a cup of coffee?”

  “Okay,” she said, feeling remarkably lighter than air, skinny and beautiful and real.

  “And perhaps a bit of cake,” he said, standing up and taking her hand in his. “I’ve had a craving for butter rum cake for a few days now. Isn’t that odd?”

  He had no idea how odd.

  Chapter Eleven

  Rachel suggested a coffeehouse that featured would-be poets, a place Flynn knew quite well. He kept that to himself, however, and with a smile agreed to meet her there.

  Naturally, the usual coterie of poets was
there. Flynn recognized a few, and one could spot them a mile away. They congregated like a flock of penguins around the bar, all atwitter as they waited for their café au laits to be steamed. He escorted Rachel to a secluded corner table he also knew very well, bought a fu-fu coffee for her, a hot tea for him, and a large cinnamon bun to share. As she went about the task of cutting up the enormous bun with a little plastic knife, he said, “Funny, but I wouldn’t have guessed you were a teacher.”

  Her astounding blue-green eyes sparkled charmingly with her smile. “Maybe that’s because I’m not a teacher.”

  “Beg your pardon?”

  “Weaving aside,” she said, “which I’m only doing to earn a little extra money . . . except that I haven’t earned even a dime, because the cost of renting space at the design school and all the materials have skyrocketed, and I can’t bring myself to charge more than I do for the course.” She laughed a little self-consciously. “That was probably in the too-much-information category.”

  “If you’re not really a teacher, then you ought to be,” Flynn said sincerely. “You’re quite good.” Actually, he’d been very impressed with her ability to engage such an eclectic group of people, particularly with something as horrendously boring as weaving.

  “So what would you have guessed me to be?” she asked as she resumed the sawing of the world’s largest cinnamon bun.

  “Hmmm . . . excellent question. You’ve been so bloody mysterious . . . I had you pegged as a mass murderer at first, but then you were too kind to Chantal, who one might guess is a likely candidate for mass murder,” he opined.

  “Mmm, no,” Rachel said thoughtfully, shaking her head. “Chantal’s too loud for just the casual sort of murder. She’d require something completely diabolical.”

  “Quite right,” he said. “And I hadn’t pegged you as the diabolical type.”

  “No?” she asked, looking slightly disappointed.

  “Clever. But not diabolical.”