"There wasn't any beer," Brenna muttered.

"Then what's a body to do, after all? I brought along the Gallagher Fix."

"Did you?" She rolled, turning her white face and bleary eyes up to him and grasping at his hand. "Truly? G.o.d bless you, Aidan. The man's a saint, Jude. A saint, I tell you. There should be a monument to him in the square of Ardmore."

"When you get yourself on your feet, crawl down to the kitchen. I brought a jug along just in case." He gave Brenna a light kiss on the forehead. "Now where's my sister?"

"She's in my office, the second bedroom," Jude told him with what she hoped was cool dignity as she clutched the clothes to her breast.

"Is there much breakable in there?"

"I beg your pardon?"

Aidan straightened. "Just pay no mind to the screams and crashes. I'll do my best to keep the property damage to a minimum."

"What does he mean by that?" Jude hissed the question at Brenna the moment he was out of the room, even as she rushed to drag on the slacks.

"Oh." Brenna yawned hugely. "Just that Darcy doesn't wake cheerful."

At the first scream, Brenna clutched her head and moaned. Shocked, Jude yanked the sweater over her head and rushed toward the sound of the thumps and curses.

"Get your hands off me, you blackhearted baboon. I'll kick your a.s.s from here to Tuesday."

"It's your a.s.s that'll be kicked if you don't get it out of bed and to work, my girl."

If the words and the vicious tone in which they were delivered had shocked her, it was nothing to the visual impact. Jude burst into the room in time to see Aidan, his face grim and set, drag Darcy, dressed in nothing but her bra and panties, from the bed to the floor.

"Why, you brute! Stop that this minute!" Driven to protect her new friend, Jude leaped forward. The order and the movement managed to distract Aidan just long enough for Darcy to ball her fist, bare her teeth, and deliver a short-armed punch straight to his crotch.

Jude wasn't sure the sound he made was human. Torn between yet another layer of shock and a wave of pure female amus.e.m.e.nt that she wasn't the least bit proud of, she watched Aidan crumple to his knees and Darcy fall on him like a she-wolf.

"Ouch. Jesus! b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l!" He did what he could to defend himself as his sister thumped, yanked, and bit exactly as he'd taught her, and still wheezing from that first blow, he finally managed to pin her.

"One of these days, Darcy Alice Mary Gallagher, I'm going to forget you're a female and plant one on you."

"Go ahead, you great bully." She thrust out her chin, blew her hair out of her eyes. "Plant one now."

"I'd likely break my hand on that face of yours. However pretty it is, it's stretched over a skull made of rock."

Then they were grinning at each other, and he was rubbing his hand over her face with what surely was as much affection as exasperation. Jude just kept staring as they got to their feet.

"Put some clothes on, you shameless hussy, and get in to work."

Darcy pushed at her tumbled hair and didn't seem in the least bothered by the recent tumble. "Jude, can I borrow the blue cashmere jumper?"

"Urn, yes, of course."

"Oh, you're a sweetheart, you are." She danced by, giving Jude a peck on the cheek. "Don't worry, I'll tidy up what I can before I go."

"Oh, well, that's all right. I'll make coffee."

"That would be lovely. Tea even better if you have it."

"Coffee?" Aidan said when Darcy had sauntered out the door. "I think you owe me a cup at least."

"Owe you?"

He stepped toward Jude. "That's the second time you've distracted me in battle and caused me to take a blow I'd have dodged otherwise. Oh, and very well you might bite your cheek to hold back the grin, but I see your eyes laughing clear enough."

"I'm sure you're mistaken." Jude looked deliberately aside. "But I'll make the coffee."

"And how's your head faring this morning?" he asked as he followed her out and down the stairs.

"It's fine."

He lifted a brow. "No ill effects due to squeezing a bit too much of the grape?''

"Maybe a little headache." She was too proud of it to be embarra.s.sed. "I took some aspirin."

"I've better than that for you." He rubbed a hand casually over the back of her neck, miraculously hitting just the spot that made her want to purr, then moved to the counter as they entered the kitchen. The jar he picked up was filled with some dark and dangerous-looking red liquid.

"Gallagher's Fix. It'll set you up right and tight."

"It looks awful."

"Not a half-bad taste all in all, though some say it needs a bit of acquiring." He took a gla.s.s from the cupboard. "When a man serves drinks for a living, he's honor-bound to have a cure for the morning after."

"It's only a little headache." She studied the gla.s.s he poured dubiously.

"Then drink only a little, and I'll fix you some breakfast."

"You will?"

"A bit of this, a bit of that, and a little lie-me-down." He nudged the gla.s.s on her. She was a bit pale and her eyes were shadowed. He wanted to cuddle her until she felt herself again. "You'll wake up forgetting you had a hedonistic orgy last night."

"It wasn't an orgy. There weren't any men."

He grinned, fast and bright. "Next time invite me. Here now, sip a little and start the coffee, and some tea as well. I'll see to the rest."

It seemed like a nice connection to the evening to have a handsome man cooking breakfast in her kitchen. That was one more thing that had never happened to her before.

It was amazing, she thought, just how quickly, and how completely, a life could change. Jude sipped carefully, found the brew more tolerable than expected. Drinking the rest, she put on the kettle.

"Jude, you've no sausage. You've no bacon."

The quiet shock in his voice amused her. "No, I don't really eat it."

"Don't eat it? How do you cook breakfast?"