" Devon, you are handsome and muscular and you seem nice but..." Don't blow it," came Eric's voice from over her shoulder. He had seen the conversatio... from the table, surmised what was happening. "Then again maybe you should," he added, grinning."Eric I..." Once again, Jeanne, you are faced with the question: should you or shouldn't you? You can walk away, but if you do you walk away from both of us. I'm not interested in a woman who cowers, who's willing to play around the edges but is too. Sara look kind of wary when she saw the Tupperware."What is it?" It's beef stew." It's not going to be like yesterday's, is it?" Nah. This smelled pretty good. And Jill made sure she didn't screw up." All right, then."Jill emptied the stew into a pot and started warming it up while Mary and Sara laid the table."I'll go wake up Mom." She's not here, Jack." Oh, did she go to the store?" No. She didn't come home after work. She called this morning and told me she wouldn't be home till dinner. "But my reputation does not depend of my ability to fire a weapon, dear Philip, as you well know." She dropped her voice an octave and squinted her eyes. "Howsomever, m'boy, that old blunderbuss is loaded. So have a care, sir." She grinned at him, well satisfied with her response. She found the word "riposte" but decided it was a bit much."One more night, I think," he said with a smile. "I'm here to protect your life, not your fragile, red-headed honor. And you haven't quite exhausted me,. “Tordis!”“What, Freja? Just needed to check that everything important is still working.”“I’m sure the girls would have been quite happy to test that.”“Do you really think it’s safe for our little girls to do that?”“Tordis, if you break that thing, they’ll probably kill both of us.”All that time she had been holding me. Even though I wasn’t shy, I didn’t really want to lie there like that. The fact that both women started to giggle didn’t help at all, and when she finally released her grip, I.