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And there was a small, human creature of undetermined sex crawling over the foyer tiles. It moved like lightning, and it was heading her way.

“Oh my God.”

“That’s my cousin Cassie. Quick as a snake, she is. Best close the door.”

Eve not only closed it, but backed up against it as the crawling thing made a series of unintelligible noises, quickened the pace, and cornered her.

“What does it want?”

“Oh, just to say hello. You can pick her up. She’s the sociable sort. Aren’t you, Cassie darling?”

It grinned, showing a couple of little white teeth, then to Eve’s horror, got a grip on the bottom of her coat and hauled itself up on its chubby legs. It said: “Da!”

“What does that mean?”

“It means most anything.”

A man dashed out of the parlor. He was tall, beanpole thin, with a messy thatch of dense brown hair. He grinned and in other circumstances Eve might have found him charming.

“There she is. I’m on watch, and I take my eyes off the monkey for a split second and she’s off to the races. No need to mention this to your aunt Reenie,” he said to Sean. Then to Eve’s vast relief, scooped the baby up to bounce her casually on his hip.

“You’d be Eve. I’m your cousin Eemon, Sinead’s son. It’s lovely meeting you at last.”

Before she could speak, he’d wrapped his free arm around her, pulled her into a hug, and into intimate proximity with what was on his hip. Tiny fingers shot out, grabbed her hair.

Eemon laughed. “She’s a fascination with hair, as she has so little of it yet herself.” Competently, he tugged the fingers free.

“Um” was all Eve could think of, but Eemon flashed that smile once more.

“And here you are, barely in your own door and we’ve got you surrounded. We’re already scattered about the place, and sure a beauty of a place it is. Roarke and some of us are in the parlor there. Can I help you with your coat?”

“Coat? No. Thanks.” She was able to ease away, peel it off, toss it over the newel post.

“Gran!” Sean raced forward, and some of Eve’s tension faded when she saw Sinead step into the foyer. At least this was someone she’d already met.

“You’ll never guess it.” Brimming with excitement, Sean danced in a circle. “Cousin Eve said there was a murder at the skating place. A dead body.”

“Murder usually involves a dead body.”

It occurred to Eve, quite suddenly, that murder probably hadn’t been an appropriate point of conversation. “It was last year. It’s okay now.”

“I’m relieved to hear it, as there’s a considerable horde who’s looking forward to taking a spin on the ice.” She grinned, stepped forward.

She was slim and lovely. Delicate white skin and fine features, golden red hair and sea green eyes. The same face, Eve thought, her twin—Roarke’s mother—would have had if she’d lived.

She kissed Eve’s cheek. “Thank you for having us in your home.”

“Oh. Sure, but it’s Roarke’s—”

“Whatever he built, it’s the home you’ve made together. How is it you manage such a place?” She hooked an arm through Eve’s as she walked back toward the parlor. “Sure I’d be lost half the time.”

“I don’t, really. Manage it. Summerset.”

“Competent, he looks it. A bit intimidating as well.”

“I’ll say.”

But she’d have handled him better than the sight in the parlor. There were so many of them. Had he said there were so many? They were all talking and eating. More kids—the couple others she’d seen outside. They must have come around the side, she thought. Or just whizzed through, invisibly.

Roarke was in the process of serving an older woman a cup of something. She sat in one of the high-backed chairs, her head crowned with white hair, her eyes strong and blue.

There was another man standing by the fireplace having a conversation with yet another who might have been his twin if you carved away the twenty-odd years she judged came between them. They appeared to have no problem ignoring the two kids who sat at their feet and poked viciously at each other.

Another woman, early twenties, sat in the windowseat, looking dreamily out while a baby of some kind sucked heroically at her breast.

Jeez.

“Our Eve