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“But it's so much fun.”
She hurled a chamber pot at him. “You can use this in your own room!”
Blake ducked and then laughed despite himself when the pot broke into pieces against the wall. “Well, I suppose one can take some comfort in the fact that it wasn't full.”
“If it had been full,” she hissed, “I would have aimed at your head.”
“Caroline, this situation isn't my fault.”
“I know, but you don't have to be so bloody jolly about it.”
“Now, you're being just a bit unreasonable.”
“I don't care.” She whipped a bar of soap at him. It stuck against the wall. “I have every right to be unreasonable.”
“Oh?” He ducked as his shaving kit sailed through the air.
She glowered at him. “For your information, in the past week, I have been, oh let's see, nearly raped, kidnapped, tied to a bedpost, forced to cough my voice into nothingness—”
“That was your own fault.”
“Not to mention the fact that I embarked upon a life of crime by breaking and entering into my former home, was nearly trapped by my odious guardian—”
“Don't forget your sprained ankle,” he supplied.
“Ooooohhhh! I could kill you!” Another bar of soap flew by his head, grazing his ear.
“Madam, you are certainly doing an able job of trying.”
“And now!” she fairly yelled. “And now, as if all of that weren't undignified enough, I am forced to live for a week in a bloody bathroom!”
Put that way, Blake pondered, it was damned funny. He bit his lip, trying to hold back his laughter. He wasn't successful.
“Stop laughing at me!” she wailed.
“Blake?”
He went utterly sober in under a second. “It's Penelope!” he whispered.
“Blake? What is all that yelling about?”
“Quick!” he hissed, shoving her back toward the side stairwell. “Hide!”
Caroline scurried away, and just in time, too, for Penelope pushed open the door to the washing room just as she closed the one to the stairwell.
“Blake?” Penelope queried for the third time. “What is all the commotion?”
“It was nothing, Penny. I—”
“What happened here?” she screeched.
Blake looked around and gulped. He'd forgotten about the mess on the floor. Chamber pot shards, his shaving kit, a towel or two…
“I…ah…” It seemed to him that it was far easier to lie for the sake of national security than it was to his older sister.
“Is that a bar of soap stuck to the wall?” Penelope asked.
“Um…yes, it appears to be.”
