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“No one besides you, I mean.”
I wait as Aspen and Ashlyn stow the shovel and trowel. Once they’ve locked up the garage, I wave and ascend the stairs toward my apartment. They follow me.
“What are you doing?” I ask them as I reach the door.
Aspen shrugs. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“I thought it was,” Ashlyn adds.
“It’s the middle of the night. I need some sleep before I have to get up in three hours.”
When they continue to stare at me, I give in and open my door. Ashlyn pushes past me. “I’ll make the hot milk.”
“Did Lilac include instructions for treating heartburn in her Ellery’s pregnant treatise?” I grumble as I make myself comfortable on the sofa.
“You really should let us dig around,” Ashlyn ignores my question to say. “As the owner of the land, the money would be yours. Minus a finder’s fee, of course.”
“I hope you’re referring to my finder’s fee,” Aspen adds as she plops down next to me on the sofa.
Ashlyn’s nose wrinkles. “Why is it yours? I’m the one who read Old Man Mercury’s book about Winter Falls and figured out the brewery building is older than everyone thought. I’m also the one who figured out the clue in the letter from Robert to Patricia.”
“You’re marrying a millionaire. You don’t need the money.”
Ashlyn hands me a mug of milk. I sniff it and my stomach clenches.
“You and your aversion to warm milk. I didn’t poison it.”
“You didn’t?” I ask to make certain.
“Not this time. And how was I supposed to know you’d steal Gratitude’s drink?”
I shiver thinking about how much time I spent throwing up the contents of my stomach due to the ipecac syrup Ashlyn laced in the librarian’s coffee.
“You need to get over your vendetta with the librarian,” Aspen comments.
I force myself to down half of the milk in one go. “The same way you’ve gotten over yours with her?” To say the West sisters and the librarian have butted heads in the past is an understatement. A vast understatement.
“It’s not a vendetta.”
“Whatever,” I mumble.
“Do we tell our children about all the crazy stuff we did as teenagers, or do we keep them in the dark?” Ashlyn wonders.
“I didn’t do any crazy stuff,” I claim.
“No one did as much crazy stuff as Ashlyn. Rowan will have his hands full when she starts pushing out babies.”
I grunt because apparently, warm milk does make you drowsy. Who knew? Besides those websites recommending warm milk I mean.
Aspen throws a blanket over me. “Get some sleep, Ellery. We’ll talk later.”
I hear them let themselves out of my apartment, but I don’t bother to open my eyes as sleep pulls me under.
