His knees had suddenly felt like water they were so weak. Kim and Blake hurried down the stairs as JJ stepped to him and put her arms around him. The ...girls joined her in hugging Jim as he sat slumped weakly on the chair."That man scares me," Jim said in a shaky voice."How do you stand up to someone like that?" Blake asked with a mixture of fear and awe in her voice as she pressed against Jim and her mom."He's a bully honey and, being a general, no one has stood up to him in a long time.. Mike got bug-eyed. "No shit?" I'd prefer that we not have a whole football squad, obviously..." I grunted. "Maybe we can limit it to those present?" Yeah." Mike's eyes hooded. "I gotta see this." He looked up. "You want it -- you'll ALL want it."Alejandro gave a little Latin shrug. "Okay." He looked at the others, who nodded -- Rudy still somewhat suspiciously.I stepped over to the stairwell and yelled, "SLUT!" Everybody flinched. I turned to Rudy and added, "You might as well open the. " I didn't say I wanted to do this," Russ said, again, surprising me."Shut the fuck up, Russ," I said, nastily. "You and I both know the truth."The truth was that Carolyn fascinated my husband."If she wasn't married, and I wasn't married to you," he'd confessed to me, "I'd put a four engine rush on her."It hurt. He'd tried to salve my injury."I'd never do it now, though," he said "I'm married to you, Deena. That's the most important thing to me."We used humor to recover. I teased him about it.. He slipped me the poniard and I drank my milk and went back to bed. I heard Eoin talking to my aunt all the way back to her room.There was very little in the way of talking done the next day at breakfast. My aunt sat at the table, eating in a frosty silence as the rest of us whispered every now and then. When Eoin's mother arrived to take the ladies away for another afternoon of lady-like pursuits, I was forced to go along with the old noblewoman, Janine, Anika, and Mickey while Aunt Sabrine.