Ruby's Dream (Crystal Warriors 2) - Excerpt Only

Ruby's Dream - Except Only (Chapter 3)

RUBY'S DREAM (Excerpt only)

By Maree Anderson

CHAPTER 3

Ruby slit one eyelid and promptly shut it again. Uhhh. She felt like death warmed over. She gave it a couple of minutes and dared stretch her arms over her head. Yeow. Bad move. Muscles she hadn't known existed begged for mercy. The couch wasn't the most comfortable piece of furniture to snooze on but she didn't remember it being this bad.

Hang on. The couch? Why the heck had she been sleeping on the couch? There'd better bloody not be anyone sleeping in her bed or there was sooo gonna be trouble. She tossed aside the blanket that someone had tucked around her, and lurched to her feet.

"Jeeeeesus!" She moaned, clutching her head. One could be forgiven for thinking she'd drunk two whole jugs of cocktail mix instead of only two glasses or so. As she staggered across the room, she sent a prayer of thanks to the kind soul who had removed her shoes. If she'd had the misfortune to be wearing high heels right now, she'd wouldn't have managed more than a couple of steps without doing a face-plant.

Her bedroom door was shut. She flung it open with a little more force than strictly necessary, and winced when it kissed the wall. A shaft of bright sunlight pierced a gap in the curtains. Typically, it headed unerringly for her eyes.

A few whimpers later, she plucked up the courage to peel open her eyelids and try again. And when her hazy vision finally settled down, she focused on her bed. Or to be precise, the very large lump in her bed that was currently emitting snoring noises fit to wake the dead.

Great. One of her guests hadn't gone home last night and—

Guests.

Her birthday party.

Omigod. The stripper!

Ruby forced her brain to logical thought. The stripper had kissed her. Then he'd stripped. And she'd... she'd....

Obviously, she'd passed out at her own party. In front of all her guests.

Ah, crap. She was never going to live it down. Never. Her friends and workmates were going to dine out on this for the next decade. Her life was over—not that it'd been that shit hot to begin with.

She checked the lump again. It hadn't moved. Which meant she would have to exert herself to wake it up and request that it leave. Fabulous. It'd better not expect breakfast before it left, either, 'cause right now she was so not in the mood for being polite to uninvited guests.

She stomped across the room to stand beside the bed—all the better to give the unwelcome lump some superlative evils. From the size of the lump, and the deep timbre of the snoring, it was male. He'd pulled the duvet over his head until only a shock of dark hair could be seen.

Ruby yanked back the cover and bit back a shocked gasp.

Mike!

At some stage last night, her brother had turned up to join her birthday celebration. Talk about bad timing. With the Birthday Girl inconveniently KOed on the couch, Mike would have missed any actual partying because everyone would have taken off not long after Ruby crashed. That was the polite thing to do—make tracks when the guest of honor passed out. Then again, knowing her friends, they might well have shrugged and partied on until the copious amounts of booze Ruby had provided ran out.

Her shoulders slumped. The carnage in her kitchen, lounge and dining area was bound to be dire.

She considered waking Mike so he could help with the cleanup, but decided to do the sisterly thing and let him sleep. He'd probably caught the late flight from Christchurch, and then had a forty-five minute drive from the airport to her North Shore home. He'd be knackered. When he woke, then she'd decide whether she was thrilled to see him or not speaking to him ever again.