Duchess Read Online Free Page B

backyard. If she saw Duchess at the table again, she would not be happy. Gently, Mia lifted Duchess off the chair. She sat down on the rug next to the pile of brushes and pulled Duchess onto her lap, but Duchess quickly stood up and started to walk away.
    “She’s too big for my lap,” Mia complained to Michael, who had just come in from the kitchen.
    “Don’t give up so easily.” Michael picked Duchess up and sat down next to Mia. “Now, I’ll hold her and you brush.”
    Mia looked at the three brushes and chose a pink one with rubber bristles. “You’ll like this, Duchess,” Mia promised. Duchess looked at the brush, blinked her eyes, and relaxed in Michael’s lap. As Mia started running the brush along her back, Duchess craned her neck around to smell Mia’s hand.
    It’s been so long since I’ve had a good brushing. I have to admit it feels wonderful, even when this commoner does it.
    “I’m going to do your tummy,” Mia said, but as soon as she started to brush the longer hair on Duchess’s belly, the brush stopped on a tangledclump. Mia gave it a tug, but the brush was stuck. The cat’s ears went back.
    Duchess hissed, stood up, and walked away with the brush still hanging from the matted hair on her tummy. Then she stopped and bit at the brush.
    Mia frowned. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
    “We can’t just leave it there,” Michael said.
    Mia hurried after the cat. “Wait, Duchess, I’ll help you. It won’t hurt, I promise.” Duchess stood still as Mia carefully reached under her belly, using one hand to hold the hair and the other to loosen the brush until it came out. “There,” Mia said. Duchess quickly sat down and started licking the spot where the brush had been tangled.
    Thank goodness she got that thing off me. I love to be brushed, but I hate when it hurts. I don’t really trust kids—like those little ones who took up all of my person’s attention. But I suppose this girl is doing her best.
    Duchess looked at Mia and blinked her blue eyes. Then she leaned forward and licked Mia’s hand with her rough pink tongue.
    Mia was flattered. Finally! Maybe Duchess was starting to like her. “Her tongue’s like sandpaper,” she said with a giggle. Duchess strutted away and jumped right back onto Dad’s chair.
    Mia sighed. “Oh, Duchess. What are we going to do with you?”

CHAPTER SIX
    “Why does she always ignore us? All we want to do is play with her.” Mia took a bite of vegetable lasagna and looked around the dinner table.
    The Battellis were having a family chat. They were trying to figure out what to do with Duchess. She had been with them for four days, but she still hadn’t warmed up much. That afternoon, Mia and Michael had tried to get Duchess to play. She wouldn’t chase a string, a catnip ball, or even the special windup mouse that Logan had said she’d liked. “She didn’t even pounce on it once. She just sat on her pillow and looked at us like we were crazy,” Michael said as he ripped off a piece of bread and popped it into his mouth.
    Mia looked at Duchess, a big white fur ball witha rose-petal-pink nose, still curled up on her bed. Mia nodded. “The mouse ran right into her, but she acted like she didn’t care. She just lifted up her paw and cleaned her whiskers.”
    “She’s
always
primping like that,” Michael said.
    Dad snorted. “Maybe she’s getting ready for the royal ball.”
    “I don’t get it,” Mia complained. “Abby said that she’s good with kids, but she usually just walks out of the room whenever me and Michael come in.”
    “She’s never mean, but she’s not exactly nice, either,” Michael said.
    “Maybe that’s what Abby meant by being good with kids,” Mom suggested. “Maybe Duchess pretty much ignored the twins, and that was a good thing.”
    “Yeah, they probably didn’t really want to play with her,” Mia said. “But we do.”
    “I’d say the biggest problem is that she still isn’t eating,” Dad said.