After supper, Maxence, Casimir, and Arthur stretched out on the couch. The rugs and sofas didn’t seem adequate for three large men to sleep on, and the bedrooms were all spoken for and overflowing with children.
Just after eight-thirty, Dree’s father stood up and slapped his hands on his denim jeans. “Welp, it’s getting late. The missus and I need our beauty sleep. Grab a sleeping bag there in the corner, and I’ll show you fellows out to the barn.”
Maxence stood and headed for the sleeping bags. On missions, he’d slept on bamboo mats, cement floors of churches, dirt floors in straw and dung houses, and more. A barn sounded great. If it had straw bedding rather than an all-cement factory-type farm, all the better. At least they had sleeping bags.
Arthur asked Bartholomew, “I say, there, old chap. What did you say?”
Oh, yes, his Lordship the Earl of Severn probably hadn’t roughed it since he’d been on a Le Rosey high school camping trip. “Arthur—”
Casimir, who’d been following Max over to the pile of sleeping bags, turned back.
“Did you say thebarn?”Arthur asked her father.
Dree fidgeted in her chair. “I forgot to mention it to you guys.”
“Why, yes, of course,” Bartholomew Clark said. “Bachelors and gentlemen without their wives sleep in the barn. We have daughters, you know. T’ain’t proper for you to sleep in the house.”
Arthur blinked his silvery eyes several times, processing the information.
“Come on, Arthur,” Casimir said. “You can have the best straw tick.”
Bartholomew grinned at Casimir for knowing the lingo.
Casimir told him, “My wife is from Georgia. Come on, Arthur.”
Bartholomew smiled at Caz. “See that? Your friend is being right nice to you. Go along, now. You don’t want the barn cats to get all the best straw ticks. They’re vicious animals.”
The straw was clean and deep in the barn, and the main floor was heated as lambing season had begun. Sheep blinked their dark eyes at them when they flipped on the light and then bedded right back down.
The guys found a stall without an occupant but with a foot and a half of clean straw, so that seemed like an excellent place to sleep. Maxence switched off the light and found his way back to them by the moonlight streaming through the skylights in the ceiling.
With the warm sleeping bag zipped up and the crackle of straw under him, Maxence was as comfortable as in the Four Seasons and began to drift in the darkness.
Arthur rolled over and poked him.“Max.”
Dammit.“What, Arthur?”
“What the hell are you playing at with this girl?”
“I’m not playing at anything.”
“Look, what’s going on between the two of you is your business. I just don’t want to see you make a mistake, like marrying somebody so that itlookslike you’re settled and stable, so you could be elected to the throne. I get it though, man. I would’ve done anything for the Severn earldom and estate, maybe up to marrying someone in a business arrangement to produce a legitimate heir. I’m just lucky I met Gen when I did.”
Maxence grumbled, “Do you think I’d come all the way to New Mexico andaskher father’s permission if I hadn’t lost my damned mind over her?”
The straw rustled on the other side of the stall as Casimir sat up. “What are you talking about, Arthur? On the plane, I was about ready to tell those two to get a room.”
Arthur said, “Max, we’ve been friends since kindergarten when our respective families dumped us at Le Rosey and went on with their lives.We’rebrothers because our genetic brothers never wanted us. But wearebrothers, and when Casimir arrived when we were six, we became three brothers. I’m here for you, Max.I’myour family.”
Max shifted in his sleeping bag, the straw suddenly poking underneath the thin padding. “I know that.”
“You don’t have to tell me what’s going on. I trust you, and I’ll stand behind you. No matter what happens, you just tell me the story, and I will repeat it to anybody who asks for as long as anyone asks. But take it from someone who understands going undercover in a role,she’s not properly prepared.She made her first mistake when we were still on the plane.”
Somewhere in the dark, Casimir asked, “What the hell is he talking about, Max?”
Maxence asked Arthur, “What did she say?”
“She got your tattoo wrong.She said that it was devil wings, that they were the wings of a fallen angel. I worked on that drawing for a year. I watched that guy etch it onto your back. I made sure he filled in every last shadow of those feathers perfectly. I was there for the whole thing, hours and hours over weeks of appointments. Did you have it changed?”
