“We take pains,” he stated. “No one knows who either of them is.”
I’d lived that nightmare.
Forsooth, it would have been good to know how gorgeous he was before his looks made me faint right in front of him.
“It kind of gives it away when we drive out of a massive heritage estate, one you all happen to live in,” I pointed out.
He took a moment.
And only then did he admit, “Chastity has been staying close to home for a while too.”
And there it was.
“How long of a while?” I asked suspiciously.
“Three years.”
I felt my eyes get big, and I snapped, kinda loudly, “What the hell is going on?”
He took my hand again and dragged me farther away.
When he was done dragging me, he faced me and bit off, “Keep your voice down.”
“What’s going on?” I whisper-snapped this time.
“It’s not my story to share. Just that Chassie is…dealing with a few things.”
Dealing with a few things?
For three years?
My gaze drifted to the Peugeot to see both Temperance and Prudence seemed to be smothering Chastity as they helped her into the back seat of the car.
Yes, even Temperance was doing this.
I went back to Battle.
“Is she okay?” I asked.
“She will be.”
“Is there something I should know?”
“Just be gentle with her.”
“With you acting all hinky, and me about to set out on a girls’ trip one of the girls on the trip isn’t all that fired up about, and you all casting me as the ringleader, that doesn’t give me much to go on, Your Grace,” I pointed out the obvious, and I did it sarcastically.
But I said the wrong thing, I knew, when I was being dragged again.
This time we went a long, loooooooong way, turning onto a path that took us down the side of the house.
Only when we were out of sight of his sisters did he stop me again.
And when he faced me this time, he did it right in my space.
So in my space, I had to tip my head way, way back to catch his eyes, and when I did, he was all I could see.
“What did I say about calling me that?” he asked, his purr silken and sinister.
