They returned to the frigidarium in triumph—Wanton radiant with victory, the Duke deeply rumpled, and the sculpture carried between them like a sacred relic.
The suspects had been assembled.
Cassian Drake sprawled across a chaise with nonchalance.
Milton Avery scribbled couplets on a damp napkin.
Monsieur M lounged, masked, unreadable, and sipping something dark.
And the valet, Mr. Trumbuttle, was standing beside a footbath with all the poise of a man who’d just been caught admiring someone else’s towels.
Wanton stepped forward. The room quieted.
She cleared her throat. “Ladies, gentlemen, and others in bathrobes. I have solved the mystery of the missing glutes.”
“You have one minute, Miss Wallflower,” the Duke said and crossed his arms.
His arms, dear heavens, his arms, bulged against the sleeves of his robe like twin warnings from Mount Olympus. His forearms, all taut muscle and aristocratic veining, folded with such grim precision that Wanton momentarily forgot what she was saying. Or thinking. Or doing on this planet.
She opened her mouth.
Closed it.
Opened it again, blinking rapidly to clear the fog of ducal proximity from her mind.
She was here for justice, certainly not for a scandalous full-body flush brought on by a man’s wrist flex.
“I only need thirty seconds.”
A murmur rippled across the frigidarium. Monsieur M adjusted his towel. Drake crossed his arms. Milton Avery leaned back with a pleased grin, as if he were about to be praised in verse.
“Mr. Avery,” Wanton began, pointing at him with the authority of a woman who’d once tangoed with death in a silk chemise, “is unquestionably guilty of public obscenity and poetic crimes against punctuation—”
Milton gasped. “I'll have you know my rhymes are blameless.”
“—but he is not guilty of sculpture theft. His hands are too busy writing odes to various backsides to have time for actual larceny.”
Milton looked smug.
She turned to Drake. “Cassian Drake, while guilty of espionage, illegal mapping, and possibly blowing up bridges—”
Drake arched a brow. “Allegedly.”
“—has no interest in glutes. He’s far more concerned with secrets and sabotage.”
Another ripple of scandalized shock.
Wanton turned slowly to Monsieur M.
“And Monsieur M—well. He may be guilty of lounging, stretching, and mysterious hip movements, but I assure you, he is innocent of this crime.”
The Duke frowned. “Wallflower, what are you about? We found the sculpture in Monsieur M’s room.”
“Yes,” Wanton said serenely. “But he didn’t put it there.”
The valet gawked like a vicar stumbling into a boudoir.
“He’s guilty!” he blurted. “He’s jealous of His Grace’s form. That’s why—”
