He had to, now.
“I don’t know,” Caillen replied. Water trickled in the basin once more as she wrung out the cloth.
“Are you ever going to hold a conversation with any of us again?” Robina asked, her voice much gentler than she normally spoke.
Caillen still hadn’t talked to her sisters? Had she talked to anyone except him? He peeked out of the slit in his eyes once more. The racing of his heart slowing to the pace of a dashing descent down the stairs of the French prison.
“What would make you ask that?” Caillen wrung out the cloth and folded it.
“Because you don’t engage in any form of discussion with us. You just spout out answers that are meaningless.”
He definitely needed to live. If for nothing else than to vex her out of her shell.
“I’m just preoccupied with Astley.” She changed the subject. “What can you tell me about Viscount Pembrock?”
Well, fuck. He had done it. He needed to recover, and fast, or the blasted woman would get herself killed.
Robina put the tray down next to the bed and he sensed her exasperation with the way Caillen had avoided any exchange that would have been personal in nature. “Why do you ask?”
Simon watched her from lowered lashes as Caillen bit her lush, lower lip. Damn, but he wished it was his teeth teasing her.
“One of Astley’s sisters is interested in him. I wanted to make sure he was a good person.”
Lie.
Robina snorted. “He’s the last person you would want your sister to be around.”
Interesting. He’d always known Robina was smarter and more well-informed than half the young chits of Mayfair, but this was reaching, even for Robina. Viscount Pembrock traveled in a much different set than he or Ross.
“Probably not the last person.” Caillen stopped her patting and he closed his eyes.
No, Pembrock wasn’t the last person, but he was definitely in the running.
“Oh, most definitely the last,” Robina said. “Don’t you readWhispers of the Ton?”
“No.”
Of course not. Caillen only had time for novels. Robina sighed, then crossed the room to where Charlotte stood on her perch and cooed at his bird for a few moments. From the whoosh of air and rustle of silk, he suspected she plopped down in the chair and then threw her legs over the arm in a most unladylike manner.
The girl was a termagant, yet she got it honestly from her older sisters.
“He is said to be a bigger rake than even Astley,” Robina said with the authority of someone who knew.
She didn’t know.
“Not possible.”
Actually, it was. Too bad Caillen didn’t realize. Once again, he peeked out to see the sisters’ interaction.
Robina shrugged and looked at her fingernails. “When he came into the title, it was in debt beyond what anyone believed to be recoverable without a marriage to a wealthy heiress. Yet somehow, he turned it around. He owns much of the land the Caledonian Canal is being built upon, and he’s said to keep a mistress at each one of his estates. Can you imagine how expensive that would be?”
“Are there any rumors about his involvement with the underworld?”
Damn. The woman was becoming almost as curious as Robina about matters she had no business meddling in.
Robina laughed, her gaiety so loud, he flinched and closed his eyes completely.
“Shhh,” Caillen admonished.
