Page 73 of Misadventures with a Duke

He jogs a look over his shoulder. “Of what?”

“Moments,” I supply. “None more than a few seconds long, but all that have given me pause to think…”

“Of what?”

His pressure is not necessary. It is a relief to free these admissions, especially to him.

“She has…lapses,” I say. “I cannot describe it any other way than that. She…goes away from me. Even from this time and place. She is lost, as if possessed—except the force inside her is not malevolent. Sometimes she will even start speaking there—and that is when I am most jarred. But not in an awful way…”

“In what way, then?” Max demands.

I pause, if only to allow myself a few seconds for the affirmation again. He is your brother. He cannot disown you. Just say it!

“There have been times when I swear…I am speaking to Magique.”

Encouraging news—he does not bolt out of here. Or openly scoff.

But troubling news—his dark contemplation does not change. I am hard-pressed to notice if the man even blinks, even after he turns around and walks back over. Though his body is clearly still capable of movement, I wonder about everything going on behind his face. In the far reaches of his bright brain.

“So now what are you intimating?” he charges. “That…what? They are the same person, centuries apart? That’s the reason Raegan’s going on about you trying this stunt in reverse?”

I set my feet apart, bracing them for the thrust of my full standing weight again. “I know it sounds crazy. But is it any more outrageous than how we got here to begin with?”

“All the more reason to leave the fuckery alone!” he retorts. “Bast. Brother. What is so awful about the idea of staying here? Would I suggest something that I cannot vouch for myself?”

“Says the salaud who recommended I take Bluebell out for a ride for my tenth birthday?”

“What?” he snaps. “The horse was always fine to me.”

“Just like the twenty-first century has been?”

He huffs. “You have simply had a skewed introduction.”

“Ah. Of course,” I bite back.

His expression remains even. “You have seen, and experienced, some of the more challenging aspects of the city. So I understand your initial reticence.”

“Initial?” I laugh but it is slathered with bitterness. “And you plan on changing my mind about that, I take it?”

His own spine stiffens. His countenance turns so dark, I wonder if he shall start breathing fire on me. “I merely hope to show you that not everyone in this place is rude and bloodthirsty.” Not the most dragon-like thing he could utter, but damn it, he believes it. “Christ, Bast. Fighting and warfare have been woven into your veins even before you knew what the words meant. So perhaps that is what you always look for in those around you.” He relaxes then, enough to clap a hearty hand to my shoulder. “Maybe you can find new ways of living that don’t involve killing and dismembering people.”

I let a brow jump up. “New ways of living. You mean right here, of course.”

“Selfishly speaking, yes,” he answers at once. “But also…concernedly speaking.”

I squirm but scramble for a note of levity. “Concernedly? Well, well, mon frere. Has your Alessandra been as good for shoring your left hook as your interesting vocabulary?”

One edge of his mouth twitches. “She is good for me in many ways—even though there was a time that she did not believe it for herself.”

At once, I discern his discomfort. The memory is clearly not easy for him to relay. I express my gratitude for his exposure with a sincere reply. “But you changed her mind? How?”

“’Twas not my doing at all—but her own bold proposition, the very night the wardrobe arrived from France. It was her Christmas present for me. A wonderful surprise, indeed—that she upended with all of her doubts about whether destiny had known what it was doing when delivering me here in the first place.”

I pucker my lips and emit a low groan, empathizing with his wounded expression. “So the evening concluded with the woman over your knee, counting out her spankings?”

“Only after I called her bluff by getting into the cabinet right away.”

I drop the pucker. It joins the rest of my amazed gape. “And what happened?”