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She studied his bare chest.“I’m just making sure I have something nice to look at while we work.”

Together, they walked out the door.Xavier slid his hand up her back to her neck, gripping lightly while massaging the base of her skull with his thumb.She made happy little noises until they reached the stairs, where they stopped.

“Do you have any idea where we’re going?”Annie asked.

“No.”

Just then, one of the Spartan Guards came down the stairs.“Follow me, please.”

They were led up the narrow castle stairs, Xavier’s bare chest and arms breaking out with goose bumps, thanks to the chill in the stone spiral stairwell.He smacked Annie’s ass as they reached the top.

Annie looked over her shoulder at him.“What was that for?”

“Stealing my shirt.”

Her gaze raked him, her smile wicked.“Cold, Xavier?”

He leaned in as they walked past the door the Spartan Guard held open.“Not as cold as you’ll be when I push ice cubes into your tight ass and then fuck you there while Colum’s deep in your pussy.”

Annie lost a step, causing him to bump into her.Xavier caught her by the hips, smirking at the way she inhaled sharply as he held her back against his front.

“That’s flirting sure enough,” Colum said with a smile, though he only spared them a glance, his attention on a package laid out on a heavy sheet of plastic on a table.

Xavier looked around the massive room for the first time, realizing this wasn’t a meeting room but an apartment with a large open living area and kitchen.One wall was all windows, with a view of the cliffs and the sea.

This was the fleet admiral’s living quarters.

Xavier and Annie joined Colum, the fleet admiral, and Regina at the table.Nikolett was noticeable in her absence.

“We X-rayed it and swabbed everything for harmful substances,” Regina said.

“You swabbed the page itself?”Colum demanded, outraged.

“It’s a dry cotton round swab.”Regina was unbothered by Colum’s outrage.“Same thing they use at airport security.”

“Fair enough,” Colum muttered.

Xavier and Colum both bent closer, reading the looping words.This page, like the one Nikolett received, was more damaged than either of the sections they’d found.The paper had yellowed while the ink faded, making the words only shades darker than what they were written on.

And this page had a large dark stain on the bottom right corner, obscuring a quarter of the text.

“This is the next page,” Xavier said after a moment.“And this must be from the section we’re missing.He mentions living in Paris and being alone.”Xavier’s heart hurt for the man who’d died long ago.“It might…I wish we could read what’s there.”Xavier pointed to the stained corner.

“I’ll have a go at cleaning it,” Colum said.“I need the cleaning putty I brought, maybe isopropyl alcohol?—”

“Hydrogen peroxide?”Annie suggested, bumping Xavier out of the way so she could study the stain.

“That too.And lint-free cloths.”

Eric stared at Colum.“Are you talking to me?”

Colum straightened and crossed his arms.“And sure who else would I be talking to?”

Eric’s exasperated fraternal expression made Xavier’s lips twitch.He turned to Regina.“Do we have any of that?”

“I’ll check, Fleet Admiral.”She was trying and failing to hide a smile.

Regina and Annie left to gather what Colum needed to clean the page.Xavier snapped photos of the page with his phone, then took a seat to study it, transcribing the part he could read and trying to guess at the missing words.