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“It’s still our plan, Anton,” she said, though it was one they had given up on a long time ago. They had deemed it impossible then—but it wasn’t now. “Trust me.”

“Trust you?” Anton shook his head. “I love you, Shan, but I don’t trust you. I’m not foolish enough for that.”

Shan kept her face impassive. “You trust that I love you?”

“Yes,” Anton said, instantly and without hesitation. “That’s the problem. I don’t trust you to hold yourself back. You’ll do anything for us, and that scares me.”

Shan shrugged. She couldn’t fault him there—she had just murdered their father, after all. “You can meet Samuel tonight, if it helps.”

“Tonight?”

“I’m having him over to meet with Laurens,” Shan explained. “He needs a new wardrobe. And then he’ll be staying here for a couple of days, until we get things sorted.”

Anton nodded. “Well, since I am quite fashionable, perhaps I can be of help—and I can keep you out of trouble. All right. But you must do something for me.”

Shan narrowed her eyes in suspicion.

“Finish your breakfast,” Anton said. “Go take a bath, take a nap if you can. Stop working for a few hours.”

Shan’s lips curled into a reluctant smile. “Or what?”

“Or you’ll start to smell.” He took a big, dramatic sniff. “Nope, too late. You’ve already started.”

Shan laughed—a startled, sudden sound. Perhaps things weren’t as bad between them as she thought if he could still make her smile. “Little brothers are the worst.”

“Guilty as charged,” he replied.

She bit back another laugh, grabbing her sandwich from the plate. He was right, after all. If she wanted to actually be helpful to Samuel tonight, she ought to refresh herself.

Besides, she couldn’t let a breakfast like this go to waste.

Chapter Eight

Samuel

Even though he knew he had the address correct, Samuel doubled-checked it against the note Shan had left him. He shouldn’t have been surprised—she was, after all, a LeClaire. And in the day since she had arrived in his home and completely changed his life, he had tried to find out everything he could about her and her family.

It hadn’t been much, but he had been able to verify a few things. The LeClaire family was an old bloodline, powerful, but the last few generations had been bankrupted. The late Lord Antonin LeClaire, very recently deceased, had found a wealthy family from the Tagalan Islands with a Blood Worker child, and, for an impressive dowry, taken her off their hands.

The family had paid to get rid of their daughter, as if she was some piece of trash. And while he didn’t have a lot of sympathy for Blood Workers, even Samuel had to admit that was horrific. No one deserved a life like that, especially if the rest of the rumors about the late Lord LeClaire were true.

But that was the past—the woman had fled years ago in a scandal that had ruined what was left of the LeClaires’ reputation, and in the wake of it Lord LeClaire had made them one of the most pitied Blood Working families in Aeravin. It was almost enough to make Samuel feel bad for this Lady LeClaire, but as he stood looking up at the grand townhouse she called home, he found that sympathy waning.

It rose high above him, a good three stories tall to a steeply tapered roofline, the entire structure painted a deep burgundy over the brick exterior. His gaze hopped from one bay window to another, the decorative gables and eaves a stylistic extravagance that was far beyond his experience, purely ornamental and ostentatious.

He had dithered on the street long enough—he was already close to being late. He squared his shoulders and climbed the stairs, knocking twice on the fine wooden door. It opened not a moment later, revealing a young footman in clothes finer than anything Samuel owned.

“Uh, hello,” Samuel said, politely.

The footman blinked at him, clearly taking in his ratty shirt and faded trousers. “Lord Aberforth,” the footman replied, his voice rising in such a way that it turned the greeting into a question.

Samuel winced at the title—though he knew that he had to get used to it—and nodded. “Just Samuel is fine.”

The footman’s brow furrowed, but he stepped aside and gestured for Samuel to follow him. “Lady LeClaire is expecting you in the parlor,” he said. “Right this way.”

He led Samuel into the house, moving at a brisk pace that didn’t give him a chance to fully ogle the richness of the home. Just fleeting impressions of the solid pinewood floors, the lush curtains over the wide windows, the fine portraits that hung on the wall.

Everything was pristine and elegant, the design surprisingly tasteful and modern with its dark colors and harsh lines, as if the house had been recently redesigned. Probably with the money that the mother had brought in, now that he thought about it.