Page 29 of Exiled Heir

“So, your cousin.” I tugged on the laces. My heartbeat was so loud. How could Cade not hear it? “Is there anything I should know?”

Cade shook his head sharply, but I gave him a narrow-eyed look. “Is there anything that a lover would know about him?”

Cade didn’t seem to notice my jerky movements, his gaze slightly unfocused as he thought over my question. I had to calm down. Compartmentalize.

I’d been doing that for eleven years. This was nothing. So, someone knew my connection to Cade. If they wanted me dead, they would have told him.

“Isaac is likely angry because he didn’t know I was seeing you.” Cade looked down, his fingers twitching for a moment before he shook his head again.

“Do you trust him?” I asked.

Cade looked at me, his eyes narrowed, and I got the feeling that he was trying to say he didn’t trust anyone. Except me, because he had told me a lot of secrets in twenty-four hours.

No. I could already see what he was going to say if I suggested that. I was his employee. He was paying me—that was different than trusting someone who wasn’t getting money from him.

“You can’t tell him? You’re afraid that he might be the person who tried to assassinate you?”

“No.” Cade’s negative was immediate. “He has even less reason than Sonja does to want House Bartlett to fall. He is my lieutenant.” There was a very slight pause before the word, as though Cade had been searching for one that fit the position. “My right hand. My fortunes are his fortunes. If I rise, he rises. If I fall… well, he likely would sacrifice himself to save me.”

“So why not just tell him? Wouldn’t he be able to help us sell this thing? People will buy our whirlwind romance better if someone had met me before I arrived. Otherwise, I’m just the gold digger showing up on granddad’s arm at the family reunion.” I frowned, but Cade’s head twitchedno.

“Isaac is very honest by nature. And his consort is not the most discreet.”

“Is his consort more of a gossip than Rhys?” I asked. “Because Rhys got a good view of me yesterday, and they know you and I weren’t bonded when they magically waxed me like a classic Chevy.”

“We cannot tell Isaac or his consort the truth,” Cade said with such finality that I knew the subject was closed.

I stood, brushing my hands over the shirt and pants. Cade presented me with a jacket that fit, and suddenly, I looked like one of Declan’s personal bodyguards. That was never a position I had aspired to, because they spent more of their time fending off angry paramours, and I preferred to keep my fights clean. Getting clawed in the face by three-inch acrylic nails wasn’t an experience I wanted to repeat.

Cade stepped close, looking up at me. He tugged the jacket straight and brushed an invisible piece of lint off my shoulder.

Something in his face told me he wanted to ask if I was ready, if I had memorized all my lines, the understudy ready for the matinee showing.

I shot him a smirk. “This is someone wholikesyou, right? This is a piece of cake.”

Cade shot me a withering look. “Unfortunately for both of us, the people who like me and the people who can kill me overlap in Isaac.”

When he opened the door, the hallway was empty. Cade waited for me to walk out before shutting the door. Small tendrils of magic slipped off his fingers, moving into the cracks around the door.

“What’s that for?” I asked.

Cade’s lips pursed, and his voice was short with irritation. “I like to know who goes in and out of my room.”

Cade stared at the door for another moment, his hand hovering over a carving of a large bear. Then he turned, tugging on his jacket and striding down the hallway, not looking over his shoulder to check if I was with him. He took the stairs, and I caught up with him.

“Who else lives in the house with you?” I heard people on the ground floor, the soft murmur of voices. Straining my ears, I could hear they were talking about cleaning and household logistics. Servants.

It had to be one of them who’d left the note. Or someone who’d paid them to get access to me. I’d need to find out who they were before they revealed me, but I couldn’t do that standing next to Cade.

When Cade glanced at me, I raised my shoulder in a shrug. “We need to know who has access to you. Who else could be a threat.”

“Technically, all of the senior members of House Bartlett have rooms here, but most of them live in their own houses on the property. Before he met his consort, Isaac lived here, but now he and Jay reside by themselves.” Cade’s face was blank, as though it didn’t bother him at all to be the only one in a house that no one else could stand living in.

We turned right at the bottom of the stairs, heading past the small reading room that Sonja and Petrona had confronted me in. Cade turned to a set of open double doors.

Looking around, I understood why Cade was concerned about Isaac breaking furniture in this room. Crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and the walls were cream with gold accents. The wooden floor gleamed.

Anything in here would cost thousands of dollars to repair. The two men in the room looked up when we entered. A brown-haired one sat at the long table, his thumb on his phone. The other paced behind him.