Page 150 of The Enslaved Duet

“It is never too early foril maestro!Although, I would argue it is way too early to be looking so cute.” I cocked my head to the side as I watched her cheeks stain with a blush. “Where are you off to?”

She smiled softly; the expression so intimate that it panged somewhere in my heart. I’d never seen her with such a secret wealth of contentment, such a secret pasted to her lips.

To my knowledge, she had always shared everything with me. Giselle was the only one of us Lombardi’s with an open heart and innocent past.

“Sinclair,” she said before clearing her throat as she dispensed ice into a glass from the fridge. “Daniel invited me fishing. I told him the other day at lunch that I had enjoyed it when I was in Mexico, and he got pretty excited about taking me.” She rolled her eyes, but they danced with amusement. “Who would have guessed such a buttoned-up guy would be a fishing geek?”

I tried to temper my grin as I turned back to my stewed tomatoes. It was now almost painfully obvious that my sister and Sinclair were having an affair. I wanted to be furious with them, but I’d seen Sinclair when he returned from Mexico and the very air around him had been luminous with newly found contentment. To look at Giselle now as she spoke about him, it was obvious she felt the same.

My heart twisted as I thought of my beautiful, misunderstood Elena and what this would mean to her even as I knew I wouldn’t get involved.

Everyone has their own dramas to play out, and this was their own, for better or for worse.

Finally, I said, “Massivefishing geek. He enters the Bassmaster Elite Series on Oneida lake every August, and I’m pretty sure he takes his executives on their annual business retreat in Mexico just so he can get in some fishing.”

Sinclair had tried to take me fishing dozens of times over the years, to varying degrees of success. I laughed lightly as I told her, “He’s taken me out before. Let’s just say I’m more comfortable on land. I’d take horseback riding over fishing any day.”

I thought about Helios, the gorgeous Golden Akhal Teke mare Alexander had gifted me toward the end of my stay at Pearl Hall. She crossed my mind frequently because I hoped beyond reason that she was still stabled at the manor, taken care of like a princess by their able groomsmen and waiting, impossibly, for my return home.

I hadn’t ridden since leaving her. It felt like a betrayal the same way practicing BDSM felt like a betrayal of my relationship with Alexander.

“Why are you up so early?” Giselle asked, pulling me out of my reverie.

I scooped someshaksuka—a Middle Eastern stewed tomato and egg dish I’d learned from Douglas during my days at Pearl Hall—into a bowl and handed it to her with a kiss on the cheek.

“A model dropped out of a Ralph Lauren shoot in England,” I fibbed, keeping my eyes averted as she took a seat at the kitchen island. There was no reason to lie. Giselle didn’t know enough about St. Aubyn or Alexander Davenport to know their connection to each other, let alone to me, but I was wary after a lifetime of coincidences that had always turned out to be too good to be true. “I have to be in Cornwall tomorrow.”

“You don’t seem too enthused, and that doesn’t really explain the early start.”

I shrugged as if I didn’t feel the siren’s call of England like a lullaby luring me to my future death. “I hate England. I leave later today, but I couldn’t sleep thinking about it.”

“That’s a bit extreme, isn’t it?” she asked with a light laugh. “I mean, the entire country? What did the Brits ever do to you?”

My answering smile was sharper than I would have liked, but happily, Giselle was distracted by the ping of her phone. I watched as a stunning expression of excitement and joy broke across her face like sun piercing through clouds.

“I have to go,” she told me without looking up from the text glowing on her screen.

She shoveled the last forkfuls of food into her mouth, then raced to her green gumboots to tug them on. I watched bemused as she finally spun to me and granted me a brief squeeze.

“If I don’t see you before you leave, I’ll miss you,” she murmured into my hair.

“I will be back in three days. If it was any other brand, I wouldn’t be going at all.” I kissed her soundly on the cheek, then pushed her away. “Now, be safe and enjoy your day. Sinclair can be a charming bastard when he wants to, so I’m sure you’ll have a grand adventure.”

She smiled tremulously at me, then quickly ducked out the door.

I stood frowning after her for a long moment, trying to pinpoint why her expression had bothered me so much.

It was only hours later, after I’d showered, packed for England, and was reading curled up on my couch with Hades that I realized why her smile had resonated with me.

It was the same one I recognized from my own face whenever I thought about Alexander.

I tried to dismiss it as my own bias spilling into my perceptions, but I knew Giselle would never continue to pursue a taken man unless she was very much in love with him.

Which meant Elena’s future was looking decidedly grim. I resolved to spend more quality time with my eldest sister when I returned, as if somehow my love would buffer the blow of her upcoming heartbreak.

I was still distracted when a raucous knock sounded on my door, and someone cursed loudly in Italian from the other side.

My heart jumped into my throat as I pulled the door open and saw Dante leaning in the frame, his big body bowed with pain and his teeth gritted and gleaming from his sweat-soaked face.