Page 98 of Accomplice to the Villain

“Yes,” he said cautiously.

“I thought you were older,” she supplied.

“What? Why?”

“You just seem as if you were born fifty.”

“Fifty!” he yelled, sitting up so fast Sage fell back onto her arse, the towel riding up to reveal shiny, shapely thighs. “I’m fine. Enough with the questions.” He put an arm out to steady himself and immediately regretted it when his fingers brushed her soft skin, a white-hot shock making his arm tingle and then his lips.

Clearing his throat, he stood and turned his back to her. “Let me know when you’re dressed.”

It was a mere three seconds later that she responded. “You may turn, but I have a problem.” When he turned, he discovered that she was, in fact, not dressed, still wrapped in the small towel clinging to her every curve.

Drop the towel, a sinister voice whispered in his mind. Every ounce of moral fiber he’d been born with was being used now with this woman. By the time he left this place, it would all be gone.

“They never brought me a nightgown—or anything, really—to change into,” she argued. “This is as dressed as I’m going to get. I don’t think that fishnet dress will hold up to a second wear.”

“There has to be something.” He dug within the drawers. Nothing. He opened the cabinet in the corner.

Not nothing.

Most definitely not nothing.

“Wow. That’s a lot of rope.” Sage whistled. “Lord Fowler’s had a good time in here, I gather.”

Trystan slammed it shut, pain in his next exhale. “My shirt,” he barked. “You’ll have to take my shirt.”

“Won’t you be cold?”

No. I’m seconds away from going up in flames. Thank you so much for asking.

“I’ll be fine,” he replied. “Just take it.” He lifted the red silk over his head, handing it to her, trying not to notice the way her blue eyes flared and remained focused on his chest.

He didn’t flex. He was stretching. They were two completely different things.

“Th-Thank you,” she stuttered out before throwing the shirt over her head. It fell well past her knees. Thank the gods for small miracles. He’d never thought Sage’s height, or lack thereof, would be such a boon.

But then she dropped the towel underneath, and he no longer thought of anything involved as a miracle, because if silk did nothing else, it showed everything, and like the reprobate he was, Trystan found his eyes stuck to her chest. Sage noticed, because of course she did. She noticed everything he didn’t want her to. It was her special skill—along with the nonsense wheels in her mind and making inappropriate shapes with the milk in his cauldron brew.

“I apologize,” he said. “I didn’t see anything.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Her nose scrunched. “They’re just nipples.”

“Sage!”

“What!” she answered. “I was just staring at yours, and I didn’t apologize. Do you want me to apologize?”

If he requested an apology from her for merely staring at his chest, then he would need to be burned in a holy sanctuary for the thoughts he’d been having about hers.

“No,” he rasped. “I don’t want us to talk about nipples at all.”

“Very well. What body partsdoyou want to speak of?”

“None of them!”

“Ears?” Sage questioned cheekily. “There’s nothing suggestive about ears.”

At this moment in time, every part of her body was suggestive to him. That was the problem.