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“Aric—”
“She told me everything,” he said, cutting off the obvious retort in Cecilia’s eyes.
Cecilia huffed and her hand returned to her hips. “Then what’s she been hiding?”
He shook his head. “I won’t tell you what you’re asking for. She told me in confidence and it’s nothing that you, or any of us, needs to be concerned about.”
She was clearly less than satisfied with his opinion. “Right, and I’m sure your opinion on this isn’t biased at all. It’s not as if you’re sleeping together or anything.”
His brow furrowed. “We weren’t at the time.” He took a breath. “Nor is Rochelle’s story the issue at hand—”
“According to you.”
Aric let some of his irritation show. “I know you lied to me, Cecilia.”
She crossed her arms in a show of defiance. “If I had lied to you, you wouldn’t know it.”
“It did take me a moment,” Aric said in lieu of devolving into an argument. “I believe that brings us back to my main question.”
“Which is what, exactly? Do you want to know if I know if Prince Denham has something to do with Trisha’s accident? Or are you asking if I somehow wound up under the tutelage of theElder Prince?” She scoffed. “Those are two very different questions.”
Aric didn’t balk. “Unless it was all one large plot.”
Cecilia stomped forward and smacked her hand across the side of his face. The closed office echoed as he blinked to clear his vision. “Don’t talk to me again until you’ve gotten your head on straight, you jackass.”
Aric made no attempt to stop her as she stormed from the room. He wasn’t surprised at her anger. What left him reeling was the echo of an epiphany he’d had during that conversation. Was it possible that Cecilia had been more than an unfortunate witness to that tragedy? From her oddly avoidant reaction, he was almost positive there was some level of connection between her and Denham. The question, then, was what that connection was.
****
“You’ve really had a lot going on the last few days,” Mitzi said. Her blue eyes were wide and filled with sympathy, as if she wanted nothing more than to chase the nastiness away.
Rochelle smiled over the rim of her teacup. “You could definitely say that.” She’d left a few details out, of course, but they’d managed to get through most of the gist of it, as best as she could. Even with the interruption of Viveca’s rambling call.
Darnel leaned back and stretched his arms over the backrest of the couch, fingers of one hand curling around Mitzi’s shoulder. “I guess it makes sense Aric wants to talk to Cece, then. They’re always strategizing something when there’s a situation he can’t just plow through.”
Rochelle hummed in what she hoped was a positive tone and gulped down the entire last half of her drink as an excuse not to comment. She most definitely couldn’t tell them about the item they’d found which had put Aric in a position to have to dredge up an uncomfortable conversation with Cecilia. Let alone tell them he was going into that conversation concerned she was keeping a very dangerous secret.
“Oh,” Mitzi said, “would you like a refill?”
Rochelle leaned forward and set the cup on the live-edge table between their respective seats. “No, thank you. Two is plenty.” The tea was honestly delicious, but she didn’t want to slosh all the way back to the estate.
Mitzi immediately turned a frown to her fiancé. “Do you think her abduction could be connected to the situation with the Lamonts?”
Rochelle struggled not to wince. With everything that had happened since, she’d allowed herself to forget about those two.
Darnel made a thoughtful sound. “It’s hard to say. It doesn’t seem like it fits, but then, I don’t think we know enough yet to rule it out, either.”
She pulled her lip between her teeth. She should really have gotten permission from Aric to at least tell them about Denham by name, though she also understood why he had wanted to keep them in the dark on that issue.
The main door swung open, startling all of them as an agitated energy rolled into the cottage. Rochelle drew a shaky breath, registering the sight of an out-of-breath Cecilia at the same time as she saw Mitzi and Darnel sit up straight on the opposite sofa. This was not something she had anticipated. She would have expected Aric to come and get her, or at the very least call ahead, and concern spiked in her chest.
“Cecilia,” Mitzi said, “are you all right? You’re out of breath.”
“I thought you were hashing things out with Aric,” Darnel said almost simultaneously.
Cecilia swept her gaze over the room and settled a glare on Rochelle. There was no friendly warmth in those gray eyes. For the first time, they were cold, even cruel. “You have a lot of gall, sitting in my house, you damn whore.” Her aura spiked as she spoke.
“Cecilia!” Mitzi exclaimed.
