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secret suspicion came as a relief and I feared its truth. If she confirmed it, I feared I’d go mad.
    Brie stepped up to me and slapped my face. “I’ve always been faithful.”
    Elation at the truth allowed her the hit. But truth brought self-loathing for my own deceit. Thank all that she’d not sought revenge on me with another man as I had with another woman. Many women. Truth be told, they’d all confess that I’d screamed her name at my weakest point. “Nonetheless.” I stood straight. “Lady Aighta and I have much to discuss.”
    Bridgette ’s eyes widened and her nose flared. Her pale skin flushed, starting from her neck and traveling up. “No.”
    She did not trust me with the woman. Bridgette thought me an animal to take Lady Aighta, and before I might have, but now anger pushed me to prove her wrong. In my heart, even I hadn’t forgiven myself for my weakness of the flesh. I was a man and a man needed his woman. But when she denied me, was I to be a eunuch forever? My jaw clenched. “I will not touch her. I will not breathe on her. By the gods-be-damned light I will stay ten feet away from her at all times. But I need to speak with her, in private.”
    “Your word is no—”
    “Stop!” I pointed at her. “Reconsider your words, my lady, because once you say that there is nothing left between us.”
    Brie shut her open mouth in a grim line. “Don’t hurt her or there will be nothing for us.”
    I swallowed. “I will sit on one side, she the other.” My wife examined the dining table. Its width was eight feet. She turned to Lady Aighta, searching her friend’s face for guidance.
    “It’s obvious you two need an arbiter,” Aighta whispered. “Who better?” The air held its breath as each stared at the other, and the moment passed. Brie hugged her friend in a fierce embrace and whooshed out of the room with Paul running to keep up with her. I pulled up a chair and sat, gesturing for Aighta to do the same. The cool breeze lifted my hair and I breathed to regain my composure. I’d nearly raised a hand to my wife. I would hate myself more if I’d let that happen. We could not go on like this. I wanted desperately to turn time back to our courtship, our engagement, or the first years of our marriage. Those were the days. The man I was then would draw a sword on the man I was now and slit my throat for looking at Brie the wrong way.
    Aighta and I were alone when I made light of my question. “So, what did you teach her?”
    Aighta gave me a little smile. “She wanted you so badly.”
    I leaned forward and repeated, “What did you teach her?”
    “I now understand that your wife has frozen your heart and that you are closed to anything anyone has to offer you. But your patience is needed for understanding this.”
    I pulled back. “Continue.”
    Aighta cleared her throat. “She wanted you so badly. I knew you had designs on both of us, but she wanted you so much. I truly didn’t care if it was me or her so I helped her gain your eye.”
    At least I’d chosen the one that gave a damn. “So everything she did to get me to choose her was really you?”
    Aighta shook her head. “She gained you fairly in any contest.”
    “But it was all a lie.”
    “No.” Aighta reached for my hand, even though it was too far away to touch. “No. All of it was her doing. I just gave her the formula.”
    “Her telling me that she wouldn’t respect me in the morning if she bed ded me too soon,” I said. “That was brilliance. Had me taking her seriously.”
    Aighta smiled. “That was Brie. Nothing to do with me.”
    “Her feigning drowning to get me to save her?”
    “I told her that might backfire, but it was her idea.”
    I started thinking about all the little things Brie did to catch my eye. All those gestures of love. Tender touches. How I missed her touch. I opened my mouth to ask another question.
    Aighta said, “Stop speaking while you’re ahead. Everything was Brie. I only gave her the