Rowles was waiting in the blue salon, reading a book but seeing nothing of the words, listening for the return of Morgan and Joan. He’d arrived a quarter hour ago, based on the information that Morgan had sent concerning the time, but upon his arrival, the siblings still hadn’t come home.

So he waited.

And each moment stretched on to the next, torturing him. Was Joan safe? Did they need help? And good Lord, he should have asked where they would be in case he did need to assist.

“And that, dear sister, is a very relaxed gentleman,” Morgan said as he entered the room, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Could you be wound any tighter, Rowles?”

Rowles narrowed his eyes at his friend, but the relief was too overwhelming for him to muster any other sort of reaction to Morgan’s teasing words. He looked for Joan, and the moment he saw her, his heart skipped and then resumed its regular cadence.

She was well.

“I think I may have worried a few years of my life away,” Rowles said as he stood to greet her.

“My brother should have given you more information. Then you wouldn’t have worried so.” She glared at her brother, but there was something comforting about her tone and her look.

“Am I allowed to ask how things went? Or am I not privy to such information?” Rowles asked, his body slowly unwinding from the earlier tension.

Joan turned to her brother, allowing him to answer the query.

“It was an interrogation of sorts, but the arrested man wasn’t a threat. I suspect he was arrested for protection.”

“I hadn’t thought of that.” Joan gasped. “It makes so much more sense, if—” She paused and closed her mouth as if preventing herself from saying too much.

Rowles sighed, reminding himself that this would likely be the first of many more such conversations they’d have.

Morgan nodded. “Exactly. I’ll explore the concept more tomorrow.”

Rowles looked back and forth between the two siblings, then reached out a hand toward Joan. Immediately, she relaxed her rigid posture and moved forward to hold on to him. He pulled her in for a hug, earning a disapproving glare from her brother, but nothing more.

His body relaxed at touching her, finding home and heaven at the same time. “I’m much better now, and I will try not to be as tense in the future,” he told her.

“Truly, I don’t do this sort of thing often. So there will not be much need for you to be concerned,” Joan said against his chest, holding him tightly as if she needed his touch as much as he needed hers.

Rowles kissed her head and slowly released her. “Now, tell me what I can know.”