“I…I didn’t think she…”

He stared at me. “You didn’t make a move.”

“She’s…Luccio is my commanding officer, man. We…we work together.”

Thomas rolled his eyes. “That’s a twenty-first-century attitude, man. She’s a nineteenth-century girl. She doesn’t draw the lines the same way you and I do.”

“But I never thought—”

“I can’t believe this,” Thomas said. “Tell me you aren’t that stupid.”

“Stupid?” I demanded.

“Yeah,” he said bluntly. “Stupid. If she offered and you turned her down because you had a reason you didn’t want to, that’s one thing. Never realizing what she was talking about, though—that’s just pathetic.”

“She never said—”

My brother threw up his hands. “What does a woman need to do, Harry? Rip her clothes off, throw herself on top of you, and shimmy while screaming, ‘Do me, baby!’?” He shook his head. “Sometimes you’re a frigging idiot.”

“I…” I spread my hands. “She just went to sleep, man.”

“Because she was being thoughtful of you, you knob. She didn’t want to come on too strong and make you uncomfortable, especially given that she’s older and more experienced than you are, and your commanding officer to boot. She didn’t want to make you feel pressured. So she left you plenty of room to turn her down gracefully.” He rolled his eyes. “Read between the lines once in a while, man.”

“I…” I sighed. “I’ve never been hit on by a woman a hundred and fifty years older than me,” I said lamely.

“Try to use your brain around women once in a while, instead of just your juju stick.” Thomas tossed me my staff.

I caught it. “Everyone’s a critic.”

My brother purloined an apple from the basket on the island in the kitchen on his way to the door, glanced over his shoulder, and said, “Moron. Thank God Nicodemus is a man.”

He left, and I stood there for a second being annoyed at him. I mean, sure, he was probably right—but that only made it more annoying, not less.

Something else he was right about: Anastasia had looked simply amazing in front of that fire.

Huh.

I hadn’t really thought of her in terms of her first name before. Just as “Luccio” or “the captain” or “Captain Luccio.” Come to think of it, she’d been out of the dating game for even longer than I had. Could be that she hadn’t exactly been brimming with self-confidence last night, either.

The situation bore thinking upon.

Later.

For now, there was intrigue and inevitable betrayal afoot, and I had to focus.

I headed out to the workshop. The day was brighter than the one before, but the cloud cover still hadn’t gone. It had stopped snowing, though the wind kicked up enough powder to make it hard to tell. A check of the mirror had revealed that the tip of my nose, the tops of my ears, and the highest parts of my cheeks were rough and ruddy from exposure to cold and my brush with hypothermia. They looked like they’d suffered from a heavy sunburn. Added to my raccoon eyes, I thought them quite charming.