Instead, she continued her perusal. His dark hair was wet and an unmistakable smirk—one she also knew too well—rode his handsome, firmly molded lips. His eyes glowed like emeralds beneath his unfairly long black lashes.

“You may go, Hawthorne,” Sebastian said, pulling a fresh white cravat from the wardrobe in front of him.

Hawthorne removed himself from the room so quickly Veronica was convinced she’d felt a breeze from the tails of his livery coat.

Sebastian turned away from her and she swallowed again while her eyes moved up from his legs covered with a dusting of dark hair, over his arse, which was fine even when hidden by a towel, to his muscled back and shoulders still teaming with droplets of water from his bath.

She cleared her throat to ensure her voice was still there. “Where is she?” she asked in a tone that she could only hope was both nonchalant and uninterested.

“Who?” he replied simply, as he continued to pull clothing items from the wardrobe.

That cursed towel looked as if it might drop from his hips at any moment and, for the life of her, she couldn’t decide if that would be a bad thing. Very well. Yes. Bad. Quite bad.

“You know quite well who…Melissa.” Veronica could barely push the hated name past her lips. She prayed she still sounded unaffected.

He turned then, and his green gaze met hers. A grin covered his face, and he shrugged. “I’ve no idea where she is,” he said simply. “In fact, your guess is as good as mine.”

Veronica crossed her arms over her chest and eyed him warily. “No doubt she’s still in the bath,” she said, nodding toward the bath chamber, desperately hoping her voice continued to sound blasé rather than angry or jealous. Because she was not jealous. She was not and she never would be. It was a fool’s lot to be jealous over a man who could not be faithful. If she’d learned nothing else, it was that.

“You’re welcome to look,” he offered, nodding toward the bath chamber as he used another towel to dry off his considerably muscled chest.

She hadn’t seen the man in two years, and he’d certainly been muscled back then, but he was more muscled now. His biceps bulging, his pectorals swelling, his abdomen outlined in six clearly defined packs. Her mouth went dry. She was looking all right. But not at what he’d offered.

She forced herself to swing her gaze toward the bath chamber door. She wanted to go look. Drat it. She was sorely tempted to go look. But that would imply that she cared, and she would rather be dead than allow him to think that for one moment. “No matter,” she said, still trying to sound completely unaffected.

“I haven’t seen Melissa since the night that you—”

“Please.” Veronica put up a violet-gloved hand and glanced away, completely unable to hear another word on the subject. They’d had this discussion…at length. More than once. And the fact remained that he was a liar and a cheater, and no amount of discussion would change that.