The moment was familiar. He’d been here with her before—the closed expression on her face, the feeling a wall three feet thick had abruptly descended between them. This time, though, he wasn’t going to go away as easily.

“Fine,” he said. “Tell me about you.”

“It’s not—”

“If you’re about to say it’s not relevant, you can stuff it. You’re the one proposing an affair. If I’m going to agree to such an arrangement, I deserve to know why.”

She scowled, and he worried he’d overplayed his hand. The wall was too thick; whatever wound it was protecting was too deep. Yet, to his surprise, she nodded.

“You’re right. You deserve to know why.” She took a deep breath. He ached to lean over and put his arm around her.

“You know I was separated from my husband. I suspect you also know it wasn’t a happy marriage. What you don’t know is…” She broke off, grimacing. “There are only four people left alive who know this. What you don’t know is this is how … why … my first marriage started. With intercourse.”

“But you were a child when you married,” Sam said. “I researched you.”

That coaxed a small smile out of her. “Of course you did.” She rolled her shoulders. “I was sixteen when I met Alain, and seventeen when I slept with him. Before marriage.”

The anger began to trickle back, but this time it was directed at a dead man. “He must have been fifteen years older than you.”

“Fourteen,” she said. “It’s not so unusual.”

“It’s damned unusual for a thirty-year-old man to seduce a child,” Sam responded. “Or at least it should be.”