“Caroline, this situation isn't my fault.”

“I know, but you don't have to be so bloody jolly about it.”

“Now, you're being just a bit unreasonable.”

“I don't care.” She whipped a bar of soap at him. It stuck against the wall. “I have every right to be unreasonable.”

“Oh?” He ducked as his shaving kit sailed through the air.

She glowered at him. “For your information, in the past week, I have been, oh let's see, nearly raped, kidnapped, tied to a bedpost, forced to cough my voice into nothingness—”

“That was your own fault.”

“Not to mention the fact that I embarked upon a life of crime by breaking and entering into my former home, was nearly trapped by my odious guardian—”

“Don't forget your sprained ankle,” he supplied.

“Ooooohhhh! I could kill you!” Another bar of soap flew by his head, grazing his ear.

“Madam, you are certainly doing an able job of trying.”

“And now!” she fairly yelled. “And now, as if all of that weren't undignified enough, I am forced to live for a week in a bloody bathroom!”

Put that way, Blake pondered, it was damned funny. He bit his lip, trying to hold back his laughter. He wasn't successful.

“Stop laughing at me!” she wailed.

“Blake?”

He went utterly sober in under a second. “It's Penelope!” he whispered.

“Blake? What is all that yelling about?”

“Quick!” he hissed, shoving her back toward the side stairwell. “Hide!”

Caroline scurried away, and just in time, too, for Penelope pushed open the door to the washing room just as she closed the one to the stairwell.

“Blake?” Penelope queried for the third time. “What is all the commotion?”

“It was nothing, Penny. I—”

“What happened here?” she screeched.

Blake looked around and gulped. He'd forgotten about the mess on the floor. Chamber pot shards, his shaving kit, a towel or two…

“I…ah…” It seemed to him that it was far easier to lie for the sake of national security than it was to his older sister.

“Is that a bar of soap stuck to the wall?” Penelope asked.

“Um…yes, it appears to be.”

She pointed down. “And is this another bar of soap on the floor?”

“Er…yes, I must have been rather clumsy this morning.”

“Blake, is there something you're keeping from me?”

“There are quite a few things I keep from you,” he said with absolute honesty, trying not to think about Caroline sitting out in the stairwell, presumably laughing her bloody head off at his predicament.

“What's this on the floor?” Penelope bent down and picked up something white. “Why, it's the note I wrote to Miss Dent! What is it doing here?”

“I haven't had a chance to send it yet.” Thank God Caroline had forgotten to open it.

“Well, for heaven's sake, don't leave it here on the floor.” She narrowed her eyes and looked up at him. “I say, Blake, are you feeling quite the thing?”

“Actually, no,” he replied, seizing the opportunity she'd offered him. “I've been a touch dizzy for the last hour or so. That's how I knocked over the chamber pot.”