Sinners at the Altar (Sinners on Tour 6)

“Shut up,” was the only retort Aggie could muster.

Starr’s lips brushed her shoulder and her arm circled Aggie’s waist so she could splay a hand over her lower belly. Aggie’s brow furrowed with confusion. Why did this touch feel intimate and at the same time creepy?

“Of all the people who ever claimed to love me, you’re the only one I regret hurting,” Starr said quietly.

Aggie threw off Starr’s hand and stalked across the room. “That’s the biggest load of bullshit you ever shoveled at me,” Aggie said, her heart twanging with pain. She’d gotten over Starr a long time ago, but the betrayal she’d suffered at Starr’s hand still hurt when she was reminded of it.

Starr sighed. “Believe what you must; I’m just stating facts. But your friendship means a lot to me, so I won’t ruin it again with sex. Even though all I could think about while you were whipping my cunt was your mouth on me.”

“I’m not interested.” As if Aggie would ever even consider hurting Jace by fooling around with someone like Starr. Or with anyone, for that matter.

“Are you going to tell him about us?” Starr asked.

“There’s nothing to tell,” Aggie said, striding purposely to the other room to retrieve the implements they’d used on Jace.

“Are you afraid of how he’ll react, knowing you once loved a woman?”

“No,” she said. Maybe, a little voice in her head countered. “I might tell him later.” If she wanted to send him back to that closed-off place he used to frequent.

She didn’t think he’d take her admission well. Mostly because she’d been hiding it from him for so long. He’d told her things about his past—about the deepest, darkest parts of himself—that no one else knew, and she couldn’t even tell him that she’d once been in love with a woman. Why? Would she have had the same reservations if Starr had been a man who’d broken her heart? She honestly didn’t know. A man had never broken Aggie’s heart. She’d never given one enough power over her to do so. Before Jace, she’d never loved a man. Never even considered loving a man. But she loved this man, and she refused to jeopardize their relationship. He meant everything to her. And he did have the power to break her heart. To destroy her.

“You’re afraid of losing him, aren’t you?” Starr interrupted Aggie’s turbulent thoughts.

She was surprised by the sudden tightness in her chest and the sting of tears in her eyes. “Terrified,” she said breathlessly.

“Then you should probably marry him.”

She was a touch terrified of that too. “Someday.”

Chapter Three

Aggie wrapped her arms around Jace and stole a kiss. Distracted, he kissed her back, but he didn’t seem to mean it. She gave his ass an appreciative squeeze and drew away to stare into his dark brown eyes.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Just a bit…” His eyebrows drew together. “Cold.”

While June in London wasn’t as warm as June in southern California, it wasn’t cold. Not even close.

“Cold?”

“I’ve been cold since we left the Tower of London yesterday.” He pursed his lips and shook his head.

“Are you coming down with something?” She touched his forehead, then his cheeks. He didn’t feel feverish. “Jet lag maybe?” He’d been a bit off all day. She hadn’t even been able to convince him to join her in the shower that morning.

“Maybe,” he said and wrapped his arms around his body to hold in a hard shudder.

Because she’d wanted to play tourist, she and Jace had rented a car to make their way from London to Donington Park for Sinners’ stage performance at the Download Festival. The rest of the band had left on the tour bus the day before. Maybe Jace was just worried they wouldn’t make it to the show in time. Their set didn’t start until late that night and driving across England wasn’t quite the same as driving across the United States.

“We’ll make it. We just have one more castle I want to see, and it’s only an hour and a half to the venue from there.”

“Another castle?” He grinned crookedly. “I’ve seen a different side of you these past two days. I never knew you were such a history buff.”

“History is so dark.”

He chuckled. “Just the parts that interest you.”

At her insistence, they’d spent the night in Mailmaison Oxford Castle—a creepy castle that had been used as a prison; their room had once been a cell. Jace had been a bit skittish the entire time, claiming some presence was lurking around him. She’d laughed his claims off, and he’d gone quiet on her, internalizing as he did when he didn’t think anyone understood where he was coming from. She’d wanted to play tourist and had easily talked Jace into seeing some real dungeons, but while he’d started their adventure with enthusiasm yesterday morning, he’d been uneasy and listless the rest of the day. A restless night’s sleep hadn’t improved his disposition.

“Are you having any fun?” she asked.

“Do you really think I’d have fun touring the English countryside looking at old castles?”

“And dungeons,” she reminded him.

His gaze lowered, and he smiled. “But not the good kind of dungeons.”

“We don’t have to leave home for the good kind. If you want to go directly to Donington and skip our last stop—”

He tipped his head to rest his forehead against hers and closed his eyes. They stayed like that a long moment while he mulled over his thoughts. They’d been together long enough that she knew he wasn’t ignoring her when he was silent. He was merely thinking. At first, her natural instinct to demand a reaction had made it difficult for her to give him these quiet moments of contemplation, and they’d gotten into plenty of arguments over it, but she now understood if she gave him a moment to put his thoughts in order, he would share them with her. Eventually.

“I’m not having fun, not exactly,” he said.

Her heart sank with disappointment.

“But I am enjoying my time alone with you away from the insanity of the tour. Even if I have to listen to history lessons all day, at least the British accents are entertaining.”

Aggie chuckled. “What would you rather do?”

“Well, that would require one of those fun dungeons, but since I haven’t seen one of those since we arrived, I’m content following your evil guidebook.”

She pulled the dog-eared copy of Tour the Scandals of England from the back pocket of her jeans. “Not evil. Just a bit naughty.”

They were working their way through the Tudor period, visiting sites where noteworthy members of society had done their dirty deeds or been punished for them.

“What’s next?” he asked, his strong fingers sneaking under the hem of her T-shirt to stroke the bare skin of her back.

Pretending not to be affected by that simple touch, Aggie flipped to the next stop on their self-directed tour. “Sudeley Castle, once home of Queen Katherine Parr. Only six months after the death of her husband, King Henry the Eighth, she married Thomas Seymour.” She glanced up from her reading and met Jace’s eyes. “Any relation?”

He shrugged. “Not that I know of. My father’s family was originally from England, so maybe, but I really doubt it. Do I look like royalty to you?”

“You’re king of my domain.”

He chuckled. “That’s more power than the King of England could ever claim.”

She shifted on her feet. It was hard for her to admit that he held power over her. Not because he dominated her but because she loved him so much, she knew she’d do anything necessary to be with him. Not a comfortable position to find herself in, but Jace was worth the compromise. Unequivocally worth it.

“Let’s go check out your ancestral home,” she said and tapped his leather-encased arm with her book. “Maybe you’re a baron or a duke and never even knew it.”

He chuckled. “If I’m related to Thomas Seymour of Sudeley Castle, I’m sure my branch of the family tree was sawed off centuries ago.”

>

“We can pretend; it’ll be fun,” she said and kissed him gently before opening the rental car’s door and slipping inside. She inexplicably had a steering wheel in front of her. Crazy backwards cars. Grinning sheepishly, she slipped back out of the car and said, “I changed my mind. You should drive.”

“You meant to do that, did you?” He winked at her knowingly.

“Of course,” she said and hurried around to the other side of the car.

In her wrong-side-of-the-car passenger seat, she unfolded the large map of England and traced the road they’d be traveling to their next destination. “It’s about a hundred kilometers from Oxford,” she told him when he settled into the car beside her.

He scowled. “Which is how many miles?”

“Sixty or so.”

“That’s not far.”

Once they were on the main road, they settled into a comfortable silence for several miles. It had been weeks since they’d been completely alone without interruptions. She enjoyed touring with his band all over Europe, but she was looking forward to getting back home in October. She missed her dungeon and her customers, but mostly she missed quiet evenings with Jace and his silly cat, Brownie. They’d had to leave the feline behind when the tour had brought them to Europe.

“I’m glad I decided to take a day off,” she said, watching his face while he concentrated on driving on the wrong side of the road.

He glanced at her and smiled. “Me too. You’ve been working so hard on filling orders for corsets that I hardly see you without a needle in your hand.”

Her business was definitely keeping her busy. Too busy. She’d collected so many orders while the band was touring the U.S. that she had enough to keep her fingers sore for months. She was horribly behind in her embroidery work, but everyone needed a day off every now and then, so she didn’t feel too guilty.