Charles squeezed her hand again. He was proud of her courage.
“Hugo trained me to be useful to him. To become a tool, a weapon in service of the Crown. Only he soon decided to use me for his own personal aims, to use me against you all.”
“It’s perhaps unchristian of me, but I would like to throw Hugo in the Thames,” Lucien growled. “To r**e a woman?”
Godric slammed a balled fist onto the reading table he sat at. “And then threaten her child?”
“And then force her to work for him?” Cedric howled. “Villain!”
“So why did you stop being Tom?” Ashton asked, the calmest of them all. “I assume Hugo changed his orders?”
“Yes. He wished for me to secure Charles’s affections, with the intention of having me betray him just before—”
“Before the endgame,” Ashton finished for her.
“This man is t
