“You made a key?”

“You wouldn’t wish for me to keep secrets, would you?”

His fingers gripped the doorframe until his knuckles turned white. “Stop looking like you’re enjoying this,” he ground out.

“Ah, but that would be a lie, and it’s a sin to lie to one’s husband.”

Strange choking sounds began to emanate from his throat.

Kate smiled. “Didn’t I pledge honesty at some point?”

“That was obedience,” he growled.

“Obedience? Surely not.”

“Where is it?”

She shrugged. “Not telling.”

“Kate!”

She slid into a singsong. “Not tellllllllling.”

“Woman…” He moved forward. Dangerously.

Kate swallowed. There was a small, rather tiny, actually, but nonetheless very real chance that she might have gone just a wee bit too far.

“I will tie you to the bed,” he warned.

“Yeeeessss,” she said, acknowledging his point as she gauged the distance to the door. “But I might not mind it precisely.”

His eyes flared, not quite with desire-he was still too focused on the Pall Mall mallet for that-but she rather thought she saw a flash of…interest there.

“Tie you up, you say,” he murmured, moving forward, “and you’d like it, eh?”

Kate caught his meaning and gasped. “You wouldn’t!”

“Oh, I would.”

He was aiming for a repeat performance. He was going to tie her up and leave her there while he searched for the mallet.

Not if she had anything to say about it.

Kate scrambled over the arm of her chair and then scooted behind it. Always good to have a physical barrier in situations like these.

“Oh, Kaaaaate,” he taunted, moving toward her.

“It’s mine,” she declared. “It was mine fifteen years ago, and it’s still mine.”

“It was mine before it was yours.”