Christian pinched the bridge of his nose and spoke to his Duchess as gently as he could to avoid starting a scene like his cousin, “How are we supposed to assess how sorry one is, Annie? There’s no scale for that.”

Annie then challenged her husband, “Do you mean there’s no scale, or that you don’t want to believe that there is one?”

That hit Christian. Like Xandar, he didn’t want anything but the worst for Greg. The Duke sighed, and pecked a kiss on his Duchess’s temple before reluctantly asking, “What’s the scale?”

Annie answered without hesitation, “His demeanor. By watching the way Greg speaks about everything he has...