Page 67 of Obsidian Throne

He made an encompassing gesture.

To my horror, the other dukes appeared dubious. Well, Mikhail looked downright giddy, but even Inessa’s father was clearly being swayed.

“And why would I use my wife’s dagger?” Evander challenged.

“Poetic justice?” Iiro suggested. “You appear to have grown rather fond of her for reasons unbeknownst to me, and he did order her flogging, did he not?”

“He did,” Ava said like the lying, despicable wench that she was.

“If he’s fond of her, that hardly seems a reason to implicate her in his father’s murder,” Theo said.

There was something like warning in his tone, and I shot him a grateful look.

“You said yourself, Brother, no one would believe someone Rowan’s size could take down the duke.” Iiro waved a dismissive hand. “She was never in danger.”

“Then why implicate myself that way?” Evander growled.

“A clever misdirect, obviously,” Iiro said.

“Your Majesty.” Theo’s voice was tightly controlled. “I’m sure no one here believes that Lord Evander would murder his own father and the duke of his clan.”

Iiro sent Theo a withering glance. “And can you vouch for his whereabouts between dinner and the time Sir Aleksander’s body was discovered?”

“You know that I cannot,” Theo all but snapped. “As I was with you.”

I suspected he realized at the same time I did how calculated that was, taking the only person who might have been on our side enough to provide an alibi out of the picture. He shook his head in quiet disbelief.

Inessa’s eyes narrowed with more emotion than she usually allowed herself to show. Suspicion of Evander? Of her husband? Of me?

Iiro, on the other hand, looked more satisfied than I had ever seen him, and why wouldn’t he be? He had just gotten the unpredictable Duke of Bear out of the picture and eliminated the one real threat to himself in one go.

Disgracing Evander was a happy bonus, and it punishedmeas well.

I barely breathed, trying to count the spaces between one racing heartbeat, then another, in an effort to calm myself. Evander’s features were the most terrifying part of all. For a man who usually had a plan followed by several contingency plans, he looked furious...but also bitterly resigned.

Iiro had played his game well, and entrapping Evander while he was still processing the shock and grief of Aleksander’s death was probably the only way he could have successfully managed it.

I opened my mouth to tell the room Evander had been with me, for all the good it would do, when another voice rang out.

“I can vouch for their whereabouts.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

ROWAN

Inessa’s voice was quiet and demure as ever, but it nonetheless echoed on the dark stone walls.

I tried to wipe the shock from my features, which was more than Iiro was managing to do. His jaw dropped, his eyes widening as he slowly turned his head to look at her.

“If that’s true…” He said the words like he suspected it wasn’t. “Why not speak up sooner, my dear?”

Her gaze darted calmly from me to Evander, then back to her husband. “I confess, it was a matter of propriety. Lady Rowan reached out to me with questions of a delicate nature, and I visited her rooms to answer.”

“And you spoke of such things in front of Lord Evander?” Iiro tilted his head in disbelief.

“He was unwilling to leave.” She shrugged a slim shoulder.

That sounded exactly like Evander. So much so that not a single person would question it.