Page 122 of The Honest Affair

He hung up. Nina and I sat there for a moment, still digesting everything for a few moments. Then, finally, I managed to push myself up from the ground.

“Duchess, I’m going to need that sash around your waist,” I said, even as I started stripping off my own white bow tie. It was a shame to be ruining any part of the suit Nina had bought, but it had to be done.

She handed me the garment, and then I crossed the hall to where Gardner lay. I bound his hands firmly behind his back, then sat his sloppy ass up so that he was sitting against a balustrade leading down to another floor, and tied his hands to the balustrade behind him.

Then I sat back on my heels, and without any mercy, reached back and slapped him across the face as hard as I could.

“Wake up, you stupid son of a bitch.”

Gardner blinked, groggy and his eyes fixed on me, and then he registered where he was and what had happened.

“I—what? What the fuck!”

“Calvin Gardner,” I said. “Károly Kertész. Whatever the fuck your name is. In about ten minutes, you’ll be under arrest for rape in the first degree. That’s a class B felony, punishable by up to twenty-five years in prison. And I don’t care how many judges you think you can bribe in this city—I know more. And now I will personally make sure your sloppy ass lands behind bars if it’s the last thing I do.”

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