Dark Lord Seduction System: Taming Wives, Daughters, Aunts, and CEOs novel Chapter 1072

"Not long," her mother replied, with the small conspiratorial lift of an eyebrow that mothers deployed when the honest answer was far more interesting than they were prepared to share out loud. "Long enough."

Ashley narrowed her eyes. Decided, wisely, not to press.

Her mother had the settled, unreadable calm of a mother who had already finished whatever conversation she'd been having with Eros before the headlights arrived, and who was not in any mood to replay the footage for the audience.

Fine. There would be a later about this. A very thorough, very suspicious later.

But tonight Ashley had him back, and she wasn't about to waste the moment chasing whatever scandalous secrets her mother was clearly hoarding like contraband.

Eros gave her mother a small, graceful half-smile and turned his body a fraction toward her, hands still clasped behind his back like the perfect gentleman he absolutely was not.

"Since we're all outside anyway," he said calmly, "may I ask you something properly?"

Her mother tilted her head. "Please."

"I'd like to take Ashley with me."

Ashley's heart did a small, ridiculous backflip against her ribs.

Her mother didn't react on the surface. "Where."

"Paris."

"Paris."

"Tomorrow morning," Eros continued, mild as spring weather. "I'm flying out for a few weeks. I'd like Ashley to come with me. Meet my family — officially. It's long overdue."

Officially meet the family.

Ashley's mouth pressed into a small, tight smile to stop the hysterical laughter bubbling behind it.

Because the "family," of course, was not the tidy domestic unit her mother was currently picturing.

The family was a harem of mature, devastatingly accomplished women and several girls of Ashley's own age, all orbiting a teenage boy who was currently standing on her mother's front path in a coat that cost more than the house and casually lying about the nature of that word with the unruffled grace of a man who had done this many, many times before.

And then there was Madison.

Sweet, terrifying Madison, who had somehow slid into the center of the whole thing like a key into a lock and was going to be waiting on the other side of whatever private jet Ashley was about to board, greeting her with that warm, older-sister smile that whispered welcome home, finally.

Ashley wondered, in a small private corner of her head, what her mother's face would do if she knew any of it.

If she knew the polite boy asking for permission to take her daughter to Paris was not just a charming seventeen-year-old with a pretty horse.

That he was a teenager with two identities, a family built of a harem of women, an empire worth more than several small countries, and enough weight in the world that a conversation with her mother about permission to take Ashley to Paris was, from his end, a courtesy rather than a negotiation.

She glanced at her mother.

Her mother was nodding thoughtfully, looking at Eros, and — apparently — registering none of that at all. She saw a well-spoken young man asking for her blessing, and was weighing it with the quiet dignity mothers reserved for such moments.

Either she was oblivious… or she was scarily good at pretending she was.

Ashley seemed oblivious to whatever had escalated between her and Eros a few minutes ago. And maybe she was. Maybe she had tucked it somewhere, the way mothers tucked things, and would not unfold it again tonight.

Maybe she had not tucked it at all and was simply better at hiding than her mother had ever given her credit for.

Either way, it was not Ashley's hour to ask. As it was too soon—far too soon—for Eros to tell her mother who he really was.

There was no reason to. Not yet.

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