The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue (Montague Siblings, #1)

by Mackenzi Lee

I wrangle my waistcoat off over my head and drop it onto the floor. From his back, Percy points at my stomach. “You’ve something peculiar down there.” “What?” I look down. There’s a smear of bright red rouge below my navel. “Look at that.” “How do you suppose that got there?” Percy asks with a smirk as I spit on my hand and scrub at it. “A gentleman doesn’t tell.” “Was it a gentleman?” “Swear to God, Perce, if I remembered, I’d tell you.” I take another swallow of sherry straight out of the decanter and set it down on the sideboard, nearly missing. It lands a little harder than I meant. “It’s a burden, you know.” “What is?” “Being this good-looking. Not a soul can keep their hands off me.” He laughs, closemouthed. “Poor Monty, such a cross.” “Cross? What cross?” “Everyone falls in immediate, passionate love with you.” “They can hardly be blamed. I’d fall in love with me, if I met me.” And then I flash him a smile that is equal parts rapscallion and boyish dimples so deep you could pour tea into them. “As modest as you are handsome.” He arches his back—an exaggerated stretch with his head pressed into the rug and fingers woven together above him. Percy’s showy about so few things, but he’s a damned opera in the mornings.