Chapter Nineteen
C HAPTER N INETEEN
“Who are you?” Lady Long-Nose demanded of the fairy.
He gave her a long, unfriendly look. “I am the Fairy King, of course.”
Christina screamed and might have fainted had Lady Long-Nose not pinched her arm.
The Fairy King settled in a throne made of human bones, and as he did so, fairies appeared from the surrounding woods.…
—From Lady Long-Nose
Julian had warned her over and over that the Duke of Windemere was quite mad, and Elspeth had believed him. But she hadn’t truly understood how mad until now.
They were in Windemere’s library, the place where she’d met Julian all those weeks ago, which was ironic and perhaps even funny, but Elspeth couldn’t find it in herself to be amused. She was chained to the fire grate at the duke’s feet. Literally chained with a padlock, which forced her to crouch on the floor as Windemere aimed a dueling pistol at her head from only inches away.
His Grace sat in an ornate chair facing the door and paid her no mind at all. She might’ve been a cat on the hearth. Or even less—the rug, perhaps. Which made his words all the more chilling because he certainly wasn’t speaking to her.
And there was no one else in the room.
“Bloody bastard,” the duke said clearly. “Thinks he can win. Like his father. Like his bitch of a mother. He went to Swanson and Richfield. Who knows who else he talked to. All of them? No, he said he did, but it’s not possible. Doesn’t matter anyway. They wouldn’t dare not do business with me.” Windemere’s eyes wandered to Elspeth, but he still didn’t acknowledge her. “I’ll make him watch. Have my men each take a turn at her, show him how his whore will share. No. I’ll take her myself. Chain her to my bed. Chain him to the damned wall. Fuck her until she’s big with my child, then kill them both.”
He was insane, Elspeth told herself, slowly twisting, attempting to get to her pocket. She hadn’t even been searched when Windemere’s men had brought her here. The duke was insane, and he wouldn’t ever touch her because Julian would come and—
But if Julian came, the duke would make him watch. Or kill Julian outright.
Her breath caught.
That couldn’t happen. Elspeth had to get to her little pistol before Julian was lured into the house. He was smart. He wouldn’t be fooled by anything the duke told him… except…
Except Julian was noble in the most maddening of ways, and if he truly thought her in danger, he might, he very well might, come walking in offering himself as an exchange, a sacrifice for a woman he couldn’t even trust.
The fool. She nearly sobbed.
No. The pistol. That was all she needed to focus on.
But Windemere must’ve seen her move because there was a sudden loud bang! that nearly made her lose control of her bladder, and a hole appeared in the floor beside her knee.
She peered up and saw the duke staring at her as he set down the first pistol and brought out its twin. “I said, stay still .”
Elspeth froze, hardly breathing, because this man looked at her as if she were no more than a mouse he’d found in his bedroom. It wouldn’t take but a twitch to shoot her.
There was a commotion in the hallway, coming closer, and it had to be Julian arriving to a trap, and she couldn’t wait any longer, she couldn’t.
The duke’s eyes jerked to the door.
Elspeth rolled back on her bottom and kicked him as hard as she could in the knee.
The duke curled reflexively over his injury, but he pulled the trigger at the same time.
There was a bellow of rage, of desperate despair, and Elspeth struggled upright to see Julian fighting with what looked like dozens of men with more coming. His eyes were wild, he had a cut lip, and as she watched he brutally slammed one man’s head into the wall, making his foe slump to the floor.
He was winning. She smiled. Julian was—
Something twinged in her arm, and she looked down.
Blood was pooling in her lap.
Elspeth was bleeding, lying against the hearth and bleeding, and still she smiled at him. Her beautiful smile, sunny and warm. And then her eyes closed, and everything went red.
Julian lost control.
Two men were holding him while a third hit him. He leaned to the side, into the man to his right, and saw his eyes widen just before Julian bit into his cheek. Hot liquid flooded his mouth, and there was screaming.
Elspeth wasn’t moving.
He had a knife in his hand, and it was bloody, plunging in and out of another’s stomach even as the man fell to the ground. Before him were others, but they were backing away now, trying to keep him and his knife from coming near but seemingly wary of touching him.
Julian had no such worries.
He charged the first, punching with the knife, stabbing as hard and as brutally as he could. Shoving, kicking, grinding knuckles into eyes, thumbs into throats. He didn’t care. It didn’t matter.
Elspeth wasn’t moving.
He staggered to her, paying no attention at all to Augustus, his voice, or the other gun he was waving around. Julian’s hands were on Elspeth, trying to lift her, but she was tied down somehow, his filthy uncle had chained her like a beast, and he tore at the padlock with his bare fingers because she wasn’t moving and he couldn’t lift her.
Somewhere behind him, he heard Quinn’s voice. “Julian.” And then more urgently, “ Julian , you need to move. He’s using you as cover.”
Not even for Quinn. He couldn’t look up, not even for his brother.
There was another shot, this one much closer, making his ears ring, the smell of gunpowder sharp in his nose.
“God’s blood,” someone said faintly.
Augustus was slumped in his chair, his head tilted to the side and half his face missing, and standing over him was the duchess, pale, blood-spattered, and strangely calm. “He tried to kill me.”