by Kresley Cole
Maddy should never have gone to England. Returning to her native land after such a long exile had made her miss it even more. She had been arrogant and rash there, and apparently she hadn't left those traits behind.
"Oh, please, justone crumb of fortune!" she whispered urgently to the sky. As if in answering jest, she spied thunderclouds swelling, obscuring the stars. Where would she go if it rained? Not all drunks on stoops were as passive as her building's collection. They could be ferociously territorial.
The air was thick and damp, presaging the storm. Maddy hated storms. Every tragedy in her life had been accompanied by thunderclaps and pounding rain.
The morning her father's second had come to report his death in a duel, lightning had punctuated the man's words. The day of her father's funeral, rain had spilled in torrents. When Maddy and her mother had returned from burying him, they'd been turned away, their home of Iveley Hall having been seized by creditors while they'd been gone.
Though one ring or brooch could have kept them for years, it was considered in poor taste to wear jewelry to a funeral, so they'd fled with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. As they'd ridden away, Maddy had looked back at the manor through the rain-streaked window of the coach and known she would never find a way to return home….
The fire that had nearly taken her life when she was eleven had raged, whipped to a frenzy by the fierce winds of a storm, yet barely dampened by the scattered bouts of rain. Maddy had been trapped inside the small apartment she and her mother shared several floors up. She'd been convinced she would die even before a burning beam had fallen on her and fractured her arm.
When she'd finally battled her way through the flames to reach the window, Maddy had blinked against the smoke, gaping in incomprehension down at the street.
Her mother—obviously one of the first ones out—stood outside.
In that moment of flames and terror, Maddy had thought,I'm as good as alone .
To this day, she had nightmares filled with fire that always ended in that gut-wrenching recognition….
Maddy jerked, startled, when the sky opened up. As the rain poured, she ran beneath the closest cover, a chestnut tree.
And laughed until she wept when the leaves began to fall on her in clumps.
Clawing the cobblestones in pain, Ethan lay in a pool of his own blood funneling from his upper chest. He cracked open his eyes, realizing he'd released his hold on his pistol when he'd fallen. As he listened for Grey's approach, he heard people filing out from the front of the tavern.
Gritting his teeth, Ethan swept his hand to the side until he brushed his gun. Stretching his arm, his very fingers, he glanced his fingertips off the handle, spinning it—
Too late. He looked up to find that Grey had a bead on him, gun raised. As Grey approached Ethan, his demeanor was as pleasant as ever. With his free hand, Grey poked his finger through a still-smoking hole in his shirt and jacket, and grinned. Ethan's bullet had only hit a deceptive billow in the man's bagging clothes.
"And people said you were better than I?" Grey said.
I was for ten years….Ethan tasted blood in his mouth and knew he was about to die, even if Grey didn't plug another bullet into him. "Hugh will destroy you," Ethan said, choking out the words.
Grey shrugged. "So everyone keeps assuring me. And yet, I'd always believed it would be you."
The tavern's nearby side door creaked open, and noise and dim light spilled out into the alley. Grey glanced up, then faced Ethan once more, furtively stowing his pistol. "That's a kill shot, old friend, and we both know it." He cast Ethan his disconcertingly sympathetic smile. "You had to have been thinking about a woman earlier with an expression like that." He turned to lope away, saying over his shoulder, "I hope she was worth it."
Ethan rolled to his side for his gun, biting back an agonized yell, but Grey had already disappeared.
Though Ethan couldn't see who'd exited the tavern out the side door, he could hear them.
Grimacing to the clouded night sky above, Ethan listened as the MacReedys soddingdebated whether to help him or not:"I'll no' get dragged into trouble."; "We do owe him."; "He's turned into a blackguard."; "Think he might've deserved the shot?"
"Warn my brother," Ethan grated to them, blood spilling from his mouth, but they ignored him. His body was beginning to shudder with cold. "Listen to me…." They didn't.
He had failed Hugh utterly. Never had Ethan been so careless, walking into the street without even a cursory scan of the vantages surrounding him. He was dying, and he had only two thoughts—getting a warning to his brother…and the fact that he'd never get to see that damned little witch again.
Ethan perceived hands under his arms, and braced for the pain as they lifted him, but he still blacked out….
He had no idea how long he'd been unconscious, but when he came to, he was in a bed, with a shaky-handed surgeon removing the bullet while others held Ethan down. He roared with agony as the man plucked metal and charred cloth from the wound then splashed whisky into it.
Before he began stitching, the doctor tossed back half the bottle down his own throat. "I did what I could," he said when he finished.
"Will he live?" the MacReedy whelp asked.
In and out of consciousness, Ethan caught the doctor's parting words: "Let's put it this way. If he recovers from a wound like that and the fever to follow…I'll quit drinking."
Chapter Twelve
"I'm beginning to wonder if anyone has even noticed the blackguard's missing," MacReedy the elder said. "It's possible no one's coming for him."
"Aye," the whelp replied in a distracted tone.
"Bugger off, you weak-kneed old bastard," Ethan growled, ready to claw at the gaudily papered walls after five weeks of being trapped in the MacReedys 'lodge. "You think I canna hear you?"
He could. Every day as he lay bedridden, slowly recuperating, Ethan could hear the sounds of their leisure—the fan of cards shuffled, or the taps as MacReedy emptied his pipe or their dominoes connected.
Tap…tap…tap…all bloody day long, until Ethan thought he'd go mad.
Why has no one come for me?He felt like an unwanted dog tied to a tree, then forgotten.
"Go to hell, MacCarrick!" the whelp replied.
"Where do you bloody think I am?" Clenching his fists in the blanket, he surveyed "his" room. Most closets boasted more space. "You're brave now, but by God, when I'm on my feet again, I'm going to make you eat your goddamned teeth."
A few moments later, MacReedy the elder stepped into Ethan's small room, eyes grave. "Son, I'm no' going to talk to you about that language again." The first time had been after Mrs. MacReedy's ill-fated attempt to read psalms to Ethan—he haddeclined in language so foul he'd thought he'd heard something burst in her brain before she'd skittered from the room and fainted. "Debt or no', I'll be tossing you out," MacReedy said calmly before stepping out once more.
The debt. Always back to the debt with this family. They knew they owed Ethan because he had delivered the completely unbelievable lie that Sarah had slipped instead of jumped, ensuring that she would have no suicide stigma and would receive a Catholic burial. Ethan had also ensured that he would be shadowed for more than a decade by rumors of his pushing her to her death.
MacReedy knew Ethan hadn't lied to protect Sarah's memory for her family; in fact, Ethan blamed them for forcing her into the marriage. And he'd been sure to let them know it every time he encountered them, which fortunately hadn't been often.
Yet now Ethan was trapped in their home.
When he'd awakened from two weeks of delirium, he'd immediately tried to rise, frantic to leave this place and find out what his careless actions had wrought. Was his brother safe? Had Grey gotten him, too?
Ethan had promptly ripped open his wound and blacked out. The consequent stitch repair by the shaky physician had earned Ethananother week's worth of fever and guaranteed he'd been even weaker than he had been the first time he'd come to.
> Every bloody time he tried to rise and leave this place, he ripped open stitches and passed out. With his height and the size of the cramped room, he invariably knocked his head in the fall, making his total time trapped in bed at over a month and counting.
He'd been forced toask MacReedy to find out if Hugh and Jane had left for Scotland. Ethan had also had to pay the whelp to wire London to report his situation.
MacReedy the elder had learned that Hugh had indeed left the lake house the very night Ethan had been shot. At least there'd been one good thing about Ethan catching that bullet—Grey's waiting to kill Ethan had allowed Hugh to begin his journey north into the Highlands, putting Hugh firmly in his element.
Ethan was confident that his brother was safe for the time being. The problem was that Hugh would be holed up on Court's estate in utter seclusion with the woman he wanted more than anything on this earth—now his temporary wife. At worst, the curse was real, and Hugh would be risking her death and torment. At best, Hugh was still secretly an assassin, massive and stony and awkward around people, such an unfitting match for the celebrated beauty, who loved to socialize.
Not to mention that Hugh took his orders to kill from Jane's own father….
But in the condition Ethan was in, there was nothing he could do to help his brother. The inaction ate at him. He burned with urgency. With nothing to do but think, he stewed, alternately dwelling on his failure and on Madeleine.
Though Ethan had ruined her chances with Le Daex, Ethan couldn't say that she wouldn't find another after so many weeks had passed. She was tempting, and if she was provided with a large enough dowry, a man could be moved to overlook her lack of virtue.
Ethan had shown mercy to Grey and look what had happened. He would not make the same mistake twice by allowing Sylvie to go unscathed.
When he was finished with Grey, Ethan would lure Madeleine away from Sylvie back to one of his more obscure estates, with an offer of security in a mutually beneficial arrangement. Or, if she proved stubborn, he was not above promising marriage, with no intention of going through with it.
He wondered if her parents had warned her about a scarred, black-haired Scot, but he doubted it. Sylvie lacked the imagination to make the connection. Van Rowen had been eaten with shame and guilt over the incident and likely wouldn't have spoken of it before his death six months later.
In any case, it wouldn't matter if the girl had been warned. Ethan would have her one way or another. He'd been disfigured—the exquisite daughter offered up would appease him. Once she was in his possession, he'd use her until he tired of her.
Then he would throw her out, thoroughly ruined, on her pert little arse, saving countless foolish noblemen from Sylvie's clutches.
Madeleine had told him that his kind used and gave nothing back.
Miss Van Rowen had seen nothing.
Chapter Thirteen
For the love of Christ, let it be someone come for me,Ethan thought the next day when he heard a carriage on the drive.
He closed his eyes in relief when he heard Hugh's voice in the front parlor. Though Hugh was usually so silent, Ethan distinctly heard him attempt to make conversation with the MacReedys. He wasn't polished with it, but he seemed to take his fumbles with a light heart.
When Hugh entered, Ethan noticed his brother looked hale and…happy?
"Ethan, it's good to see you!" he exclaimed as Ethan made a painstaking attempt to sit up in bed. "Grey told me he'd killed you."
Ethan quirked a brow. "So we're talking to Grey now?"
"No, of course no'." He grinned. "Those were his last words."
"You…killed him." Grey was dead at last? "How?"
After all this time—it wouldn't beEthan who destroyed Grey.
"Well,I dinna kill him precisely." Hugh pulled at his collar. "More like Jane and I did it together. It's a long story. I'll tell you on the way back. If you're ready to go home now?"
"What do you think? It's about bloody time someone came for me. I sent a wire weeks ago."
"There was no wire from you. I've searched everywhere—even had runners combing the countryside. That's how we located you here."
"No wire?" he bellowed, then heard the whelp take off, slamming out of the house. That was why he'd been stuck? Because the whelp had pocketed the telegraph fee? "I'm going to kill that puny bastard."
"Do it another time. I have to get back to London. Do you need help getting dressed?" When Ethan reluctantly nodded, Hugh helped him to the edge of the bed. "Let me see the damage." He gave a whistle at the sight of Ethan's wound. "That was close. Another inch—"
"And I would no' have been trapped here for five weeks."
"A bullet wound, though? Exactly how slowly were you moving for Grey to be able to hit you?" Hugh asked, and Ethan's fists clenched. "The skin's healing nicely. A couple of weeks more for the stitches—if you're careful with them." Frowning, Hugh said, "Why are you still so weak?"
"Because the food here tastes like sawdust," Ethan said. He'd probably lost a stone of weight.
"That might be, but you're still going to have to thank them for it."
"The hell I will."
Hugh lowered his voice. "If you doona, I will no' tell you how Grey died. And I might just leave your arse here…."
Twenty minutes later, Hugh and his coach driver were heaving Ethan up into his carriage. "That was no' so bad, now, was it?" Hugh grated with a last shove.
Ethan gritted his teeth, collapsing back onto the squabs. "Sod off, Hugh." His wound was singing, his head was spinning, and yet even after being blackmailed into muttering gratitude to that family, excitement drummed in him. Because Ethan had realized that Grey's death meant his duty was done. Ethan was free to go to Paris as soon as he got his strength back.
Suddenly he felt ravenous.
"Now, tell me how the hell Grey died," Ethan said once the coach began to roll along.
Hugh peered out the window as he answered, "Well, Jane plugged him with some arrows, and I…tripped him."
Ethan grew still. "Grey died bytripping ?" This was too humiliating.
"It was worse than it sounds," Hugh said quickly, facing him again. "Gruesome. A trial, truly. So how did Grey get the drop on you?"
"I was careless, and I paid for it." He shrugged, wanting away from that subject. "What else has happened in the last five weeks? Have you gotten your marriage annulled yet?"
"No, I dinna."
Ethan exhaled. "You told me Grey died weeks ago, and you still have no' done this?"
"I'm…staying married. Jane is mine now."
"But the curse," Ethan said, scowling at this absurdity. "Your past—"
"She knows about my past, about her father, about everything. Grey was sure to reveal all to her. And of the curse…it's no' as we thought, brother. Court's gotten married to Annalía, and, well, he's to be a da."
"No. That's no' possible." Ethan grew light-headed.Never seed shall take….
Hugh shook his head. "It's true. Annalía's big with his child. I saw her myself."
"The babe's no' his."
"That's what everyone thought you'd say. Annalía's a good lass, but for your benefit, I'll tell you that Court was her first and only, and that it was just the two of them together for weeks."
Ethan had met Annalía and knew she wouldn't possibly lie about the parentage of her babe—or take another lover besides Court. But still, to have this sole development refute what they'd believed for so long? "So how do you explain why Court's never gotten a bairn on any girl before? And then he does it so quickly with her?"
"Everyone who knows about the book and what's happened agrees that the last two lines of the foretelling must say something about each son finding the woman meant for him."
This was exactly what Ethan had feared—his brothers getting their hopes up, to be crushed. And yet Ethan couldn't argue the reasoning. Many a time, he'd used the book in just such a way as this. "You believe that?"
"I do, Ethan, and I hope yo
u will, too."
"So you feel certain that I can marry and have bairns?" Ethan was unaccountably restless after hearing this news, even as he felt removed from the entire conversation, as if he were watching it instead of participating in it.
"Aye, if you find the right lass. And then you can get back to the life you're meant to lead."
"I am—"
"No, you're no'," Hugh interrupted. "You're the Earl of Kavanagh. You've got responsibilities and lands and people. You've got a title to pass down."
"Maybe I'm more satisfied in my current occupation."
"It's no' the life Da wanted for you—no' killing and being shot. And no' being alone nearly every damned day and night of your life," Hugh snapped.
"Just because you and Court have suddenly settled down does no' mean I have the same needs. I like the hunt. I like the danger."
"For how long, Ethan? You're no' getting any spryer. You bloody got tagged byGrey ."
Ah, that was low, and they both knew it. Ethan narrowed his eyes. "So you think you can just walk away from your job without looking back?"
"Aye, because now I have something to look forward to."
"Have you ever thought that you should no' be staying with Jane for reasons other than the curse, and other than your past?" Ethan demanded. "This all goes back to common bloody sense—something I'm discovering my brothers dearly lack, especially in their choices of brides." He flashed an expression of realization. "Jane's with bairn, is she no'? Apparently, it's quite easy for MacCarricks to propagate these days. That's why you are staying with her? And that's why she had to accept you."
"No, she is no' pregnant. We're waiting." At Ethan's look, Hugh hurriedly said, "No'as in abstinence."
"Waiting," Ethan said with a slow nod. "So my mercenary brother has gone off and married an excruciatingly rich heiress and gotten a babe on her, and my other brother is practicing contraception like a radical. Let me guess, her idea?"
"Ouridea. And I have thought over my marriage, Ethan. For weeks, I agonized over keeping Jane or no'. Every time I tell someone I married Jane Weyland, they laugh, thinking I'm jesting." Hugh frowned, muttering, "That's grown wearying quickly."
