The Duke of Hearts (The Highwaymen #2)

Chapter Fourteen

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

ARTHFORD WASN’T EVEN allowed into Marjorie’s sitting room. She met him at the door, just inside her house, and she was carrying a pistol. She tucked it into the belt that held up her trousers and said, “It turns out I don’t need you at all .”

He blinked at her. “What are you talking about?”

“Well, I think Champeraigne’s men were simply watching and waiting for you to leave. They struck as soon as you were gone. But I got rid of them.”

“How did you do that?”

“I threatened them with this gun, and then I shot off one of their kneecaps,” she said. “The servants and I are prepared. I have armed all of the men in my stables and the Cook besides. We are shooting at targets every afternoon. We are ready. So, as it happens, I don’t need anything from you.”

He squared his shoulders. “I wasn’t aware that was the only reason I was here with you.”

“Perhaps I wasn’t either,” she said. “But it’s cleaner this way. I feel safer knowing I can protect myself. And I think, no matter what there is between us, I shall always feel as if there is some element of obligation between us.”

“Well, no, because you’ve just said that there isn’t, and you don’t need me,” he said. “I am impressed, in fact, and you’re rather ravishing with a gun, and I’d be lying if I wasn’t thinking about how I might like us to bring it—unloaded, of course—to bed with us.”

She scoffed.

“Marjorie, you said you’d marry me.”

“I’ve changed my mind.”

“I came back. You thought I wouldn’t come back—”

“You came back out of obligation.”

“I…” But then he didn’t finish the sentence, because he was thinking of that stupid conversation with Nothshire, how she “needed” him and here she was, saying the exact opposite. And he was thinking about how he did wish to be worth something to a woman, and he was beginning to wonder if he was worth anything to her.

All that talk of society and balls and the pressures of being his duchess, the pressures of being forced to be around men who had participated in her debauchery.

Was he any good to her at all?

Hadn’t he thought, all along, she’d be better off without him? Hadn’t he truly taken sincere advantage of her?

“Obligation,” she said, “or possibly guilt. Because you feel as if you have used me badly or some such notion, and you wish to make up for that by marrying me, as if being your wife is something I even want.”

All of the air left his lungs in a defeated whoosh. He bowed his head. Well, he had been foolish, hadn’t he? This felt rather familiar, actually. This felt quite a great deal like certain conversations he’d had with Seraphine. She had never needed him. Marjorie didn’t need him. He was doomed to fall for women who, in fact, did not need him. And really, what did he even have to offer?

“I don’t need that from you,” she said. “I don’t need anything from you.”

He lifted his head and looked deeply into her eyes. “Why would you, indeed?”

She flinched. “I didn’t mean… it’s not that you aren’t… you’re a damnable duke, you don’t need me to make you feel important.”

“I am not actually important at all, Miss Adams, something I am painfully aware of.” He gave her a tight smile. “I am so very sorry for taking up so much of your time.”

He left.

THE BANDITS DID not come back.

Marjorie felt quite secure in her ability to protect Briar Abbey, and time passed.

Weeks went by, in fact, and she thought too much about Arthford.

She got into a conversation with her maid about it, actually, and her maid was too polite to say that she had been an idiot, but Marjorie got the impression that the woman thought that she had been.

To her maid’s way of thinking, the world was simply one way. Certain people had power and influence. Other people didn’t. The people without it had to seek protection from the people who did.

And Marjorie could understand why the maid would think that way. Truly, she should never have had the opportunity to protect a house like this, or to be its mistress, or to have this kind of independence and freedom. Other women didn’t get such opportunities.

And didn’t the nature of things seem to dictate that women must seek protection from men, not only because women were less physically strong than men but because women were often with child or burdened with helpless babes? If she had been a she-bear, off in the woods, she would have had claws, and she could have fought off anyone who had attempted to harm her and those she cared about.

She, however, was a human.

Of course, she did have a gun. Certainly, guns equalized everything.

Of course, if she were a she-bear, protecting her young, there would have had to been some kind of male bear somewhere in her past to have put the child into her, wouldn’t there have been? She didn’t have any young or anyone, really.

Yes, she was quite safe now. Entirely safe. And she could rely on herself and didn’t have to rely on a man.

But.

She was lonely.

She remembered those stupid conversations about whether God existed or not, and she missed him. She lay in her bed, all alone and thought of his hands on her, of the way it had felt to burrow into his large, hairy chest, and she missed him.

She hated missing him, because it was weakness.

But she was beginning to realize that driving all the weakness out of her would be driving other things out, too, and she wasn’t sure what was left, now. Maybe she was only hollow.

However, she wasn’t sure that she’d started this hollowing out process herself. She thought perhaps her father had. Of all the men in the world, he was the one she should have been able to trust implicitly. He should have cared for her welfare higher than anything else. He should never have put her in danger.

And he had.

So, how was she supposed to fill up that hollow part inside of her and welcome anyone into her life? She didn’t even know how to trust a man.

And then, one day, Champeraigne arrived.

The servants let him into a sitting room, but when she heard it was him, she sent back word to turn him out, to tell him she would not see him.

She wasn’t going to play that game with that man.

She stood upstairs, gazing out the window. She would watch him leave.

Only, he did not. And after several moments, a servant returned to tell her that Champeraigne had refused to leave.

She loaded her pistol. She descended the steps. She walked into the sitting room, following the barrel, like she’d done that night before with the bandits he’d sent.

“I want you out of my house,” she said by way of greeting.

He was seated in an easy chair and he got to his feet, slowly, smiling at her. “Well, well, look at you. I see the reports of your resourcefulness have not been exaggerated.”

“I will shoot you,” she said. “I will shoot you now.”

“Here? In the sitting room? You’ll have quite a mess on your hands,” he said blithely. “This entire rug will be ruined, and perhaps this chair as well. You’d be surprised how far the bits of brain matter will spatter if you shoot a man at close range. Have you ever shot a man to death, Miss Adams?” His smile widened.

Her hands were starting to shake. “This isn’t a joke.”

“I know that. You are very, very serious. And you must know, I respect it. What you did before, with the men I sent, I found it quite laudable. If it were only about you, I would let it all go. When men are afraid for their lives, they demand ever so much money to continue a job, and I’m not willing to pay it. So, if it were simply about you, Miss Adams, I would leave you here. But it seems you may be the best way to get at the Duke of Arthford, so…” He shrugged. “I apologize.”

“What does this have to do with him?” she said.

“I’ll be happy to explain,” said Champeraigne. “Put down the gun, have the servants bring some refreshments, and we’ll talk.”

“No.” She drew in a breath, took careful aim, and pulled the trigger.

The gun jerked in her arms, which she had been prepared for, but she was badly unnerved by this man, and she’d been holding the gun for too long, and she’d somehow lost some of her sureness and with it, her aim.

It wasn’t a bad shot. It actually winged him, cutting into his neck, and he swore and put a hand to the wound. But it did no real damage.

And she, of course, had to reload if she wished to shoot again, and that meant powder, and another ball, and a ramrod. She hadn’t brought any of those things— idiotically , she now realized.

She tried to back out of the room.

He ran across the room, still clutching his bleeding neck. He moved very fast for an old man. Too quickly, he was on top of her.

She tried to sidestep, but she only tripped and fell. She landed on her backside.

He brought down that cane of his into her midsection.

She shrieked, doubling in on herself, the pain going all through her like the icy blast of a winter wind.

He kicked the gun out of her hand, and then flung himself down on her, knee digging into her sternum. He bared his teeth as he looked into her face. “Don’t move, Miss Adams. I should hate to have to really hurt you.”

The devil take this man. She summoned all her strength and vaulted up into him, going for that awful face of his. She clawed at him, clawed at him in the way she’d wished to before, going right for his eyes.

He backed away, flailing, letting out another string of swear words.

She looked about for a weapon. Should she pick up the gun again, worthless as it was in its current state?

The moment of hesitation cost her. She should have fled. She should have shut him in the room and then—

But he tossed the cane up into the air, caught it and hit her across the face with the handle of it.

Her entire face exploded in pain. She staggered backwards, colliding with the wall.

He put a hand against her throat, pinning her there, and he used his other hand to unscrew the cane and take out the blade within. He put that to her throat.

She whimpered.

“Out,” he said tightly. “We’re going out of the room, and you will tell the servants to stand down and to do whatever it is that I say, or I shall cut your throat. My plan was not to kill you, Miss Adams, but it might serve my purposes even better if you were dead. I’d have to blame that act on Lilsbin, of course, but it would motivate Simon quite, quite well, I think.”

Her head was pounding. Her ribs ached. Blood trickled down her face from where he’d struck her with the cane. She had no choice but to do as he bid her.