Chapter Seventeen
Alyssia had never known terror could come with such wild clarity.
Being chased down a corridor by a blackguard stripped the world to a single command: move.
She flung anything she could grab in her mad dash—candlesticks, vases, a serving tray—anything to slow him.
Each crash was a tiny victory, though it bought only a breath more distance.
This was madness. Giles was in the drawing room, fighting a man twice his size, and she had abandoned him. She’d thought it the wisest choice at the time, but with every blink, she saw him falling beneath that behemoth’s fist. She did not want to imagine how this ended if they failed.
Servants surfaced, startled from sleep. “Hide!” she snapped at them. She would not let innocent blood be spilled for her name. But the ones who remained had the audacity to overturn a side table between them to slow the man down and join her in her dash. A loud curse whipped at them.
Brave fools!
You’re one to talk.
She darted into the dining room for the second time flanked by three breathless maids and one pale-faced footman, taking a spot at the far end of the table while they caught their breath. The ruffian stumbled into the room, glaring at them.
“This ends now,” the man growled.
“I beg to differ, sir,” Alyssia shot back. “This only ends one way, and that’s with you at the gallows!” Stopping here might not have been the wisest choice, but at least she wasn’t alone anymore.
They were deadlocked. The man blocked the door. Unless he moved, they couldn’t make one.
“Don’t do anything foolish,” she whispered to the servants.
They each nodded, their gazes locked on the blackguard.
Giles, where are you?
Even if he fought Zeus himself, she believed he could win. These ruffians were just following orders. But the two of them were fighting for something much more. Their lives. Their love. Deuced vengeance!
The faux duke must really be relentless and hasty.
Why else would he make choices that would make vehement enemies of men like her father and the Marquess of Knoxley?
That man inched forward. “Your husband is dead by now,” he said tauntingly. “You are all alone.”
Alyssia’s mouth went dry. For one awful heartbeat the image he painted—Giles crumpled, lifeless—blossomed in her head. Her world narrowed to that single, terrible picture.
Do not fall for it, Liss, she heard his voice in her head.
I won’t, she said back firmly.
“No,” she said to the man. “He isn’t.”
To her horror, he pulled a pistol from inside his jacket. “I saved the best for last, wench.”
Oh, God. Help.
“Don’t worry,” she said to the servants at her side. “Giles—”
The intruder jerked as if yanked by an invisible cord, then toppled face-first with a heavy, graceless thud, slamming against the table on his way down.
A voice drawled from the doorway, breathless and dark, “Did someone say my name?”
Giles!
“Intruders are dropping like apples from trees,” her husband remarked, his hot eyes finding hers.
Relief slammed through her so hard her knees nearly forgot to keep her upright.
He stood framed in the doorway like death’s own herald, knuckles split and slick with red, and his cheek blossoming in a vicious purple, one eye already puffing sinisterly.
Blood traced thin, dark lines down the stubble of his face.
A tall man entered the room behind him and snorted. “I remember dropping your apple and tying him up.”
Alyssia could breathe again, but the breath came sharp. She rushed toward Giles without thinking, hands hovering over the dreadful marks on his body. There were too many, and every bruise felt like her fault. Every bead of blood looked personal. And it deuced well was. He was her husband.
“Liss,” he gritted out. “Did you rush down here in just a robe?”
She thought the first thing he’d do was scold her, not this.
She glanced down and started at the gaping neckline, and a newfound mortification crashed into her like a boulder.
She was naked beneath the robe! Fortunately, it covered most of her, but damn well still.
Heat flooded her face. She snapped the robe closed, retying the sash so tight she nearly lost the ability to breathe.
Trust her to wage war in nothing but her husband’s robe.
She didn’t have time to inspect her husband any further. Heavy boots pounded down the corridor. Alyssia flinched, instinctively pressing closer to Giles. He shifted to shield her, arms instantly enveloping her.
“Stand down!” a loud voice barked. “Bow Street!”
Oh, thank the Lord!
They stepped aside, and a Bow Street Runner strode in, followed by the Marquess of Knoxley still in evening attire. His sharp gaze took in the toppled man then Giles.
“There’s another one in the drawing room,” Giles said.
The marquess nodded. “I saw. There’s a Runner dealing with him now.”
“Did the servants find you?” Alyssia asked the marquess.
“No. Not at first.” He nodded at Crane. “Met this one outside the masquerade with his wife, recognized him instantly as Bishop’s old employer.”
The Duke of Crane?
“I do not look like my half-brothers,” the man muttered.
“So you decided to call on me at this hour?” Giles asked. “Not that I’m complaining.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Knoxley said. “His carriage wheel broke so I offered to take them home. Who would have thought two of my servants would be running about, spot my carriage, and hail us down?” He shrugged. “I set off to Bow Street offices with one and Crane followed the other back here.”
Ah.
So she had made the right choice then. What a relief.
“Where is your wife?” Giles asked Crane.
“Sent her home,” the duke said. “She’s not allowed to set a foot in danger’s way.”
Alyssia bit back a smile. Like employer like household, it seemed. She wouldn’t be surprised if the duke’s wife kept close as well.
The Bow Street Runner crouched beside the unconscious man, retrieving the pistol. “You were all very fortunate.”
The arms around her tightened. “You weren’t hurt?” Giles asked softly.
Alyssia shook her head.
The Runner turned to Giles. “Charges will be brought against whoever sent these men.”
Giles’s mouth hardened. “I’m counting on that.”
Knoxley’s brows rose. “You are certain you wish to deal with it like this?”
“Beyond certain.”
Alyssia glanced at Giles. This meant he wouldn’t deal with it outside the bounds of law. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking he came after my wife,” Giles said, clenching his jaw. “I’m thinking his worst fears are lack of power, loss of prestige, and being shamed. Let’s give that to him.”
She nodded. “I hear Australia is terribly hot this time of year. Life is particularly hard there.”
Crane’s voice cut in, clipped as steel. “Do you go now, or do we go in the morning?”
The Runner spoke, “We’ll take statements in the morning. For now, these men are coming with us.”
Just like that?
“I have a request,” Giles suddenly said. “This one,” he pointed to the man on the carpet. “We need him for tomorrow.”
The Runner paused, then nodded.
Giles’s gaze then landed on her. “As for you and me, we need to have a nice long talk.”
Alyssia didn’t know if she should feel scared or excited.
Her inner snip snorted.
Probably both.
There were hopeless lost causes, and then there was Bishop.
What nice long talk?
He still hadn’t recovered from the nice long talk his wife had given him last night.
With her tongue.
Truly, utterly hopeless.
Bishop shelved that thought for later as he strode past the butler of his childhood home, fist clamped around the collar of the brigand who had chased Alyssia through Knox’s townhouse like a fox through hens.
How fitting that the final confrontation should take place in the dining room.
What happened to him mattered far less than what happened to her—and his uncle was about to learn precisely how merciless Bishop could be, especially before the very society the man treasured so dearly.
He marched into the dining room without pause—much as he had the first time—only now he bore bruises Alyssia had soothed mere hours ago, still aching like the devil, and he was flanked by his wife, Crane, Knoxley, and, bringing up the rear, the Bow Street Runner. Oh, and he’d hauled something with him.
“Uncle, Aunt, we meet again,” Bishop drawled, dragging the cutthroat by the collar and flinging him to the ground without ceremony. “I’ve come to return your property and request that you relinquish mine.”
Alyssia snorted behind him, a lovely sound.
“What the devil is the meaning of this?” his uncle demanded, leaping to his feet, flecks of egg flying from his lips. Disgusting. They would absolutely have to strip this house of every furnishing his uncle had soiled. Starting with this dining table.
His mother, had she been alive, would have insisted on nothing less.
His uncle’s gaze snapped to the brigand on the floor. “I have no idea who that man is.”
“Of course you don’t,” Bishop murmured. “Just as you claimed not to know who I was when I first reunited with you after so long. How singularly unfortunate for you that Bow Street disagrees.”
His aunt rose, wringing her hands. “This is absurd. How could they side with you?”
“Well, the cur who’s not here is still at Bow Street. Big devil, that one. Tight-lipped. This one, on the other hand, not so much.” Bishop nudged the man with a foot. “Is this the man who hired you?”
The blackguard looked to his uncle and nodded. “That’s him. Told us to end you and your wife.” The man spat on the ground and added, “By any means possible.”
“Do you hear that, uncle?” Bishop gave the man a hard, uncompromising look. “By any means possible.”
“This is absurd,” his uncle bellowed. “You can’t take the word of a snake!”
Alyssia scoffed. “The only snake I see is you, sir.”
“I agree,” Bishop said. “After all, what brother orders the murder of his brother?”
“I never murdered Seth!”
“Not with your own hands, no,” Bishop said. “But you did have it ordered.”
“Hearsay!”
Bishop shrugged. “Men have been doomed for less. Besides, our trusty old snake here confirmed the men’s names of that day. He was supposed to be there himself, he said, but got a wild stomach bug and sat the job out. Isn’t that right?”
The man scowled but nodded. “Right.”
“Now that that’s settled, what to do with you, Uncle?”
“You aren’t my nephew,” the man spewed, his aunt nodding along. “You’re nothing but an imposter!”
Bishop arched a brow. “Will you truly deny the heir’s existence before the very heir himself?”
He thought he’d be angrier, be furious. However, a rare form of calmness had settled over him the moment he’d stepped foot into the house.
Old wrongs were being righted here today, and these people before him, they did not even deserve a sliver of his anger, much less anything else. Hell would settle the scores with them.
His uncle paled. “You cannot prove—”
“Actually,” Crane cut in, stepping forward. “I am the one who found him twelve years ago. Half-dead.” His gaze pinned Bishop’s uncle. “I am the Duke of Crane, if you were wondering, and I back Bishop’s claim. Anything to protest to that?”
Color mottled the older man’s cheeks.
“I thought not,” Crane said smoothly.
“I back his claim as well,” Knox added, voice sharp. “You might pretend to have forgotten his face, but I, his childhood friend, remember it clearly.”
“As do I,” Alyssia announced, clasping his hand and weaving their fingers together. “He was, after all, my betrothed and,” she glanced at him, “my first and only love.”
Bishop blinked at the woman. “Now? You wish to confess this now?”
“I love you,” she said simply.
“Christ, Liss. I love you, too.” He wanted to lift her up and drag her off somewhere private.
“You!” his uncle sputtered. “You cannot simply barge in here and—and . . .”
“And what, Uncle?” Bishop snarled, squeezing his wife’s hand.
“Take what has always been mine? Tell me, why have you failed to have the title transferred after all these years? After all, I’ve been gone longer than seven years.
You already know, don’t you? Even if everyone believed I was dead, they didn’t believe in your claim. ”
“Or they simply didn’t want him to claim the title, and the power that comes with it,” Knox muttered. “Like me.”
His uncle finally lost all color.
Enough of that. “You and aunt have two choices,” Bishop said. “You either face a lifetime of imprisonment, or you face a short imprisonment while you, Aunt, and your offspring wait for a ship to dock bound for Australia.”
“Absurd! It would take weeks, months, to prove your claim.”
Bishop nodded. True. They needed to file a petition and then the committee would call witness, assess claims and all that drama.
However, “Since you’ve proven yourself a threat to my wife and my livelihood, Bow Street will keep you in irons until they are finished. It will all be so very . . . public.”
The words landed like a hundred satisfying lashes.
For a moment, his uncle’s mouth worked and found no shape for denial.
His face took on all shapes of rottenness.
His aunt clutched her throat, and they shared a look, one filled with degrees of panic, and in that flash, Bishop saw every last thing he had wanted: dread of what was to come.
Ah. There it was.
Not the hot, animal hunger of blood. Not a clumsy form of revenge.
This—a slow, public unmaking—was cleaner and much more exquisite.
He felt the pleasure of it in his bones, a satisfaction so complete that torturing them in a cellar would have felt petty by comparison.
To watch the man who’d taken his parents’ lives and names shrink beneath his gaze with no hope—this was a justice that would last.
He smiled as Bow Street stepped forward.
Public, final, undeniable.
The end of a chapter.