Chapter 23 #2
“Are we?” Kit asked Cassian, his eyes flashing with unrepressed anger. “Are we truly guests here, or am I here only so you can show me how successful your revenge has been? My sister is now your wife. You are doing well. Why do you need me to see all this?”
“I invited you because my wife, your sister, believes you are still worth saving from the wreckage of your life. I have disagreed with her, but I have been persuaded by how I value her happiness.”
Kit laughed sarcastically. He was not there to follow any proper etiquette. He was unhappy and deeply suspicious. “Is that what we are calling this estate? A place where my sister can be truly happy? A cage with better, more lavish furniture.”
“At least we have furniture. And actual staff, too,” Cassian added, reminding everyone of how the Hawthornes’ lifestyle had fallen into hard times and disarray.
“Stonevale is now my home, Kit,” Juliana said, even as her voice trembled with hurt and the persistent effort to keep the peace between the two men she cared for.
“I want you to be part of our family as we try to raise one of our own. Cassian has even agreed to help you deal with the dangerous people after you.”
Kit’s hand froze over his glass. He looked from his sister to his former friend, his eyes no longer suspicious but horrified.
“Help me? Is this some kind of jest? I do not want your help. In fact, I do not think you can help me. You have already helped me enough when you married my sister.”
“You sold me, Kit,” Juliana reminded him, even though she did not want a fight. Kit had a tendency to act like a spoiled child, thinking only of his own feelings.
Juliana might have wanted to kick either man, but they were seated too far from her. She was trying so hard not to behave terribly, yet her temper was getting the better of her. Why could Kit not understand that he had damaged his friendship, perhaps irreparably, by hurting Marta?
When is he going to acknowledge his errors?
“I did not,” Kit grunted. “I… I was desperate. I am sorry, Juliana. I might have said those things to get the creditors off my back, but I would never have let that man touch you. Or any man, for that matter. I did not know Stonevale would take it upon himself to marry you, and you do not have to suffer another minute of it.”
“Kit, Cassian and I have been married for months now. That is final. It cannot simply be undone unless you want me to see myself ruined,” she said softly, feeling the gravity of her words.
It was true. That was her life now: hoping for a successful marriage to a man who hated her brother so everything would not fall apart.
“One day, we will have children of our own, and I… I think they should know their uncle.”
Kit jumped up from his chair as if he had a spring beneath him. His eyes looked wide and half-mad.
“Children? Did you dare touch my sister?” he asked in rage.
“Well, that is what happens when a couple marries,” Cassian replied dryly, perusing the pot roast and greens on his plate.
“I believe that much is clear. Two becoming one, and all. But I suppose you do not know that, since you defiled my sister before walking her to the altar. You did not even have the morality to do it belatedly.”
“What? How dare you say that? You know nothing about what happened between Marta and me!” Kit bellowed, red in the face.
“I do not? It is clear as day. You were in charge of Marta, took advantage of her, ruined her, and got her with child while I was at the hospital. Then you left her when you found out she was pregnant!”
The words landed in the dining hall like a stone dropped into still water.
Juliana did not know whether it was idle anger or something boiling inside her brother, waiting to be let out, but things quickly got out of hand.
Kit climbed onto the table, heedless of the crystal, the plates, or the rather ambitious flower arrangement the staff had placed in the center.
He launched himself off the edge at Cassian, who sidestepped just enough that Kit’s fist caught only air.
The momentum carried Kit stumbling forward, and as Cassian moved to catch him, his elbow struck the edge of the table, sending the flower arrangement toppling sideways into Lady Hawthorne’s lap.
Then Cassian lost his balance and hit the floor, and Juliana screamed.
“Kit! Have you lost your senses? Leave him alone!”
But her brother no longer seemed to hear her.
Kit was too far gone. He threw himself down after Cassian, with the full commitment of a man who had wanted to do exactly this for years.
They grappled on the floor, Kit’s legs kicking the table legs with a series of hollow thuds that rattled what remained of the crockery.
A fork slid off the edge. A wine glass followed.
The Dowager Duchess cried out in outrage.
“Stop it, you two!” she screamed, bringing her fan down on the table with a crack that made everyone flinch, except the two men on the floor.
Meanwhile, Lady Hawthorne had pressed herself back against her chair, making small sounds of helplessness and clutching her reticule as though it might offer protection.
“Oh, do stop that dreadful noise, Honoria!” the Dowager Duchess snapped at her. “If you cannot be useful, at least be quiet!”
Lady Hawthorne’s chin came up. “I beg your pardon! I will not be spoken to in such a manner by some powder-faced harridan in blue silk!”
The Dowager Duchess drew herself up to her full seated height, which was considerable. “Powder-faced!” she repeated, in a tone of such icy precision that Juliana took a small, involuntary step back. “How dare you!”
What followed was the inevitable consequence of two proud women who had sat stiffly across from one another all evening, with a great deal to say and nowhere appropriate to say it. Lady Hawthorne reached for the bread basket. The Dowager Duchess seized what remained of the flower arrangement.
“Oh, I dare to do more than that!”
Lady Hawthorne threw a roll at the Dowager Duchess with considerably more force than anyone had anticipated. It struck her squarely in the coiffure, knocking a pin loose. A curl drooped over her left eye.
The Dowager Duchess looked at her.
Then she picked up the flower arrangement and threw it at her.
It was not a precise throw. Greenery landed in Kit’s wine glass. A peony hit Lady Hawthorne in the mouth. She pulled it out, set it on the table, and reached for the salt. The Dowager Duchess ducked, came back up with her spectacles askew, and reached for the butter dish.
Both women seemed to have forgotten about the two men fighting on the floor.
All Juliana could do was cover her mouth with both hands.
“It is your fault that Marta is dead!” Kit yelled at Cassian, even as the two rolled on the floor in what looked like a tiring, futile fight.
And there it was.
Cassian stopped fighting. He went still, in the way of someone who has been trained not to react, and who is now using every scrap of that training. His breathing remained even. His expression revealed nothing.
But Juliana saw his hand close slowly into a fist against the floor.
Then, with a quiet and deliberate calm that was somehow more alarming than any amount of shouting, he hit Kit square on the jaw.
Kit’s head snapped back. He rose from the floor, cradling his jaw, staggering a little, blinking as if surprised to find himself upright. He shook his head once, and then the reckless look returned to his eyes, and Juliana’s stomach dropped.
Kit’s eyes were fixed on Cassian. Something resolute and ugly passed over his face.
“This is for Marta’s death,” he muttered, drawing his arm back.
“Kit, stop! Everyone, just stop!”
The word tore out of Juliana before she had thought a single thing.
“Marta is not dead! Marta is alive!”
Everyone froze.