Page 99 of The Virgin Who Humbled Lord Haslemere
No farther than the main house, at any rate.
She hurried from the stables and crossed to the drive that led toward the kitchen door at the back, her gaze once again on the windows, still staring blindly down at her just as they had before. Except this time Benedict was behind one of them, and he wasn’t going to be pleased if he saw her coming toward the house—
She stopped, a frown on her lips as her gaze landed on a window on thesecond floor.
Was that…?
She thought she’d caught a glimpse of something moving behind it—a flutter of the drapes, or a shadow, perhaps? Before she could make out what it was, it disappeared. She waited, but she’d either imagined it, or whatever had been there was now gone.
Georgiana hurried toward the house, but she hadn’t taken more than a few steps before pausing again, her gaze drawn once more to a flicker of movement at the window. She shaded her eyes with her hand and squinted up at it, just in time to see it shiver in its frame,as if it were—
“Dear God.”
The horrified whisper had hardly left her lips before a deafening crash rent the air. Jagged glass exploded outward and plunged two stories down, shattering on the ground below.
Georgiana gaped in disbelief at the place where the window had been seconds before, her brain sluggish with shock. For a moment she could only stare dumbly between the heap of glittering shards on the ground and the gaping hole above, struggling to make sense of whatshe was seeing.
Two men were grappling in front of the broken window, their furious shouts echoing in the clear morning air. Georgiana stared up at them, her heart leaping into her throat. She’d seen men fight, but never before had she seen anything like this. One man had the other by the throat, trying to squeeze the life out of him, and the second man was struggling to shove the first oneout the window.
Benedict and Kenilworth, each of them intent on killing the other.
A sound left Georgiana’s mouth, either a scream or a whimper. She didn’t know which, nor was she aware that she was running, flying across the drive, a spray of pebbles at her heels and words on her lips, aplea, a prayer…
The kitchen door was unlocked—thank God, thank God—and she burst through it, only dimly aware that it was empty, with Mrs. Ellery nowhere to be seen, and no fire in the huge stone fireplace. She darted around the corner and up a flight of narrow stairs to a dusty entryway dominated by a sweeping staircase surrounded by dark paneling, with a massive bannisterof carved wood.
She must have run up the stairs, but she was aware only of the pounding of her heart, her desperate heaving breaths echoing in her ears, and the other sounds—another crash of glass, the dull thump of fists pounding flesh, a man’s grunt of pain, all of it growing louder as she neared the second-floor landing. A few steps from the door she heard Benedict’s voice, low and furious, and the duke’s, louder and mocking, and a woman, her voice high-pitched and panicked, and the sounds of a scuffle, the heavy crunch of boots over broken glass.
Georgiana tried to prepare herself for what she’d find when she crossed the threshold, to brace herself for the nightmare she was certain was waiting for her on the other side of that door, but when she got there she stumbled to a halt, a scream trappedin her throat.
There was no way to brace yourself, no way to prepare forthis.
There was shattered glass everywhere—fragments scattered across the floor or ground to a glittering powder, wicked-looking shards standing like a row of jagged teeth in the window frame, and—
Blood.
Benedict’s hands were covered with blood, his shirt sleeve soaked with it from a slash on his upper arm, and streaming down his face from a jagged cut on his forehead.
Georgiana stared at him in horror, her heart trappedin her throat.
If Benedict noticed her in the doorway, he gave no sign of it. All his attention was focused on Kenilworth, who was clutching a bloody shard of glass in his hand. The two men circled each other warily, mere steps away from the open window, each waiting for their chance to strike.
“You’re never going to see Jane or Freddy again, Kenilworth.” Benedict circled closer, forcing Kenilworth to back up, closer to the gaping hole.
One stumble, a single misstep, a push at the right time and the right angle, and one of them was going to fall through it. Georgiana knew it, felt it in the deepest part of herself where her most unspeakable nightmares lived.
Please, please don’t letit be Benedict—
“How do you intend to stop me, Haslemere?” Kenilworth laughed, but it was a mockery of one, twisted and ugly. “Jane is mywife, and Freddy my son. Theybelongto me, and there’s not a damn thing you can do to change that.”
“No?” Benedict bared his teeth in a savage grin. “The English courts don’t take kindly to bigamists, Kenilworth, even if they do happen to be dukes. Your marriage to Jane is illegal, and will be dissolved as soon as your crime is discovered. I wonder what all your London admirers will think, to see the great Duke of Kenilworth brought so low?”
Kenilworth tutted, as if disappointed. “Do you truly think a worthless rake like you is going to be the one to bring my secrets to light? I’ve kept them for six long years, Haslemere. It’ll take a cleverer man than youto expose me.”
Kenilworth lunged forward suddenly, slashing with the shard of glass in his hand. Georgiana’s heart dropped as the jagged edge came within inches of Benedict’s wrist, but he jumped back just in time, out of Kenilworth’s reach. He dragged a hand over his forehead, and his sleeve came away drenched with blood. “Half a dozen people know what you’ve done, Kenilworth. Do you intend to kill us all?”
“No, just you, Haslemere, and Draven, of course. He doesn’t look like he’s in much of a condition to defend himself, does he?”
Kenilworth jerked his head toward the bed. Georgiana followed the gesture, and for the first time noticed the dark-haired housemaid—Rachel, or Clara—was there, her body between Kenilworth and the bed in which Lord Draven lay, pale and haggard, but very much awake.
