Page 88 of Cold November Rake

Cold air rushed in. He pitched his cousin out into the yard, and Everly stumbled over the cobbles, going down on one knee in the slush.

"Here. You are let go, just as you asked," he said.

Everly just laughed.

"Mr. Everly is no longer welcome in this house," Sutton said, addressing a footman before him, but loudly enough for the whole kitchen to hear. "Not tonight, not ever. No one is to open this door to him. Is that understood?"

"Yes, my lord," the footman said with a nod.

"Pass the message along."

He shut the door and turned the key himself. Then he went back to the maid, who was still in the corridor, her hands shaking.

"Are you hurt?"

"No, my lord. Thank you, my lord," she stammered.

"Mrs. Higgins," he called.

She appeared at his elbow, saw the trembling maid, and her face softened in concern. "Is something the matter?"

"Give her a few hours of rest tonight; she's suffered enough."

"Of course, my lord."

Sutton glanced at the back door he'd thrown Everly out of.

If Everly was behind the murder attempts, he would likely escalate now, after being humiliated.

Temperance, he immediately thought. He would want to hurt Temperance.

He needed to find her.

He stalked into the drawing room, scanning it in search of his wife. The room was abuzz with conversation and card games. The evening seemed a success, but there was no sign of his wife.

Whitlow approached him with a glass of wine. He opened his mouth to speak, but Sutton interrupted him.

"Where is Temperance?"

"You did not meet with her?" Whitlow frowned. "She was looking for you. I thought I saw you go toward the gardens, so that is where I sent her. I may have been mistaken. She is probably still out there."

Sutton's blood ran cold. Everly, shoved out the back door, could easily find his way into the garden.

Without a word to Whitlow, he rushed back to the hall, through the French doors, and into the garden.

Faint voices drifted from somewhere behind the hedges; he followed them.

Temperance stood in a lamplit patch at the end of the path. Landen stood before her. Her hands were in his, and a smile lit her face.

His entire being stilled.

Something in Sutton's chest cracked, quietly and completely, like ice on a pond.

He had caught them much like this seven years ago in another garden, her hands in his. Only then, tears had streamed down her face, and her words to him were forever imprinted on Sutton's mind:

I will never love anyone the way I love you.

And then she had kissed him.