No Good Duke Goes Unpunished (19 page)

She pushed the thought away.

He was not for winning. Certainly not by her.

She didn’t deserve him.

Now, after this, he would be rid of her.

Temple turned to her, pushing her back to the ropes. “Temple,” she said quietly, not knowing how she would finish.

This wasn’t my plan.

I didn’t know he was here.

Win.

He didn’t look at her. It was as though she didn’t exist. And in that moment, nothing else mattered. All she wanted was for him to see her. All she wanted was to go back. To the dressmaker. To the night on the street outside his home. To twelve years earlier.

All she wanted was to change it.

“Temple,” she said, again, wishing his name said all of it.

He ignored her, lifting her over the ropes and passing her down to the Marquess of Bourne standing on the other side. Bourne caught her and held her, keeping her safe from the throngs around them. “He should kill you for setting him up.”

Dear God. They couldn’t possibly think she’d planned this.

He
couldn’t possibly.

Except, it was precisely what she would have thought, if the situation was reversed.

And she and Temple were two sides to the same coin.

She would tell him everything once he’d won. All of it. From the beginning. She would tell him that the money belonged to the orphanage. That she fought for the boys, and nothing else. That she did not wish him ill.

That she wished him to win.

But for now, she had no choice but to watch the bout. Temple faced Kit—faced her—and she saw that this was nothing like the fight with Drake. There was emotion in his eyes this time. Anger. Fury.

More.

He dragged his foot through the sawdust in a powerful, undeniable beginning.

Or perhaps it was an end.

The fight began, and even now, Temple followed his own rules. Allowing Kit the first move. Her brother grabbed at Temple with vicious intensity, landing a blow to the eye.

She hadn’t expected the sound of flesh on bone, the way fists fell with hollow thuds. The way knuckles slapped against bone. The sound turned her stomach as she watched Temple take first one hit, then another, then a third. And then, as though he’d been counting the blows, offering them for free before forcing her brother to pay for them, he came at Kit the way she’d always heard he fought.

His fists landed like thunder, pummeling Kit’s abdomen and sides, until her brother turned from the assault, taking a moment to find his breath. To find his strength. And went at Temple again.

Perhaps he was named because he was built like stone, impenetrable. Unbeatable. As though the world could come to an end, and Temple alone would survive. His fists rained down upon her brother. Jabbing and crossing and cutting until Kit fell away, coming to rest on the ropes mere inches from her, one eye nearly shut from the blows.

She might hate him at times. He might no longer be the boy she’d known—the one she’d left—but he was still her brother. And she did not wish him dead. She pled with him. “Kit! Stop this! He’ll kill you!”

He met her gaze, and she expected to see pain or regret or surprise there . . . but instead, she saw something unexpected. Hatred. “You chose him.”

She shook her head, instinctively. “No.” It wasn’t true. Was it? She’d chosen the boys. She’d chosen their safety.

And then . . . somehow, she’d chosen Temple.

The thought shocked her. Dear God. Had she chosen him?

Would he allow it? Her gaze flickered to him, coming at them. Coming to fetch Kit. Temple’s eyes found hers instead. Cold. Hard.

Betrayed.

She hated that look. Couldn’t face it. Turned back to her brother, who smiled, the way he always had when they were children and he was about to do something that they would enjoy, but that would no doubt earn him a beating from their father.

And then he reached for the floor of the ring.

For her knife.

She saw the gleam of silver before anyone else.

Mara gasped and screamed out, “No!”

But it was too late. He went at Temple without finesse—with sheer, unmitigated force.

Her gaze flew to Temple, who was not watching Kit.

He was watching her.

Dear God.

“He’ll kill you!” The same words, now with a different meaning. “No!” She was a madwoman, breaking free of Bourne’s grasp and pushing toward the ring, grasping at the ropes, trying to get to Temple.

Trying to save him.

The words were lost in the roar of the crowd, in the way they seethed and barked and howled like dogs on the hunt for blood.

Kit gave it to them.

The knife landed hard and deep in Temple’s chest, blood blooming from it like a perverse blossom.

She froze at the sight, halfway into the ring as someone caught her by the waist, pulling her back with wicked strength. She didn’t notice her scream until it was out and earsplitting.

And, for the first time since he’d taken to the ring twelve years earlier, the Killer Duke fell.

She couldn’t stop watching, unable to tear her gaze from the awkward angle of his legs and the river of blood pouring from him, spreading dark and ominous over the sawdust on the floor. A tall, ginger-haired man was in the ring then, on his knees at Temple’s side, stripping off his coat, barking orders, bending over to inspect the wound.

And then Mara couldn’t see at all, her view blocked by the dozen men already in the ring, trying to get to him. Each eager to be the first to make the call.

“He’s dead!”

“No,” she whispered, refusing to believe it.

What had she done?

Temple was too strong, too big,
too alive
for it to be true. She struggled against the arms holding her in an iron grip, desperate to be free. Desperate to get to him. To prove the words wrong. “No. It can’t be true.”

The arms around her tight almost to the point of pain. Bourne’s voice was a vicious promise at her ear. “You shall pay dearly if it is.”

Chapter 12

T
he men of The Fallen Angel stood watch over their fallen comrade.

It had taken three men to carry Temple from the ring—Bourne; Asriel; and Cross, the club’s financier—and the trio was winded when they barreled through the great steel door into Temple’s private rooms—the place he had crafted for quiet and peace.

They’d cleared the large, low table, and lay him on it before lighting every candle in the room. Without needing to be asked, Asriel left in search of hot water, linen, and a surgeon, though there was no promise that a surgeon could help. There was no promise that anyone but God himself could help. And to the owners of The Fallen Angel, God had rarely taken kindly.

Cross moved with quick, economical precision to investigate the wound. “Stay awake, you heavy bastard. You’re too big to fall.”

Temple struggled. “I shouldn’t be here,” he said, his thoughts clouded and his tongue heavy. “I’ve a fight.” Cross angled one of Temple’s arms outward to test the location of the knife and Temple bowed off the pallet at the pain, fighting the movement.

“You’ve had a fight,” Justin, the club’s majordomo, said quietly from a few feet away. “You’ve had two.”

Temple shook his head, the movement loose, like a broken doll, a sign of delirium. “No. He’s run the dice too far this time. Too long. There are too many of them.”

Bourne came to hold him down, swearing harshly. “That was a long time ago, Temple. Years. We don’t run dice on the streets anymore.”

The door to the room opened, and neither man looked toward the sound. This room was as secure as if the King himself were here, clinging to life. If someone were entering, it was because they had access to the darkest secrets of the club.

“Justin, get back to the floor.” Chase had arrived. “We do not stop the fleecing of the aristocracy simply because Temple’s suffered a flesh wound.”

Bourne cut Chase a wicked look. “It took you long enough to get here.”

“I was the only one who remembered that we have a club to run. Where will Temple be if we bankrupt ourselves while he convalesces?”

Cross did not look up from the knife. “This is more than a flesh wound.”

Temple struggled against his partners’ hold. “I have to get to the fight! Bourne can’t beat them!”

“We beat them together,” Bourne said quietly, his face pale with frustration and worry. “We fought them together.”

Temple’s eyes shot open and he met Bourne’s gaze. “We will lose.”

Bourne shook his head. “Not with the devil on our side. Chase came.”

“I saved your ass then,” Chase said, leaning in, something catching in the words—something the founder of the Angel would never dream of admitting to. “I saved it then, just as we shall save it now.”

Temple shook his head. “I have to fight . . .” The words faded away, and he went limp on the pallet.

Bourne turned instantly to Cross, his voice gravel. “Is he—”

Cross shook his head. “No. Passed out.” He inspected the place where the knife was buried deep in Temple’s chest, thick and deep halfway between shoulder and breast. “It might not be fatal.”

The words lacked conviction.

“As none of us are doctors,” Bourne said, “you’ll forgive me if I am not comforted by your diagnosis.”

“It might be muscle. Nerve.”

“Pull it out.”

Cross shook his head. “We don’t know what that would do. We don’t know if it would—” He stopped, and the words rang in the room despite his not saying them.
Kill him faster.

Chase swore, low and furious.

“Justin?” Cross called and the pit boss pushed his spectacles high on his nose, waiting for the order. “Summon the surgeon. And my wife.” The Countess of Harlow’s knowledge of human anatomy was impressive, and she was the closest they had to a doctor if the surgeon weren’t nearby.

Chase spoke low and dark. “And get me everything there is to know about Christopher Lowe.”

Bourne looked to Chase. “I presume he’s gone?”

“Lost in the fray tonight.”

Bourne swore, harsh and wicked. “How?”

“Security was so concerned about Temple, they forgot that their job was to protect the exits. I shall have all their heads. Every damn one.”

“They care for him,” Cross said.

A golden brow rose. “Interesting, that. Considering they could have captured his killer if they weren’t all wailing like banshees. They shall answer to me for behaving like children who lost their sweets.”

“You’re a cold bastard,” Cross said.

Chase ignored the words, instead turning to Bourne. “What happened to you?”

A bruise was blossoming on Bourne’s face, coloring his right eye socket black. Bourne scowled. “I would prefer not to discuss it.”

Chase did not seem to mind. “Where’s the girl?”

“Locked in Prometheus, where she belongs.”

Chase nodded. “Good. Let her think on what she’s done.”

“What do you plan to do with her?”

The founder of the Angel stood over Temple, watching his shallow breath, the barely-there rise and fall of his massive chest, the way his normally brown skin had gone sallow under the threat of death. “I shall kill her myself if he dies. With pleasure.”

“Lowe thought she’d betrayed him,” Bourne said.

“She tricked us all.” Chase did not look up. “I did not think she had it in her.”

Cross raised a brow. “She faked her death and blamed him for it.”

The door opened again, and Philippa, Lady Harlow entered, out of breath, spectacles askew, Asriel on her heels with hot water and linens.

Pippa ignored everyone in the room, heading straight for Cross, touching her husband’s shoulder in a fleeting expression of comfort. After Cross lifted her hand and pressed a kiss to her knuckles, she turned her attention to Temple, running her fingers along his shoulder and down the skin to the place where the hilt of Lowe’s knife protruded, perverse and unnatural.

She pressed at the flesh and Temple groaned.

“You hurt him,” Chase said, warning in the words.

Pippa did not look back. “That he can feel pain—that he can protest it—is a good thing. It indicates consciousness.” She turned to her husband. “The surgeon left once the first fight was complete. They’ve sent several men to search for him, but we mustn’t wait. You must pull it out. Straight and true. We must treat this wound before—”

She stopped. No one in the room needed hear the rest.

“And if it’s somehow keeping him from bleeding out?” Chase asked.

“If that’s the case,” Pippa said, her tone turning gentle, “then we prolong the inevitable.”

“Lady Harlow, while I am certain that you are exceedingly competent in all areas of science,” Chase said, “you will forgive me for questioning your skill as a doctor.”

Pippa paused, looking to Cross. Waiting.

“In light of the current circumstance, I shall ignore the tone you’ve taken with my wife,” Cross said. “We cannot wait for the surgeon. It could be hours.”

Chase swore, the reveal of emotion from one so stoic harsh and unsettling for the rest in the room.

“He won’t die,” Bourne said, the words half vow, half prayer. “He’s Temple. Stronger than all of us. Haler. Christ. He’s big as an ox. Unbeatable.”

Except, he had been beaten.

“Bring me the girl,” Chase said.

Cross was simple and direct. “No.”

Bourne was more colorful. “Over my rotting corpse does that bitch gain access to this room.”

Chase did not rise to the anger. “She will see what she’s done to him.”

“I would prefer she
experience
what she’s done to him.”

Chase looked to Asriel. “Bring me the girl.”

Asriel did not hesitate again. Chase’s will was done.

“You watch her. She’s as likely as her brother was to take a knife to any one of us.” Bourne lifted his hand to his eye. “And she’s got a surprising right cross.”

Pippa looked to him. Her wide eyes blinked once behind her spectacles and Bourne resisted the urge to fidget. “She hit you.”

“I wasn’t expecting it.”

Cross couldn’t resist. “I don’t imagine you were.”

He returned his attention to Temple’s wide expanse, watching as Pippa cleaned around the knife, her task Sisyphean—blood blossoming anew with every swipe.

After long moments, she said, without looking up, “You can’t plan to reveal yourself to her.”

Chase looked to her. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

“She can’t know who you are,” Cross agreed with his wife. “She’s not to be trusted.”

Pippa brought a clean cloth to Temple’s brow as they all watched, wiping away the sweat and sawdust that clung to him from the ring.

Bourne spoke, “If she knew . . .”

The words trailed off, completion unnecessary.

If Mara—if anyone aside from a trusted few—knew Chase’s true identity, the Angel would be in peril.

And the Angel’s peril belonged to them all.

T
here was a gruesome painting of Prometheus on the wall of Mara’s prison cell. A torture scene.

The hero lay prone, chained on his back to a rock, his face a portrait of agony as Zeus, in the form of a wicked black eagle, tore at his flesh. Punishing him for insolence. For stealing fire from the gods. For thinking he could beat them.

It was a terrifying piece, enormous and threatening, no doubt designed to make those who defied the Angel aware of the consequences of their actions and amenable to confession.

A vision flashed, Temple collapsed on the floor of the ring, the life spilling from him as she screamed.

Kit had stabbed him. With her knife.

Fire from the gods.

The door opened and she turned, her words out before she could stop them. “The duke. He lives?”

Temple’s second, the man who had stood sentry outside the orphanage, tall and broad with skin dark as midnight, did not reply, instead silently indicating that she should walk ahead of him into the dark hallway with a seriousness that suggested it would be a mistake to push him for an answer or to ignore his instructions.

He’d clearly been trained by Temple.

Heart pounding, she did as she was bid, and as she passed him, he did speak, his voice low and gruff. “Try nothing.”

She wanted to tell him she wouldn’t. That she hated what had happened. That, had she known it would come to pass, she would have done everything in her power to stop it. That even at her most angry, she’d never intended to hurt Temple. But she knew the words would be futile and their meaning mistaken for lie or worse. And so, instead, she held herself straight and tall and made her way past him into the dimly lit hallway.

The corridor was lined with men and women in a variety of uniforms—from livery to lady of the evening—each face pale with shadow and concern. Each gaze hot with loathing.

She longed for the mask that had been taken from her after the fight.

They watched her with angry eyes as she made her way through the already unsettling passageways designed to overpower with their size and curvature—designed to make it exceedingly clear to all who passed who held the power. Designed to dissuade Prometheus from thinking he might fare well in his quest.

“I hope you’re taking ’er to Chase,” one of the women said, blond and beautiful and filled with vitriol. “I hope ’e plans to deal with ’er.”

A murmur of agreement rolled through the too-small space at the suggestion, and a man nearby added, “She deserves everything Temple got.”

“She deserves more,” a wicked shout came from behind her, and Mara crossed her arms tightly, moving more quickly, desperate to get away from them. From their hate.

And then her escort opened a door and she threw herself from the hallway into the chamber, pulling up short as she realized where she was.

Wishing she had remained in the corridor beyond.

She was in Temple’s rooms, where she’d watched him strip his shirt earlier in the evening. Where they’d sparred. Where he’d kissed her on lips and more, giving her a taste of a vast amount of pleasure to which he had access. Where she’d tried to stand firm and tried not to notice his muscles and sinew and bone. His warmth. His vitality.

Vitality that was gone now. A woman and two men leaned low over him, candlelight wrapping him in its warm glow, highlighting the paleness of his skin, still as death. She closed her eyes against the words, wishing she hadn’t thought them. Willing the word
death
away.

She stepped toward him, a knot in her throat. “My God,” she said, her chest heavy with fear and sorrow, unable to stop herself from reaching for him before her guide placed a strong hand on her arm and stopped her forward momentum.

The Marquess of Bourne turned at the sound of her voice, and she noted the bruise blossoming at the inner corner of his eye, feeling the related sting in her right hand. He pointed at her. “You don’t come near him.”

There was hatred in the words, and a different woman might not have replied. But she could not bear another moment of not knowing. “Is he dead?”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“No,” she said, the truth coming on a flood of relief, knowing that the quiet word would mean nothing in this room, but wanting to say it nonetheless. Wanting to remind herself that she’d never intended to hurt Temple. Never. Not since the beginning. And certainly not now. “No.”

He raised a brow. “I don’t believe you.”

She met his gaze. “I didn’t expect you would.”

“Enough, Bourne.” The woman at the table looked up and Mara recognized the blond, bespectacled woman from the mysterious room where they’d watched the fight earlier. “We can’t wait any longer. We must extract the knife.”

It had been an hour . . . longer.

Mara could not keep quiet. “Straight and true, as it went in.”

“She would know how it went in, as she fairly put it there herself,” Bourne said. “Look upon your work, you fucking harpy.”

As though Mara couldn’t see it. As though she hadn’t seen her brother plunge it deep into Temple’s chest.

As though she didn’t will it away.

She met Bourne’s hating, hazel gaze. “I did not do this.”

“Of course you did.” This, from the other aristocrat in the room—tall and ginger-haired. When she looked to him, he added, “You did this the moment you set him up for a murder he didn’t commit. Twelve years end here. With this.”