LITMIR.BIZ

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even remembered her existence a mere hour ago.”

      Chelsea stopped just at the doorway to the kitchens and turned to face him. “Shut. Up. I’ve been trying to tell you since I arrived, but you keep interrupting me. Now we have to leave, unless you really are stupid enough to want to face Thomas while you’re still so obviously intoxicated. And obnoxious, as well, although I have begun to doubt that will change much even once you’re sober again.”

      “I take it all back, brother mine,” Puck said, snorting. “I think I’m beginning to like her.”

      Chelsea pressed her palms to her cheeks, seemed to perhaps be counting under her breath for a few moments, and then dropped her hands to her sides and let out a breath.

      “One, my brother did you a great, unforgivable harm seven years ago. Two, he is by nature a very stupid man—and easily led, as you seem already to have ascertained on your own, hence the spoiled grapes. Three, just after our father died, Thomas became very ill and thought he was going to die before he could enjoy the fruits of our father’s labors now that he was earl. Four, he truly believes that Francis Flotley came into his life as a gift from God, the same God Thomas had made all manner of promises to if only the good Lord would allow him to rise from his sickbed. Five, Francis Flotley delivered Thomas’s promises to God, personally—yes, I know that’s insane, so you can stop making those odious faces at me—and now Thomas is not only still stupid and easily led, but he thinks he is on some holy path, and in charge of my soul, which he is not! Seven—”

      “I think you skipped six,” Puck corrected helpfully. “Sorry,” he added quickly, when Chelsea glared at him.

      “Six,” she said heavily, “because I have chosen not to marry any man Thomas could like, he has decided to take me to Brean first thing tomorrow morning, lock me up and then marry me to Francis Flotley as soon as the banns can be read. In order to save my inferior female soul.”

      “Seven,” Beau interrupted, holding up his hand, “as you were clever enough to ferret out that I am responsible for your brother’s financial plagues of locusts—don’t ask, Puck, just listen—you assumed, incorrectly, I might add, the reverend to also be one of my inventions. So that, eight, it is now my fault that you are to be bracketed to the man. Ergo, I am responsible for saving you from this fate, which I, nine, will somehow do by escorting you out of London with your brother in hot pursuit and out for my blood. For which, ten, you will offer me some sort of favor in return. To which, one, but not to worry because my list is quite short, I say no. Thank you for the honor, putting my head on the chopping block the way you have, but no.”

      “I may never drink again,” Puck said quietly. “I mean, I actually think I understand this. But what could Lady Chelsea offer you that would help you? And to help you, it would follow that whatever she’d offer would somehow revenge you against her brother in a way that makes up for the audacity you had as to come to his house and, bastard that you are, besmirch the family escutcheon by asking for his sister’s hand in—uh-oh. Beau? Do you even know the route to Scotland?”

      Beau looked at Chelsea—the bane of his existence at fourteen, a ripe plum fallen out of the sky seven years later. The perfect revenge against Thomas Mills-Beckman and all of London Society, wrapped up like a lovely gift and dropped into his lap.

      No. He couldn’t do it. Could he? He’d prided himself on being a gentleman in a world that, for the most part, had branded him as something all but inhuman. Yes, he was taking his revenge against Brean, but that was different; it was only money.

      To elope with the man’s sister, bed the man’s sister? That was not only despicable, it would be akin to signing his own death warrant if they were caught before the deed was done, the girl was deflowered and her reputation already so ruined that killing Beau could only make a bad situation worse.

      Brean would be disgraced, the entire family would be disgraced.

      Madelyn? She’d said that he would “never be one of us.” It had never occurred to him that he could turn that particular table, make her one of him, that she could be made to know what it was like to be secretly laughed at, looked down upon, kept to the fringes of Society. Beau had become a student of Society since The Incident, and he knew what would happen. Her sister’s ruin would be Madelyn’s final ruin, as well, even after all these years.

      But that would be petty revenge, beneath him. He could never forgive her, but that was because he hadn’t been able to forgive his own youth, his own blind assumptions about the way the world worked. He could have friends, even a few real friends, among the ton. But rich as he might be, well-mannered as he might be, educated and affable as he might be, the Marquess of Blackthorn’s bastard son could never marry any of their sisters.

      “Beau? You’re staring, and I have to tell you, it’s a little repellant,” Puck said, stirring his brother from his thoughts. “What are you going to do?”

      Beau shook himself back to the moment and looked at Lady Chelsea, who returned his look as she nervously bit at her bottom lip.

      “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I can’t do it. I’m sorry, but one of us has to think of the consequences. You’d be shunned by Society, disowned by your family. Perhaps this all seems romantic to you, perhaps you see it as some sort of adventure, the sort best reserved for the pages of a novel, but—”

      “His mouth is always wet,” Chelsea said quietly. “He says a female on her knees is a woman who knows her place. He preaches that women are inferior in their minds and must be led, guided, or else be considered harlots who must be shown the staff.”

      Puck pulled at his brother’s arm, leading him a short distance away to whisper, “Which one, brother mine? The staff of obedience, or his own personal rod? Wet mouth, spouting religious nonsense, a girl as luscious as this one—I think we both know the answer. Not a pretty picture, and I would sleep nights, thank you. Damn it, Beau, we can’t let it happen, not now that we know. We can’t let her go back to her brother and this Flatley fellow.”

      “Flotley,” Beau corrected distractedly, feeling Fate slipping its strong fingers around his throat, and squeezing.

      “Doesn’t matter. Man’s a rotter, plain and simple. If you don’t marry her, I will. There are worse things than marriage to a rich, handsome and eminently affable bastard. That would be me, you understand. You’re just rich and passably handsome.”

      Beau looked across the hallway at Chelsea and saw a single huge tear run down her cheek. The girl in tears, his brother threatening to sacrifice himself, the girl’s brother probably on his way to Grosvenor Square even now, armed to the teeth and with half his serving staff with him. If the girl were gone, Brean couldn’t try anything, but with the girl here, he could probably claim she’d been kidnapped, shoot both Puck and him and not be charged. After all, everyone knew their shared history; Brean would be believed.

      But if Beau managed to put a hole in the earl? That would mean the gallows for him and probably for Puck, as well.

      And the always-wet mouth for Lady Chelsea.

      So why was he still standing here? There was only one decision, only one route to travel, and that led straight to Gretna Green and marriage over the anvil.

      “Damn it all to hell,” he said, grabbing Chelsea’s elbow and turning her toward the kitchens once more. “Puck, get yourself out of London. Leave now, with us. Take the yacht, and let your baggage follow you to Paris. Brean is most probably about to lose his newfound religion, and I don’t want you anywhere in the vicinity when it happens. Give me five minutes to instruct Wadsworth, and we’re off.”

      “Then … then you’ll do it? You’ll marry me.”

      “Or die in the attempt, yes. You’ve left me no choice.”

      Her smile nearly knocked him off his feet. “Yes,” she said sweetly, all trace of tears now gone. “I know. Escape is only a temporary solution. But marriage rids me of Thomas and will, even though you did not send Francis Flotley to us, probably go a long way toward pleasing

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