A spark of hope ignited in her breast.
“Have you thought about telling him how you feel?”
A half-laugh, half-sob burst from her chest. “Have I thought about telling the man who was betrothed to my cousin, and made a fool of by my family, and who is repulsed by anything and anyone connected to them that I love him? No.”
Her heart felt like it was attacking her, knocking and pounding against her ribcage.
“Maybe before,” Fleur said, her voice thick with tears. “But…now, I can’t…” That night of Lord and Lady Rutland’s masquerade she had ensured she was not fit for any respectable gentleman, certainly not Henry. “I’ve done something u-unforgiveable and…”
The Duke of Hartwell’s bride must be as virginal and pure as the fresh-driven snow.
A woman such as Lady Angela.
And not one who lost her head and virtue against a stranger’s bookshelves in the middle of a wicked ball—as Fleur had done.
Burying her face in her hands, Fleur sobbed. She had noted their first set, and after Henry left Fleur to join Lady Angela in the couple’s second, he told the entire room who was his choice.
Kilmartin made a soothing sound and, in the same way that her elder brothers, Dallin and Arran, had soothed her hurts as a young girl, he gave her his shoulder to lean on.
“He is going to m-marry Lady A-Angela.”
He didn’t deny it.
That made her cry even more.
But then weeping began to make her feel better, and she let out all the emotion she had kept buried. Until she cried her last tear and they faded, and she sagged against Henry’s friend.
“Better?”
“S-Surprisingly, y-yes.”
She felt Lord Cassian’s shoulder tense before she heard the menacing words that spread through the air.
“What is the meaning of this?”
Chapter 15
“Out of chaos God made a world, and out of high passions comes a people.”
~Lord Byron
He was going to kill someone.
Hart took in the pair of Fleur and Kilmartin seated side by side on the balustrade, with her curled up close, her face tucked against the other man’s bloody, big shoulder.
A hard pounding filled his chest.
Not someone.Kilmartin.
He was going to kill the affable bastard.
And here he’d been besieged with panic as pandemonium broke out around Fleur. The stalwart hellion—who could have battled all the King’s Guard and won—appeared pale and forlorn, was what gossips around Hart were saying. He hadn’t seen Fleur whisked off, only the tails of the McQuoids as they rushed after her. And the whole time, while Hart had been stuck with Lady Angela, completing the damned foolish steps of the Spanish Dance.
Through all that, all of Hart’s worrying about Fleur, the chit had been outside with his damned man-of-affairs.
Through a red haze of rage, he swept his stare over them. He surveyed her gown, making sure nothing was out of place. If there was, Kilmartin would lose fingers and teeth.
He eyed her mouth—the same sweet mouth Hart had kissed three days earlier—and the way her flesh trembled.
