So, Ezra told him everything. The search for information about the fire. Iris’ arrival. Hiring Letitia. Everything she had revealed about how Dugley had harassed her. He was circumspect about the particulars of his relationship with Letty, but it was clear that Xander understood that Ezra regarded her as more than an employee.
To Xander’s credit, he took it all extraordinarily well.
“Right,” he said. “You have a child in your home. Her mother was likely your sister. You hired a governess—our governess. An evil gentleman has become fixated on her and abducted her. And you have come here to rescue her because you have fallen in love with her.”
Ezra choked on nothing.
“I didn’t say?—”
Xander gave him a look so acutely skeptical that it stopped Ezra’s protest in its tracks. That was a neat trick. He would have to get Xander to teach it to him. Later, though.
“Yes,” he said. “That is—more or less—accurate.”
“Right,” Xander said. “Well, we had best not hesitate, then.”
“We?” Ezra asked.
Xander scoffed. “I am not about to let you confront this bastard alone. We are family, Ez. That’s what family is for.”
Ezra had little room in his mind for anything other than Letitia, but this warmed him.
He hoped that Letty would never let him hear the end of this sudden affection he felt for his family. He wished she would tease him about it every day of his life.
Because, God above, that would mean she wasthere. It would mean she was alive, safe, and by his side.
“Thank you, Xander,” he said quietly.
His cousin looked appalled. “Don’tthankme. Did I not just say that that’s what family is for? I understand that you are exhausted, Ezra, but do try to pay attention.”
There was a note of wry amusement beneath Xander’s high-handedness, and Ezra wondered faintly if his cousin had always taken himself a bit less seriously than anyone in the family suspected, but the rest of them had never noticed.
No, he decided a moment later. Xander had been very annoying for nearly his entire life.
“In any case,” Xander went on, “do you need to rest and refresh yourself briefly, or should we travel on to Dugley’s holdings posthaste? I started making inquiries as soon as Hugh wrote that you were coming. I have the address of his family home, but I doubt he will carry on his nefarious deeds there. He did, however, recently purchase a house in a small village about an hour from here?—”
“There,” Ezra interrupted. “Let’s go there. Right now.”
When Xander smiled, Ezra was reminded that, for all that the Lightholders were now known for being civilized members of society, each wrapped in the pacifying embrace of true love,in his grandfather’s era, the family had been spoken about in hushed tones as the kind of people that you did not cross. Not ever.
Ezra smiled, too. Dugley was about to learn what it meant to cross a Lightholder. And then he was going to regret the day he had ever heard the name, Letitia Knightley.
CHAPTER 25
When Letitia heard footsteps on the stairs outside her prison, she raised the flagon over her head and tried to convince herself that it was a more effective weapon. Peter had left in such a huff yesterday that he forgot to take the basket with him, which had contained a small metal flagon of ale. She left the liquid in it so it would have some extra heft.
Neither of his options was acceptable to her. She would not remain a prisoner here forever. And she wouldneveragree to give herself to him.
So, she would fight her way out. And if he hurt her, overpowered her, or even killed her... So be it. At least she would know she had tried.
She stood behind the door with her makeshift cudgel as the lock rattled for longer than it should have taken to turn a key. Goodness, was he drunk? She could not decide if that was agood thing or a bad one. It would make him easier to fight off, perhaps, but it would also make him even more unpredictable.
Eventually, the door opened, and he stepped through. She waited until he cleared the doorway, then surged forward, swinging as hard as she could, and?—
“Lord above, Letty! What...?”
She dropped the flagon in the very last second before she brought it down atop Ezra’s skull.
“Oh, dear God,” she cried, the words spilling out of her even as her mind raced to catch up with what was happening. “You are here, you are here.”
