The Serpent Prince

Page 39

Surely there was someone else who felt as she did, someone who didn’t want this duel with Sir Rupert. She’d go to Christian if she could, but from his reaction at the Lord Walker duel, he would not have sympathy for her cause. Few would have the same feelings as a wife. Lucy straightened. A wife. Sir Rupert was married. If she could win his wife to her side, perhaps between the two of them they could stop—
“Aunt Lucy,” Pocket cried, “won’t you come taste Cook’s pies? They’re ever so good.”
Lucy blinked and focused on the little girl tugging at her hand. “I’m afraid I can’t right now, dear. I must go see a lady.”
Chapter Seventeen
Simon snipped off a dead leaf from a Rosa mundi. Around him the smells of the conservatory floated in the humid air—rotted leaves, earth, and the faint scent of mildew. But the perfume of the rose in front of him overpowered them all. She had four blooms on her, all different, the streaks of white swirling into the crimson on her petals. Rosa mundi was an old rose but a favorite nonetheless.
The leaf he’d snipped fell to the white-painted table, and he picked it up and threw it in a bucket. Sometimes a dead leaf carried parasites and, if forgotten by the horticulturist, would infect the healthy plants as well. He made it a habit to clean up as he went. Even the smallest of leftovers might later prove the doom of an entire table of plants.
He moved to the next rose, a Centifolia muscosa—common moss rose—its leaves glossy green with health, its perfume almost cloyingly sweet. The petals in her flowers spilled over themselves, lush and billowy, shamelessly revealing the green sepals at their center. If roses were women, the moss rose would be a tart.
Sir Rupert was a leftover. Or perhaps the last of a series of labors. Whichever way one looked at it, he had to be dealt with. Clipped and cleaned up. Simon owed it to Ethan to finish the job. And to Lucy, to make sure she was safe from his past and his enemies. But Sir Rupert was also a cripple; there was no getting away from that fact. Simon hesitated, studying the next rose, a York and Lancaster, which bore both pink and white flowers on the same plant. He balked at dueling a man with such uneven odds. It would be a killing, pure and simple. The older man wouldn’t have a chance, and Lucy didn’t want him dueling. She would probably leave him, his stern angel, if she found out he was even contemplating issuing another challenge. He didn’t want to lose her. Couldn’t imagine never waking again with her. His fingers shook at even the thought.
Four dead, wasn’t that enough? Is it enough, Ethan?
He turned over a healthy-looking leaf on the York and Lancaster and found a swarm of aphids, busily sucking the life from the plant.
The door to the conservatory crashed open.
“Sir, you’re not allowed—” Newton’s voice, outraged and fearful, admonished the intruder.
Simon turned to confront whoever disturbed his peace.
Christian charged down the aisle, his face pale and set.
Newton dithered. “Mr. Fletcher, please—”
“That’s all right—” Simon started.
Christian punched him in the jaw.
He staggered back, falling against the table, his vision blurred. What?
Pots crashed to the floor, the shards skittering in the walkway. He straightened and brought his fists up to defend himself as his eyes cleared, but the other man was simply standing there, his chest heaving.
“What the bloody hell,” Simon began.
“Duel me,” Christian spat.
“What?” Simon blinked. Belatedly his jaw began to throb with pain. He noticed that the moss rose was in pieces on the floor, two of the main stems broken. Christian’s boot crushed a bloom underfoot, the perfume rising from the dead rose like a eulogy.
Newton hurried out of the room.
“Duel me.” Christian raised his right fist in threat. “Do I have to hit you again?” His expression was without humor, his eyes wide and dry.
“I wish you wouldn’t.” Simon felt along his jaw. He couldn’t talk if it was broken, could he? “Why would I want to duel you?”
“You don’t. You want to duel my father. But he’s old and his leg is bad. He can hardly walk. Even you might feel a twinge of guilt at running through a cripple.”
“Your father killed my brother.” Simon let his hand fall.
“So you have to duel him.” Christian nodded. “I know. I’ve seen you kill two men now, remember? I’ve watched you enact your sense of family—of honor, though you refuse to use that word—over the last few weeks. Do you really expect any less from me? Duel me as my father’s surrogate.”
Simon sighed. “I don’t—”
Christian hit him in the face again.
Simon fell on his arse. “Shit! Stop that.” He must look a complete idiot, sitting in mud in his own greenhouse. Pain bloomed across his cheekbone. Now the entire left side of his face felt on fire.
“I’ll keep doing it,” the younger man said from above him, “until you agree. I’ve seen you badger two men into dueling. I’ve learned well.”
“For God’s—”
“Your mother was a dockside whore, your father a bastard!” Christian shouted, red-faced.
“Christ.” Was the boy mad? “My fight is with your father, not you.”
“I’ll seduce your wife—”
Lucy! a primitive part of his brain screamed. He shook it away. The boy was playing his own game. “I don’t want to duel you.”
“And if she won’t submit, I’ll kidnap and rape her. I’ll—”
No. Simon surged to his feet, backing Christian against a bench. “Stay away from her.”
The younger man flinched but kept talking. “I’ll parade her naked through the streets of London.”
Dimly, Simon saw Newton coming down the aisle, Lucy’s ghost-white face behind him. “Shut up.”
“I’ll brand her a slut. I’ll—”
Simon backhanded him, throwing him against another table. “Shut your mouth!”
The table quaked under Christian’s weight. More pots exploded on the floor. Simon flexed his hand. His knuckles stung.
The younger man shook his head. “I’ll sell her for tuppence a pop to any man who’ll have her.”
“Shut your bloody mouth, goddamn it!”
“Simon.” Lucy’s voice, quavering.
“Shut it for me,” Christian whispered, his teeth red with blood. “Duel me.”
Simon took a slow breath, fighting down his demons. “No.”
“You love her, don’t you? Would do anything for her.” Christian leaned close enough that blood-flecked spittle struck him in the face. “Well, I love my father. There is no other way for us.”
God. “Christian—”
“Duel me or I’ll make sure you’ll have to.” The boy looked him straight in the eye.
Simon stared at him. Then his gaze traveled over the other man’s head to Lucy’s face. Straight, severe brows, mahogany hair pulled back in a simple knot, lips compressed in a line. Her beautiful topaz eyes were wide, pleading. Absently he noted that she still wore her cloak from an outing. Newton must’ve just caught her as she returned home.
Impossible to chance her safety.
“Very well. The morning after tomorrow. That will give you and me enough time to find seconds.” His eyes flicked back to Fletcher. “Now get out.”
Christian turned and left.
TOO LATE. LUCY STOOD IN THE GREENHOUSE and watched her world crumble around her, despite all the efforts she’d gone to this afternoon. She’d arrived home from her mission too late.
Her husband’s face had turned to graven stone. His eyes had lost any color they once might’ve had. They were as cold now as the midnight frost that kills sparrows in their sleep. Mr. Fletcher brushed past her, but Lucy couldn’t tear her gaze from Simon’s expression. She hadn’t heard their conversation, but she’d seen him hit the younger man and seen the blood on Simon’s cheek.
“What happened? What have you done to Mr. Fletcher?” She didn’t mean the words to sound so accusatory.
Behind her she heard the door close. They were alone in the conservatory. Newton had left as well.
“I don’t have time to talk.” Simon rubbed his hands together as if washing away imaginary dirt. They trembled. “I need to find seconds.”
“I don’t care. You must talk to me.” She felt almost dizzy from the perfume of the roses smashed on the floor. “I went to meet Lady Fletcher. She and I—”
He looked up, his expression unchanged, and cut her off. “I’m to duel Christian Fletcher in two days.”
“No.” Not again. She couldn’t take another fight, another man dead, another portion of Simon’s soul burned away. Oh, God, no more.
“I’m sorry.” He made to walk past her.
She grabbed his arm and felt it flex beneath her hand. She had to stop him. “Simon, don’t do this. Lady Fletcher has agreed to talk to her husband. She thinks he will see reason, that there might be another way—”
He cut her off, his head bowed, his eyes not meeting hers. “It’s Christian I’m dueling, Lucy, no longer his father.”
“But the hope remains the same,” she insisted. She’d made the effort, come up with a plan, gained Lady Fletcher’s trust. It’d all seemed so close, so possible half an hour before. Why didn’t he understand? “You can’t do this.”
“But I shall.” His eyes were still averted.
“No.” They—their marriage—wouldn’t survive this. Couldn’t he see? “I’ll talk again with Lady Fletcher. We’ll find another way to settle—”
“There is no other way.” He raised his head finally and she saw anger and despair in his eyes. “This is not your business. Talking to Lady Fletcher will solve nothing.”
“We must at least try.”
“Enough, Lucy!”
“You can’t just kill people!” She flung his arm away, her mouth twisting bitterly. “It’s not right. Don’t you know that? It’s immoral. Simon, it’s evil. Don’t let evil destroy your heart, your soul. I beg you, don’t do this!”
His jaw clenched. “You don’t understand—”
“Of course I don’t understand!” Her chest was constricted. She couldn’t catch her breath. The heavy, humid air seemed too thick to inhale. She leaned forward and said fiercely, “I went to church as a little girl. I know that’s considered provincial to a sophisticated man like yourself, but I did. And the church says—the Bible says—that it is a sin to take the life of another.” She had to stop to gasp, tasting the scent of roses on her tongue. “And I believe that. It’s a mortal sin, to murder a fellow human being, even if you try to hide it by dueling. It’s murder, Simon. In the end, it’s murder, and it will consume you.”
“Then I’m a sinner and a murderer,” he said quietly. He walked past her.
“He’s your friend,” she called desperately.
“Yes.” He stopped at that, his back toward her. “Christian is my friend, but he’s also Fletcher’s son. The son of Ethan’s murderer. He challenged me, Lucy, not the other way around.”
“Listen to yourself.” She fought against tears. “You’re planning to kill a friend. A man you’ve eaten with, talked with, laughed with. He admires you, Simon. Did you know that?”
“Yes, I know he admires me.” He finally swung around, and she saw a sheen of sweat on his upper lip. “He’s spent the last month following me around; he apes my clothes and my mannerisms. How could I miss that he admires me?”