Sins of a Wicked Princess (24 page)
Read Sins of a Wicked Princess Online
Authors: Anna Randol
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Historical, #Regency, #General
But she didn’t have time to wonder. The remaining guard was trembling wildly, his gun swinging from side to side. Ian reached for him but the gun fired. Smoke billowing from the muzzle.
A pained gasp came from behind her. She whirled about. Leucretia had been hit. A wet spot spread over her crimson gown. Eustace ran to her, but she gave Juliana a small head shake when she saw the wound.
No one stood between Apple and the door.
“Apple, get help!”
The girl darted around, ignoring a grab from the injured men at her skirts.
Juliana glanced back at her aunts again, but now a trickle of blood dripped from the corner of Leucretia’s mouth.
The gun was wrenched from her hands.
Juliana whipped her head around to find Sommet holding Leucretia’s gun.
“Over here, Sommet,” Ian called. He’d picked up the downed man’s gun. “You know I always thought you fought like a girl.”
“Put the gun down or I will kill her.”
“If you value your life you will put
your
gun down.”
Sommet sneered. “No, I don’t think I—”
Ian didn’t wait for him to finish. He fired, the shot clean to the center of the duke’s chest as Apple burst through the door with a group of elegantly dressed gentlemen behind her.
One of the gentlemen caught Sommet as his eyes rolled back and he slumped forward.
Everyone’s gaze swung to where Ian still held the smoking pistol.
For an instant there was silence, then everyone spoke at once.
“He’s killed him!” one of the new arrivals shouted. “He’s murdered the duke.”
“And the princess!”
Suddenly there were a dozen voices shouting, calling for his apprehension.
“. . . the mad servant.”
“. . . killer. He shot the groom as . . .”
“Fetch the constable . . .”
Juliana tried to shout over the crowd but the men weren’t listening. There were too many people in the room. She could only see Eustace weeping beside Leucretia.
She reached for Ian but he was being dragged toward the door. She fought her way to Ian’s side, finally throwing herself bodily in front of them.
“He’s my servant. I have a right to speak with him.”
The men holding him froze.
She reached for him. She didn’t care that all the assembled people saw her put her hand on his bare chest. He had bruises there. Cuts trickling blood from the broken glass.
“Why did you even break the window? I had the window open.”
“Distraction. And I can’t resist a good entrance.”
“I’ll have a hard time convincing them that you’re not mad with your current clothing choice.” Her voice quavered.
“It was a daring escape. It involved my feet and a nail from crate of onions. Spectacular even for me.” Ian smiled sadly. “Abington!” he called over her shoulder.
The other duke appeared next to her.
“Keep her out of all of this,” Ian ordered.
She shook off the other man’s hand. “What? No!”
“Tell her how it will be,” Ian said.
Abington took her arm again, more firmly this time. The crowd was beginning to agitate again. He had to shout so she could hear him. “A duke has been murdered. Someone must pay the price.”
“Not you, Ian.” Had he known this would happen when he pulled the trigger? But from the resignation in Ian’s eyes he had.
“It was self-defense!” she screamed.
But the constable had come into the room, and he ordered the men to take Ian away. “Ian!”
“Take her, Abington,” Ian called over his shoulder. “We have worked too hard to have her name linked to mine. If the government thinks she is in any way linked to this— You owe me a favor, Abington.”
Abington swore. “I owe you nothing. You bloody owe me a dozen times over.” But he grabbed Juliana and swung her into his arms, ignoring her thrashing and protests.
“Watch her arms, she has a decent swing,” Ian said as they led him out the door.
Abington pinned her arms just as she was about to go for his nose. “She’s overset,” he told the others as he carried her from the room.
She craned her head around and she could see the group of men leading Ian down the corridor out of her sight. “Put me down,” she ordered. “If I explain to them what happened—”
Abington sighed, then grunted as she dug her elbow into his ribs. “Sommet was a powerful man with powerful friends.”
“Sommet didn’t have friends.”
Abington tilted his head in acknowledgment of that. “But he had many associates who will not want to risk Sommet’s dealings being revealed. Too many powerful men would look foolish. Or corrupt.” Abington finally set her down. “They will want this settled quickly.”
“They can’t do that,” she said.
“They do it all the time.”
“I won’t
let
them do it.”
Abington slowly smiled. “That, Your Highness, is a completely different matter.”
I
an stood before the magistrate, the heavy iron manacles digging into his wrists. This was what Juliana had reduced him to. He could have escaped seventeen ways over the past two days of his incarceration. He’d begun counting them to keep himself entertained.
But as soon as he escaped, Juliana would be lost to him. He’d become a wanted man. And a wanted man could never have Juliana. Could never marry her and have her growl at him in the mornings when he awoke her with a kiss. Could never stay by her side and protect her from all the foul things in the world she should never have to see.
So he stood here and faced the magistrate, a man who’d just made it clear he had no plans to believe a word Ian or his barrister said. Who thought the world had been plagued by Ian’s existence for far too long.
He hadn’t quite decided what he would do when he was sentenced to hang, but as long as there was any chance at all that he’d still be able to keep Juliana, he’d endure anything.
The courtroom was crowded around him, every seat filled with people who had come to gawk and heckle.
“The right honorable gentlemen of the jury will agree that this villain—”
The doors to the courtroom were thrown open.
Ian glanced back, then glanced back again, rising to his feet. His heart, his lungs, his brain—hell, every organ in his body—ceased to function.
Juliana. She’d come for him. She’d disobeyed everything he’d said and come for him.
Ian grinned.
His princess marched in wearing her crown and a full, gold gown fit for a coronation. Twenty soldiers marched in behind her.
The magistrate leaped to his feet, his white wig tilting on his head. “What is the meaning of this?”
Juliana strode forward until she stood directly in front of the blustering man. “I am Princess Juliana Castanova of Lenoria. The man you have on trial is my betrothed. Any further action of this court against him will be seen as an attack on our sovereignty and an act of war.”
Well, that rather made keeping her name out of all this a moot point. The magistrate had to bang his gavel several dozen times before the courtroom quieted enough for him to speak. “This will not be tolerate—”
The soldiers behind her all drew their swords.
One of the guards was amazing small. Nearly the same size as his sword.
No, her sword. It was Apple, her hair tucked out of sight in her cap. And to her right was— No. Impossible. It was an incognito Prince Gregory.
Ian fought his grin. The front row of soldiers closest to the magistrate were Juliana’s actual soldiers.
But the rest . . . Canterbury. The other members of the Trio.
“You will release him or we will take him by force.”
“The man is a murderer.”
Juliana lifted her chin. “Ian Maddox is a hero. He protected me at great risk to himself when the Duke of Sommet attacked and tried to kill me.”
“That is an outrageous charge—”
“I will testify to it here and now. Ian Maddox killed the duke in his role as my minister of security. My aunts . . .” She swallowed. “Aunts will swear to it as well. Along with the Duke of Abington. If you have any further doubts, you can request an audience with your prince regent.”
The magistrate’s mouth opened, closed, then opened again.
She turned and her soldiers parted neatly to let her pass. She finally looked at Ian, her eyes blazing with determination and love. “Come, Mr. Maddox.”
Ian didn’t hesitate. He walked past his barrister and held out his shackled arms to the guard. The man looked helplessly at the magistrate, and when he didn’t receive any direction, he fumbled for the key and unlocked them.
As soon as Ian reached her side, she marched them out of the court. No one tried to stop them.
The royal Lenorian coach was waiting outside. He helped her in, then leaped in after her, the door barely closing before the coachman had spurred the horses into a gallop.
“You—” Ian started, but his throat was suddenly too tight to speak.
You came for me?
Too obvious. And too likely to induce weeping on his part.
You were incredible?
Understatement.
Finally he managed, “That was the most bloody brilliant thing I have ever seen.”
He pulled her onto his lap, ignoring the jumble of hoops and petticoats. Reveling in her broken breathing. Half excitement. Half laughter.
“Does that trump walking out of prison with the gaoler’s hat?” she asked, her laughter finally emerging as sound. A beautiful sound full of hope. Love.
“You’ve elevated the Wraith to an everlasting legend.”
She tried to frown but couldn’t hold the expression. “Do you outrank me now, then?”
He smoothed a strand of hair away from her face. “No. Not when you’ve just proven yourself a goddess.”
“No,” she said. “I don’t want to be a goddess. I can hardly manage being a princess.”
“A queen,” he corrected.
“Not yet. I may have Wilhelm’s troops. But I still have to find a way to regain my country without bloodshed.”
“Oh, I took care of that. Right before I allowed Sommet to capture me.” Ian traced the confusion as it spread over her face. Her eyebrows rising, her jaw loosening. He’d made sure she would be all right no matter the outcome. “The French and the Spanish have agreed to accept you as ruler of Lenoria and have given up their claim to Lenorian land.”
“What— How— The Spanish?”
“I figured out the details of Sommet’s blackmail. The ambassador doesn’t want anyone else to.”
“The French.”
“Bribes. Lot and lots of bribes. I’m bloody rich, you know.”
She was watching him with awe, and he was already plotting the next few pleasurable things he could do to keep that look there. “I love you, you know,” he said.
“I do know. I love you.”
The words expanded in Ian’s heart, obliterating all the lonely, hungry places. He pressed his cheek to hers. “Do I have to be king after I marry you?”
“No. I think you are officially the queen’s consort.”
“Far, far better. That has a naughty ring to it. Just promise me one thing,” Ian said.
“What?”
“Promise me I won’t have to have a double wedding with my butler.”
Juliana grinned. “Don’t worry. I think they might beat us to the altar.”
“Ah, those impetuous old people.”
“We will be old together someday.” Her face grew serious. “I hope. Are you well? I worried about you in that prison. How are your wounds? Did they feed you enough? I had my cook—”
He caught her hand, stopping her from searching for whatever food she’d brought. “I’m not hungry.”
“Did those words just come out of your mouth?”
He lowered lips to hers. “I don’t need anything to fill my empty places but you.”
ANNA RANDOL lives and writes in sunny Southern California. When she’s not plotting sexy storylines, she’s usually eating chocolate, having wild dance parties with her kids in the living room, or remodeling her house, one ill-planned project at a time. Anna loves to hear from her readers online at www.AnnaRandol.com or on twitter @AnnaRandol.
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