Ways to Be Wicked (28 page)

Four words. Each given equal weight. As somber, and as permanent sounding, as a sentence handed down by a judge.

Tom held her eyes evenly with his. Daring her to look away.

“Now tell me you love Etienne. Look me in the eye, in front of all these witnesses, and tell me you love
him,
and there will be no duel.”

No color in her cheeks or lips. Her hands, he could see, were shaking, and surreptitiously she pressed them into her dress. Her chin went up.

“I love Etienne.”

Tom stared at her. And finally he dropped his head into his chest with a nod.

Then looked up again at the prince. “I’ll see you at dawn, Etienne. My seconds shall arrange it with yours.”

“But—” The shocked protest came from Sylvie.

“I lied,” Tom said, not looking at her.

Etienne made an exasperated sound, turned his noble palm up in apparent confusion. “Come now, Shaughnessy. You’ve nothing at all to prove. You might as well forgo the drama. She doesn’t want you; she just said as much herself. And I’d hate to waste a perfectly good bullet on a mongrel.”

Tom nodded along as Etienne spoke, as if this was all very fascinating. “But you’ve taken away all I have, including Sylvie, who has told everyone here she does not love me, so now I have nothing left to lose, do I, Etienne? Why should I care whether I live or die?” Tom’s voice was level. He made it sound like a philosophical conundrum, something worthy of idle discussion over brandies.

“Because I knew there was more pleasure to be had in ruining you than killing you,” Etienne said simply. “And you’ve no right to her. You’ve never had a right to her.”

Tom furrowed his brow a little. “I see. So now that you’ve ruined
me
. . . Sylvie will love you?” He made it sound as though he was genuinely baffled by the logic. “Because it’s clear from all the effort you’ve gone through to ruin me that you don’t believe that she truly does. Or ever will. Despite what she says.”

Tom watched with satisfaction as the color drained from Etienne’s face, leaving him white with fury.

“You heard her,” Etienne said coldly. “She doesn’t want you, Shaughnessy.”

“I heard her.” Tom gave him an enigmatic little smile.

Etienne’s breath came quickly now, along with his words, staccato and furious. “Very well. Since you want killing so badly, I will shoot you at dawn.”

“Splendid. As I said, my seconds shall arrange it with yours.”

Tom turned on his heel and made for the mural room, past Sylvie, past all the other staring faces, through the gasps and murmurs, without looking at any of them.

“You’re really going through with it?”

The General simply watched, as he had so many times before, as Tom got out his pistols. He hadn’t lit a cigar. Just being practical. There wasn’t time, of course, to smoke it down satisfactorily, since dawn was a mere hour away.

Tom pried his pistol from its velvet nest.
Inspecting it for perhaps the last time,
he thought mordantly. “Yes.”

“Are you going to shoot him?”

“I am,” Tom said, hefting the pistol in his hand, “going to do my level best. Should it come to that.”

Quiet in this cozy room once more. Kit Whitelaw, Viscount Grantham, was outside speaking with Belstow; he’d volunteered to be Tom’s other second. The discussion was a mere formality, for the duel would be as they always were: in the clearing at the edge of St. John’s Wood, with pistols, at dawn, just as the light began to dilute the dark.

“And your son?”

“Will know his father wasn’t a coward—if anyone remembers me and tells him. I assume that will be you.”

The General gave a lift of the shoulder:
Of course.

Tom looked at him. “You aren’t going to remind me that you told me she’d be trouble, are you?”

The General shook his head to and fro. “She might even be worth it,” The General said.

Suddenly The General’s head jerked toward him. “Wait: ‘Should it come to that,’ you just said. Does this mean you have a plan?”

“Don’t I always, Gen?” Tom grinned.

And while Tom was inspecting his pistols, Kit had sent Susannah and Sylvie back to the Grantham town house in his carriage so he could go about the very masculine business of playing the role of second.

In the Grantham parlor, over tea laced with whiskey, Susannah held Sylvie’s hand.

Sylvie was dimly aware she was still dressed as a fairy.

“I remember this,” Susannah said softly. “I remember another dark night, long ago. And it was you who held my hand.”

“You were crying,” Sylvie said softly. “I remember, too.”

And she remembered she’d scarcely cried since, if ever. She wasn’t crying now. She could not. She felt numb clear through. She was made of ice, she breathed ice. Her heart might be beating, but she could scarcely feel it.

“Well, I’m glad I can hold your hand now.”

Sylvie said nothing.

“Somehow I knew it would be exciting to have a sister,” Susannah added.

Sylvie managed a faint laugh at this. “I think we are doomed to be exciting, given the story of our mother’s life.”

“Sometimes men have duels and deliberately miss. Kit shot his best friend over a woman when he was just seventeen, and he deliberately missed.” Susannah’s way of offering comfort.

“Etienne won’t miss,” Sylvie said dully. “He won’t try to miss. His temper . . . And Tom...” Her voice broke over the word. “Tom won’t try to miss, either.”

Susannah was very quiet. And still. Sylvie could feel her almost vibrating with alertness. “Mr. Shaughnessy is very handsome. Ow.”

Sylvie had squeezed Susannah’s hand a little too tightly. “I am sorry, Susannah.”

Another deafening silence.

“You just called him Tom,” Susannah added softly.

And a trifle, if Sylvie was being honest, insistently. Which began to penetrate the ice in her mind and heart.

Safety, certainty. These were the things she’d always wanted. Or thought she wanted. The things that Etienne promised, a future that should have seemed enormous and comfortable, a future beyond the
demi-monde.

Why then, when then, did the idea of it become stifling? Even frightening?
Were you running from him when you came to England?
Tom had asked. And she had known he’d meant Etienne.

She realized then: she’d known he’d meant Etienne, because she
had
been running from Etienne as well as trying to discover her past.

Her breathing began to quicken. Etienne claimed to love her, but Tom’s words returned to her now:
So now that you’ve ruined me. . . Sylvie will love you?

It wasn’t so much that Etienne loved her. Etienne felt
entitled
to her.

And then Sylvie thought about what Susannah had said: That Kit had felt like . . . air. Like everything she had always needed. But he was not at all what she expected.

She thought of Tom Shaughnessy, and how even as he glittered, and even as he reveled in all things bawdy and some things deadly, and even as he took her to what surely must be sinful bliss with his hands and mouth, there was something about him that made her feel. . .

Safe.

It wasn’t so much about what he did, or what he owned. It was simply a part of him, that core of strength, of confidence, of—

Oh, this would amuse him:

Of goodness.

He was the best man she had ever known.

“Susannah, call the carriage! Now!” Sylvie yanked her sister to her feet.

“Oh Good
God,
I was afraid you were never going to say that.” Susannah stumbled after her.

It was nearly as familiar to Tom as Manton’s now, this clearing at the edge of the park. Half a bright moon hung overhead, tangled in shreds of clouds. Dawn was encroaching; the deep purple of the sky was softening, gradually, to mauve.

Two carriages hung on the edge of the park, horses calm in their traces, nipping at the grass, unaffected by the various madnesses of men. They no doubt would scarcely flinch when the shots were fired in a few minutes.

The air was sharp; it was the brink of autumn, after all. An impatient wind gusted, getting in hair, lifting coats, tugging at the carriage reins.

The seconds had loaded the pistols; the surgeon, called from his bed, rubbed at his eyes and stood quietly next to Kit and The General, and Tom and Etienne had counted off.

They now stood the appropriate number of killing paces apart from each other, arms raised, pistols pointed.

When everyone heard the clatter of hooves, a carriage being driven at breakneck speed, pulled by a team of dark horses. The door burst open before it even came to a complete halt.

“Stop!”

A blur of dark flying hair and cloak hurtled out of the coach and planted itself between the two men, undecided, it seemed, as to which way to turn.

“I’ve heard of this sort of thing happening,” The General muttered.

And at first, there was a stunned silence, for the
Code Duello
didn’t particularly address women bursting in upon the proceedings.

“Sylvie,” Etienne’s voice finally cracked in the silence. “Don’t be a fool. Step aside. Leave us.”

She whirled on Etienne decisively. “Lower the pistol, Etienne, or I will shoot you myself.”

And by God, she did have a pistol, which she raised. Who would have given her a pistol? Her
sister
?

Susannah’s head was just now peeking out of the coach. The viscount turned and glared at his wife, who made a small “eep” sound and pulled her head back in.

“Susannah,” Kit growled.

Ah, apparently so.

“I’m afraid I have to agree with Etienne to some extent, Sylvie,” Tom said calmly. “Please don’t point that at an armed and angry man.”

Sylvie turned to Tom; her eyes caught the early light; she clenched the fist that wasn’t holding the gun against her billowing skirts.

“Have they changed the rules for these things?” Kit murmured to The General. “There are usually only
two
armed parties.”

“Sylvie—” Etienne’s voice was dark with warning.

She turned back to him, and her voice rose so that everyone present could hear it, furious, aching with the need to confess. “I lied! I lied. Damn both of you, but I
lied.
”

“What sort of lie did you tell, Miss Chapeau?” Tom encouraged almost conversationally.

She whirled on him, glaring, breeze whipping her hair out behind her, then across her face, like those shreds of clouds in the sky.

And then she spun back to Etienne. Her voice softened just a little, but the words were firm with resolve.

“I am sorry, Etienne. When
I
said I loved you, I only meant to stop the duel. But since you are
both
idiots, and
must
duel...”

Suddenly the fury went out of her. She caught her hair in her fist to keep it from blowing about her face. “I did lie, Etienne. I do not want to be with you. I do not love you. It is...it isnot you I love.”

Tom doubted any man in the clearing truly gloated, for it was clear from Etienne’s stance, the frozen posture, that she might just as well have shot him.

It was quiet, except for a horse whickering softly.

“When Molly said. . . when she said she thought she heard you throwing things at him...” Etienne lowered his pistol, handed it to Belstow. He gave a short laugh, a sound half pain, half disgust. “I suppose I knew.”

His way of attempting to seize a little dignity from the occasion.

Sylvie was silent, gazing defiantly at Etienne. Watching him, daring him to do anything further.

And everyone, for the moment, was utterly still, apart from the rude wind buffeting coats and whipping hair.

And then Etienne nodded, lifted a hand, either in surrender or farewell or dismissal. He walked away, stepped into the coach. Belstow followed a moment later and pulled the door shut behind them.

Everyone watched until the horses lurched and pulled the carriage away.

Tom cleared his throat.

Sylvie turned suddenly. Gazed at him from a distance, very still. And then she knelt so she could gently place the borrowed pistol on the ground. Took two steps toward him. And stopped.

Tom obligingly handed his pistol to Kit.

Then Sylvie broke into a run and flung herself into his arms. He wrapped her tightly, buried his face in her hair, and forgot there was anyone else in the world in the sheer relief of holding her.

“I lied,” she murmured again.

“So you said. Pity you lack faith in my aim.” His voice was thick. “You thought he would kill me. You wanted to save me.”

“I lied because I love
you,
” she said indignantly.

“Oh yes, I know that, too. But
you
didn’t know.”

He held her. Gently touched the rough tip of his finger to the one tear shining on her cheek. Pressed his lips where the tear had once been.

“Well?” she demanded, looking up at him. “And?”

“Oh. Hmm. Well, I suppose if this isn’t love, then love doesn’t exist.”

“Tom.” The word was a warning and a command.

“Oh, very well. I love you, too.”

He said it quickly. Trying to be glib. But he’d never said the words before, to anyone, in his entire life, and they instantly turned him inside out. He was suddenly glad she was there, warm in his arms, because though he was no coward, he suddenly felt very exposed.

And she knew. Smiled softly up at him.

And the first kiss in the aftermath of “I love you” was different from any other kiss he’d known. He kissed her then, pulled her close into his body, tightly against him, and took her lips with his, knowing he would never grow tired of the soft perfection of that lower lip of hers, of the sweet singular taste of her, hadn’t tasted her nearly enough.

He lifted his head.

“Do you see how clever I was?” he congratulated himself. “You thought Etienne would shoot me dead, and there I would be on the ground, the life bleeding out of me. And I knew you would come and stop the proceedings because you couldn’t let me go to my death without saying you lo
mmph
—”

She’d clapped a hand over his mouth, very much not wanting to hear the rest of it.