Page 41 of Bound to the Heartless Duke (Regency Beasts #4)

F og hung thick in the air when they arrived. Lantern light from the carriage they had flagged down when the horse got tired cast a pale glow on the cobblestone. The wind was cold, especially for someone who was clothed in such light material.

Lily didn’t feel it, though. Not truly. Not when her gaze was fixed ahead.

Especially when her focus was on the person they had been searching for.

There her brother was, thinking he could escape them. Thinking he could escape her husband.

He looked smaller somehow under the porch of a rundown inn. His coat was threadbare, and his shoulders were hunched with fatigue, or shame, or perhaps both.

Her face contorted with disgust as she realized he was arguing with a man twice his size. The man was blocking the inn’s doorway, his arms folded across his chest, and a scowl etched deep on his face.

Lily stepped down from the carriage before Magnus could offer a hand. She had been holding her breath the entire ride, every heartbeat filled with dread and longing. And now that she was here… now that she saw Nathan alive and mostly in one piece…

Her breath caught in her throat.

She had imagined this moment differently.

She had thought she might scream at him or throw something, or fall apart entirely.

But now, seeing the brother who had once taught her how to climb apple trees and dared her to race ponies across wet fields, the brother who had traded her for coin and hadn’t bothered to show up for her wedding…

All she felt was the weight of a thousand unsaid questions.

“Go back to wherever you came from,” the innkeeper barked, his voice cutting through the cold night. “No coin, no bed.”

Nathan flinched. “I just need a few hours. I’ll have the money tomorrow, I swear.”

The innkeeper grunted. “That’s what the last one said, and he still owes me two teeth.”

Magnus stepped forward, his strides slow and menacing, like a lion stalking its prey.

“Is this what you’ve been reduced to?” he asked coolly, his voice laced with contempt. “Begging for a bed like a street rat?”

Nathan’s head snapped toward him, and for a second, relief softened the lines of his face. But then he saw Lily beside him, and his eyes widened with something sharp and ugly.

“Brilliant,” he muttered. “Here comes the cavalry.”

“Do not mistake her presence for mercy,” Magnus warned, his tone steely.

“Mercy?” Nathan scoffed. “From you? That’s rich.”

The innkeeper was eyeing them both with growing suspicion, and Lily could feel the night devolving into chaos.

She took a cautious step forward.

“Nathan,” she said, her voice quiet. “I—” She broke off.

What do you say to the brother who betrayed you? Who sold you like livestock and disappeared when you needed him most?

“I was worried,” she whispered at last.

It wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough.

Nathan looked away.

“Touching,” Magnus muttered with disdain. “Shall we discuss what you did to earn her worry?”

“Oh, do go on,” Nathan spat. “Play the saint. Tell everyone how noble you were, riding to save the girl you bought.”

Magnus moved in a flash without warning. He grabbed Nathan’s collar and shoved him back, sending him crashing against the wall with a groan. Lily gasped, stepping forward on instinct, but stopped when she saw the rage on Magnus’s face.

“Nathan!” the innkeeper shouted. “I’ll not have a brawl outside my doors. Get gone, all of you, before I call someone with more arms than teeth.”

Nathan wiped dust from his face, but he didn’t retreat. Not yet.

“Fine. Kick me out. Add it to the list of everything I’ve lost because of him.”

“You lost everything,” Magnus growled, “because you’re a coward who couldn’t hold his own cards.”

Nathan’s expression twisted. “Easy for you to say. You were born with a bloody silver spoon in your mouth, weren’t you? You never had to worry about putting food on the table ever since you inherited the duchy. Your father didn’t leave you a pile of debts after his death! Mine did.”

Silence fell between them, only to be broken by Magnus’s sarcastic, dry chuckle.

But Lily quickly interjected before anyone could.

“You think handing me over to Ronald Bailey was keeping me safe?” Her voice cracked despite her attempt to keep her composure. “You think disappearing when I got married was keeping me safe?”

“I thought,” Nathan bit back as he rose from the ground, “that if you were in enough danger, he’d pay it off! He’s clearly attached to you, isn’t he?” He waved a bloody hand toward Magnus. “I gambled on the only card I had left—his weakness for you.”

“You absolute bastard,” Magnus gritted out, his voice no louder than a breath but sharp enough to cut glass.

This time, when he moved, Lily didn’t flinch. Her heart hammering, she watched as her husband drove his fist into Nathan’s ribs, hard enough that Nathan folded with a wheeze and dropped to one knee.

“Go ahead,” Nathan rasped. “Hit me again. You want to beat something into me? Try sense. Try luck. Hell, try responsibility. Because all I ever got handed was a life already damned before I could hold a quill. A father who drank away our future, a mother buried before I grew into my boots, and a sister I was supposed to protect with nothing but air in my pockets and debts biting at my heels.”

His voice rose with each word.

“You think I wanted to disappear? You think I didn’t see you kissing her, holding her like you would die without her? What was I supposed to do? Watch her marry the devil and pretend it wasn’t better than starvation?”

“Nathan, stop!” Lily snapped.

But it was too late.

From the shadows in the alley, the sound of footsteps echoed, and it sounded like dozens of them.

Boots pounded against cobblestone, followed by a low murmur of voices and malicious laughter.

Nathan froze with instant recognition.

Lily and Magnus exchanged a look before turning around slowly.

Out of the fog emerged six—no, seven men. They grinned like a devil who stumbled upon the evening’s entertainment.

One of them, younger than the rest with a wicked glint in his eyes, cracked his knuckles and looked straight at Nathan.

“Well, well,” he drawled, his voice dripping with mockery. “Looks like the rat found his way home.”

He stepped forward, cocky and careless, like a fox toying with a bird that had already broken its wing.

“Thought you could outrun the lot of us, didn’t you, Medlin?”

Nathan said nothing. His mouth opened, but no sound came. For once, he looked exactly as he was—cornered, breathless, and utterly defeated.

Lily stepped instinctively between him and the newcomers.

“Move,” the boy ordered, sounding bored. He looked barely twenty-two. “Unless you’d like to get your pretty dress dirty, Duchess.”

She didn’t move. “You’ll touch neither of us.”

The boy grinned. “It ain’t you I’m after, sweet. But if you’re protecting him?—”

“He’s not worth your trouble,” Magnus cut in, stepping up to Lily’s side, his tone flat as stone.

The men paused at the sound of his voice.

They knew his voice. At least two of them shifted uneasily from one foot to the other.

One of the older men, with a scar across his cheek and the tattoos of a naval deserter curling up his neck, tilted his head in disbelief.

“The Duke of Blackmore?” he drawled. “Fancy seein’ you here.”

The boy blinked. “This is him?”

“The hell it is,” another muttered, stepping back slightly.

Magnus looked positively unbothered, which only made him more dangerous.

“That’s right. I run the halls where you gamble your stolen shillings and piss away your borrowed time.

I’ve seen men crawl to my feet, begging for mercy.

” He took a step forward, slow and deliberate.

“You’re not the worst I’ve dealt with. But you could be. ”

Scar-face hesitated, but the boy wasn’t deterred. He approached Magnus with a swagger in his step, his lips curled into a sneer. “You talk big for a man with a wife and a whelp to protect.”

Magnus moved so fast that no one had time to blink.

One second, the boy was smirking; the next, his wrist was pulled and twisted before he was thrown into a pile of wood with a sickening crunch.

The rest of the men stepped forward instinctively, their hands moving toward their knives, ready for their leader’s command.

“Try me,” Magnus growled, his eyes flashing with barely leashed violence. “I’ll make what I did to him look like a damn handshake.”

The boy groaned from the ground, his leg bent at a bizarre angle. He would not be walking anytime soon.

Nathan stared at the scene before slowly pushing himself to his feet. As for Lily, she didn’t speak. She couldn’t. All she could manage was breathing hard.

Magnus turned his gaze to the rest of the gang and straightened the sleeves of his coat, his voice even once more. “If any of you would like to join him, now’s the time.”

Silence ensued, a tense one.

Scar-face exhaled slowly. “He owes us.” He jerked his head toward Nathan. “That doesn’t disappear just ‘cause you can throw a punch.”

“He owes you,” Magnus agreed, stepping up to Nathan’s side. “But now I owe you. And unlike him, I pay my debts.”

Scar-face furrowed his brow. “When?”

“Tomorrow,” Magnus said simply. “You’ll hear from me no later than midday.”

“And if we don’t?” Scar-face asked, his voice rough.

“Then by nightfall,” Magnus said with a cold smile, “you’ll find out exactly how many bones I’m willing to break.”

More silence followed, the men seeming to weigh their options.

Finally, Scar-face gave a grunt, tugged at the collar of his coat, and nodded toward the others. “Let’s go. He’s buying time.” He cast a final look at Magnus. “You’ve got one day. No more.”

One of the men came to help the boy up before they turned and disappeared into the fog.

Once they had gone, Nathan sagged against the wall.

Lily’s heart fluttered. She looked at her husband, who had just stared down an entire gang of thugs with the ease of a man discussing a dinner menu.

She had the worst feeling ever—that her family always had a way of dragging him into trouble.

He turned to her, catching her searching gaze with his unreadable one. “Are you all right?”

She nodded stiffly, her voice still somewhere between her ribs and her heart. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I did,” he said simply, then reached for Nathan’s collar and yanked him up like a sack of flour.

Nathan winced. “Was that truly necessary?”

“No,” Magnus said, “but it felt rather satisfying.”

Dragging Nathan forward with little regard for his protests, he moved back to the carriage waiting at the mouth of the alley. The driver stared openly, his eyes wide with concern.

“Open the door,” Magnus ordered.

The driver jumped down and opened the door without missing a beat.

“Get in,” Magnus said.

Nathan hesitated at first. Then, reluctantly, he climbed inside.

Lily followed silently, but she didn’t sit beside him. Instead, she sat across from him, her spine stiff and her hands clasped in her lap. Once the door shut behind them, the carriage lurched forward.

During the ride, Nathan didn’t dare meet her eyes. The silence that fell over them was thick… too thick, it was almost unbearable.

And then, when it was least expected, Nathan cleared his throat.

“I suppose a thank you is in order,” he muttered.

“Don’t,” Lily said quietly. Not with anger, but exhaustion.

He clamped his mouth shut before looking at the couple. Lily had her gaze fixed on the window while Magnus was watching him quietly, as though waiting for him to attempt to escape again.

Minutes passed, the clip-clop of hooves and the light drizzle being the only sounds.

Eventually, Lily turned to look at her brother.

“I want to forgive you,” she began, her voice low. “I want to remember you as my brother. The one who gave me the last slice of cake when we were children. The one who snuck me out of Father’s study when I’d broken his inkpot.”

Nathan looked down at his hands.

“But you didn’t just disappear,” she continued, her voice shaking slightly. “You watched it all burn and walked away with the matches.”

He winced. “I didn’t know?—”

“Don’t lie to me.” She scowled at him. “You made your choices, Nathan. Now, you’ll live with them.”

He opened his mouth to reply, but Magnus reached over and knocked twice on the wall.

“Not now,” he said firmly. “Let her be angry. You earned every bit of it.”

They rode the rest of the way in silence.

Nathan didn’t speak again. Lily didn’t look at him. And Magnus sat between them like a wall neither dared try to breach.

But beneath it all, there was still something else. Something yet to be broached.