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N omansland’s study had always struck him as the sort of room where a man could drink himself to death with style.

Even tonight, with just the light from a single candle, it was a place perfectly suited to melodrama.

Mahogany paneling, the reek of cigar smoke lingering from a previous night, and the solitary company of a bottle of brandy half-emptied and sulking on his desk.

He leaned back in the chair, filled with visions of the spectacle he’d made of himself at the Munsterley ball, or, more accurately, the spectacle he and Chrissy had made of each other. London’s gossips would feast for months.

The clock in the corner—an absurdly grand thing with a face like a bishop and chimes that struck the hour as if announcing the coming of the Lord—ticked with the gravity of fate.

Nomansland counted each second as it slipped away, waiting for the inevitable, the visit that would settle everything or nothing.

He tipped the decanter and poured another glass. His hand shook—just a little, just enough to move the liquor in the glass. He watched the brandy swirl, amber and viscous, and considered his options.

He’d rehearsed the conversation a hundred times since he’d left the Munsterley’s home, each version more disastrous than the last. Abingdon would demand satisfaction.

He would make threats, some empty and some not.

There would be talk of honor and families and the lifelong wreckage of a girl’s reputation, all of which was entirely justified.

Nomansland knew himself well enough to accept the full catalogue of his crimes.

He had, after all, written most of it himself.

But what he didn’t know—what terrified him, if he were being honest, which he rarely was—was whether he could say the right thing.

Whether he could give Abingdon, and Chrissy, and the entire damned world, the assurance they needed.

That he would do the right thing, marry the girl, make a model husband, and put the ghosts of his past to rest.

He doubted it. But he would try, and that had to count for something.

A gust of wind shook the windows, and somewhere below, the sound of a carriage door slamming echoed up through the house.

The front door opened and closed, not gently.

Nomansland didn’t bother to move from his seat.

The next act was inevitable, and he would not give Abingdon the satisfaction of seeing him so much as blink.

He counted the footsteps on the stairs—fourteen, each heavier than the last. The corridor outside the study was silent for a moment, then the knob twisted and the door banged open so hard it rattled the glass in the decanters.

Abingdon strode in, all champion of innocence and coiled violence. His hair was wild, his cheeks slashed red with rage, and his eyes, usually so calculating, were feral.

Nomansland set the glass down, but didn’t rise. “Shall we dispense with the pleasantries?” he said, voice low and, he hoped, calm.

Abingdon didn’t answer. He crossed the room in three steps, balled his right hand into a fist, and drove it into Nomansland’s left eye with the precision of a man who had once boxed at Oxford and never quite outgrown the taste for it.

Stars exploded and blocked out the rest of the room for a good two seconds. Nomansland tasted blood where he’d bitten his tongue and then remembered to breathe. He slumped back in the chair, clutching the armrests.

When he could open his eye, he blinked up at Abingdon, the world fuzzy and doubled at the edges. “I suppose I deserved that,” he said, trying and failing to sound wry.

Abingdon’s chest heaved, but he stood over Nomansland, fists still clenched, eyes still wild.

“If you’d like another go,” Nomansland continued, “I can stand up this time. Make myself a better target.”

Abingdon shook his head, but the motion was more animal than human, as if trying to clear the taste of violence from his tongue.

He stalked away, paced to the window, then spun on his heel and glared at Nomansland with such pure fury that he almost expected the glass to shatter from the force of it.

“You arrogant, reckless—” Abingdon could not finish the thought. He pressed his knuckles to his mouth, then let his hand drop. “You were seen. You were both seen,” he spat.

Nomansland nodded, accepting the truth of it.

Abingdon closed the distance between them in a flash, leaning down until they were nose to nose.

“Did you intend to ruin her?” he demanded. “Was that the plan all along? Get the little Westfall girl alone and?—”

Nomansland forced himself to meet Abingdon’s gaze, even as the pain in his face blossomed into something ripe and spectacular. “I didn’t intend?—”

Abingdon slammed a hand down on the arm of the chair, cutting him off.

“Don’t lie to me. She is my wife’s sister. I warned you to leave her alone. And you—” He said the word as if it were an epithet. “You knew exactly what you were doing.”

Nomansland wanted to argue. Wanted to explain, to say that what he’d done was not calculated, not even particularly rational, but driven by some terrible, uncontrollable need.

But Abingdon would not want to hear it. He would only want to be assured that the scandal could be contained, that the girl would be made respectable again, that Nomansland would do his damned duty.

So Nomansland took a breath, and let the pain settle him.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to compromise her. I…” The words tasted foreign and not a little sour. He groped for the right phrase, found none, and settled on the truth. “I care for her.”

Abingdon snorted. “You don’t care for anyone but yourself.”

Nomansland flinched, though not from pain. “You are wrong. I care for her. Enough to do what’s necessary. Enough to marry her.”

Abingdon’s laugh was so sharp it could have flayed a man. “Have I done something to make you hate me? Is this some sort of revenge, threatening to marry Dinah’s sister? You think I would allow you within ten feet of her again if I had a choice?”

Nomansland pressed a hand to his face, wincing as the swelling began in earnest. “Do you truly think me incapable of being fond of the girl?”

The silence that followed was not companionable. It was a knife fight in a dark alley.

Abingdon finally straightened, stepped back, and looked at Nomansland with a loathing so complete it might have frozen water.

“You will marry her,” he said, each syllable a gunshot. “And you will make her happy, or so help me I will see you broken. I don’t care if it destroys Sutcliffe’s. My family is more important.”

Nomansland met his gaze. “Done.” He raised his glass in mock salute.

Abingdon turned on his heel and stalked from the room, slamming the door behind him.

Nomansland sat in the silence, the brandy burning in his throat, the pain in his face blooming like a peony.

He should have felt victorious. Instead, he only felt hollowed out, as if the punch had reached right through to the center of him and found nothing worth the trouble.

He closed his eyes, letting the world slip away, and wondered what on earth he would say to Chrissy.

The clock ticked on, indifferent and inexorable.

Somewhere in the house, a door banged. Somewhere in the city, rumors spread like wildfire.

And in the study, Nomansland poured another drink, the first of many.

* * *

The clock had just finished tolling three when Abingdon returned.

He didn’t knock this time, but entered with the sullen inevitability of a debt collector.

His face was a study in exhaustion, lines carved deep by anger and a night spent wrestling his better nature.

He closed the door quietly behind him—a courtesy, perhaps, or a sign that whatever happened next would not need witnesses.

Nomansland stood by the window, the glass of brandy untouched in his hand. He could see his reflection in the glass, the swollen eye, the split lip, the bruises already blooming at the edge of his jaw. He looked like a man who had lost a fight, which was only fitting.

Abingdon said nothing for a long time. He paced the length of the study, five steps to the bookshelves, five steps back, each circuit winding him tighter. Nomansland waited, letting the silence do what words could not.

Finally, Abingdon stopped, bracing himself against the edge of the desk.

“What the hell were you thinking?” he demanded, voice ragged from shouting or drinking or both.

Nomansland stared at the window, not trusting himself to answer.

Abingdon pounced, crossing the room in two strides. “Was it a joke to you? A game? You knew what would happen if you were seen—if she was seen—with you.”

Nomansland turned, setting the glass down with deliberate care. He didn’t sit.

“It was not a joke,” he said. “And it was not a game.”

Abingdon scoffed, but the sound was hollow. “So what, then? You fancied her and thought you’d take your chance before someone better came along?”

This time Nomansland’s voice carried steel. “No. I decided a week ago I was going to marry her. The rest—” He shrugged, wincing as the movement tugged at the bruised muscles of his neck. “The rest was clumsy. I’ll grant you that.”

Abingdon’s eyes narrowed, searching Nomansland’s face for any sign of mockery or evasion. Finding none, he barked a bitter laugh. “You’ve ruined her,” he said, as if announcing a verdict.

“Gossip will pass. I’ve said I will marry her.”

Abingdon’s hands balled into fists, but this time he kept them at his sides. “You’re a reckless bastard. You always have been.”

“Agreed.”

“And yet—” Abingdon looked away, wrestling with something unseen. “She seems to think you’re worth the risk. God knows why.”

Nomansland let the words hang, heavy as lead.

They stood in silence, the space between them charged with the unspoken knowledge of what men like them could and could not say aloud.

At last, Abingdon spoke again, softer now. “If you ever hurt her—if you ever make her regret this for even a day—I will see you in the ground. There won’t be enough left of you to bury.”

Nomansland accepted this with a nod. “I understand.”

He expected Abingdon to storm out, or perhaps throw another punch for good measure, but the other man just stared at him, the fight draining out of him by degrees.

“What will you tell her?” Abingdon asked, voice small.

“The truth,” Nomansland said. “That I want her. That I intend to make her happy, if it kills me.”

Abingdon grunted, a sound halfway between approval and defeat. “See that you do.” He turned toward the door, but paused. “Do you love her?”

Nomansland considered the question, tasted the word on his tongue. It was not one he had ever spoken in earnest.“Yes.” He was surprised to find it didn’t hurt at all.

Abingdon nodded, almost imperceptibly, and let himself out, closing the door with a softness that belied every threat he had made that night.

Nomansland remained by the window, watching the streetlamps flicker in the pre-dawn gloom.

He knew what was expected of him now.

And for the first time, he found he didn’t dread it.