Page 29 of The Devil Himself (The Devil You Know #1)
Twenty-Seven
R ys hit the landing on the second floor and turned, racing down the hall to where he knew Gareth’s bedchamber lay.
How could he have been so blind as not to realize that Arthur would have some kind of an accomplice in all of this?
He’d known he was missing something, and it had been someone urging Arthur to follow through on this scheme. If it wasn’t Daffyd, then who was it?
He reached the end of the hall where Sauce Box Joe sprawled on the floor, blood seeping from his shoulder, his eyes only half open. “She came in through the window,” Joe croaked.
Rys’s pistol dangled from his hand until he remembered finally that he held it. He burst through the door, hoping against hope that Gareth was still alive and unharmed. He skidded to a halt again when he saw the tableau.
“Stay back!” The cocking of an ancient dueling pistol sounded loud in the room, and Rys stared at the lovely, if exhausted, young woman who stood with an arm wrapped around Gareth’s neck.
The mate to the pistol lay smoking on the floor.
With a start, he realized she was the woman in widow’s weeds who had been at the inn where they had stopped the night before.
And the woman who had been outside his house when he was stabbed… Damnation.
“Who in the bloody blazes are you?” he snapped, evening the score by pointing his pistol at her. Gareth was just short enough that he could get a good shot in if he kept his hand steady. She was not a dainty woman.
Luc came to a halt behind him, just to his right where Luc could also get a shot off if need be. Two pistols against one were always better odds.
“I will shoot him, I swear. I will. Arthur says he’ll get the money if he dies.
” The woman started backing away toward the window, which even if she had entered that way, seemed not the best plan to get out with Gareth, but then if this was Arthur’s mistress as he suspected, she was probably no more organized a criminal than his brother.
“Now, madam, there’s no need to be hasty.” Luc said it in a soothing tone. “You haven’t actually harmed him. If you just drop your pistol, we’ll let you go.”
She scoffed. “I shot the big fool in the hall. Do you really think that I believe toffs like you would let me go? You’ll send me off to the gaol and let Arthur go free because he’s the son of a marquess.”
Rys flashed her his most devilish smile, knowing it looked like that of a dangerous animal baring its teeth. “On the contrary. I intend to see Arthur hang for this. He’s downstairs being detained by several of my men. You don’t stand a chance, my dear. Let him go.”
Gareth simply stared at him, eyes like two holes burned in a blanket. The lad had to be terrified; his lips were almost devoid of color, but he stayed still as a statue, not crying or even shaking. Rys thought he was waiting for his opportunity, and he was incredibly proud of the young man.
She tightened her arm around Gareth’s neck, causing him to gurgle. “I have nothing to lose now, devil! I will take him with me.”
“And what Arthur has given you, is it worth this?” That was Luc, his voice impassioned, his hand still never wavering, though, where Rys could see it out of the corner of his eye.
“He promised me I would be a lady!” Her voice rose to a screech, but then she calmed. “It doesn’t matter now what he promised me. I’m not gonna get any of it, but I’m not gonna live through this either, so why shouldn’t I kill the boy?”
Rys advanced on her one slow step at a time, backing her toward the wall.
“Because he’s just a boy, and because he hasn’t done anything to deserve it.
Arthur killed his father, and he’s tried to kill both me and Lord Angelsey here.
If you didn’t help him with any of that, then the worst you’ll get is time and gaol. ”
“I think I would rather hang.” Her back hit the wall, one shoulder blade against it, the other at the open window, and Rys rushed at her because if nothing else he would grab Gareth before she tried to shoot him in order to distract him while she went out the window.
Her pistol wavered wildly, unlike his and Luc’s, and he knew that she would probably not be able to hit him with that ancient firearm.
They were unpredictable at best even at short range.
With any luck, it would jam on her or perhaps she wouldn’t be able to decide which of them to shoot.
One way or the other, he had to stop her.
Gareth was too important. He was family, real family.
In fact, after this debacle, he would be the only blood family Rys still acknowledged.
“Let him go.” He stared into this unfortunate young woman’s eyes as she teetered and saw calculation and fear. She had gotten herself mixed up in Arthur’s mess, and now there was no way out. And desperate people did desperate things.
So he made a final lunge at her, smacking her pistol out of the way with the hand that held his own weapon.
It went off, the shot going wide, and he could only hope to hell that it hadn’t hit Luc, but he couldn’t look now.
Instead, he grabbed Gareth’s arm as she backpedaled even more, tearing the boy out of her grasp.
The woman screamed as she fell backward out of the house through the window, and Luc rushed to the opening to peer through as there was a sickening crunch outside.
The fall was only one story, but that was enough.
With a house like this, one story was enough for her to have broken her neck or crushed her head.
“Is she—" Gareth buried his face in Rys’s chest and shook. “Is she gone?”
“I don’t think we’ll need to worry about her any longer, regardless. Joe’s men have her surrounded even if she’s still alive.” Luc joined them. “Gareth, are you injured?”
“No, she hurt my neck, but I don’t think it’s anything permanent. Where is Uncle Arthur?” Gareth pulled back, eyes wide. “Sauce Box!”
“Your uncle is downstairs surrounded by our men.” He glanced out the bedroom door. “Joe is being tended.” By two people no less. “Where are the maid and footman?”
Gareth pulled away, wiping his eyes and nose on his sleeve. His expression hardened into something that was very marquess-like. “They ran. I’ll have to sack them.”
“I think that’s probably a very good idea.” He understood fearing for one’s life, but really, how could one not protect a lad of Gareth’s age?
Luc laid his pistol on the side table by the bed and then went to the hall to kneel next to Joe, who was being tended by a hired guard and the housekeeper. “How are you, Joe?”
“I’ll live, m’Lord, but I think we’re going to need to dig the ball out.” Joe grimaced as he and Gareth walked out into the hall.
“Thank you, Joe.” Gareth sounded shaky, his face ashen.
“Had to keep you safe, Master Gareth.”
“We will call for a physician,” Luc murmured, removing his jacket and folding it into a pad that he could put over the wound. “Thank you for not abandoning him.”
No, sir. I’ll never leave me post.”
“Good man.” Rys wrapped an arm around Gareth, who still wobbled. “Shall we go confront your uncle?”
Gareth nodded, that jaw still firmed up, his lips pressed tightly. “Together, yes. I want to look him in the eye when the magistrate comes for him and takes him to hang.”
Rys chuckled, because he supposed he and young Gareth had a great deal in common. “So do I, nephew. So do I.”