Good thing it hadn’t hit Marlbury; she might have wanted her revenge, but she didn’t want to be a killer, and heaven knew he didn’t want that for her, either.
Marlbury groaned, sprawled across the floor on broken glass. Oliver hoped it cut him. His head throbbed, and there was blood sliding into his eye.
“Oliver!” Emily was by his side, her hands cupping his face and trying to wipe away the blood. He thought she might have been crying, but he couldn’t quite see.
“I’m all right,” he said, his voice surprisingly calm. “Get Isabella. We’re leaving.”
Emily pointed the pistol at where Marlbury was now sitting up, his palms as bloody as Oliver’s temple. There was no more ammunition in the pistol, but if there had been, he was certain she would have fired.
“Steady, sweetheart,” Oliver said. At the endearment, she glanced at him. “If you kill him, I’ll be forced to flee to Europe with you, and then you’llhaveto marry me.”
A tiny smile flitted across her face. “Is that what it will take for you to ask me again?”
“No. You only need to tell me you love me, and I will get on one knee. But not here, darling, please. I must have my dignity.” He kissed her forehead, hoping he got no blood on her. “Fetch Isabella now, and take her to the carriage.”
Marlbury groaned, his eyes unfocused. “What the devil—”
“Quiet,” Oliver snapped.
Isabella descended to the bottom of the stairs, white-knuckled fingers holding the cloak in place. “Emily,” she said, her voice faint. “You tried to shoot him.”
“Don’t worry, dearest. I missed.” Emily once again put her arm around Isabella and ushered her from the room. This time, either because of the pistol Emily still held or because it had finally become evident that Marlbury had no honourable intentions, Isabella put up no resistance.
Oliver turned back to Marlbury as his former friend hauled himself to his feet. “It’s over,” he said. “Just let her go.”
“You’ve changed.” Marlbury’s face twisted. “What does it matter who I entertain myself with?”
“If you’ve paid a whore, that’s one thing, but this is entirely different. She’s a lady. Respectable—or was.”
“Is that what you thought when you took off with the sister?” Marlbury’s lip curled. “I got there first, you know.”
Oliver moved before he knew what he had done. His fist connected with a satisfying thud against Marlbury’s jaw, and he shook out his hand as Marlbury staggered back. Rage boiled in his chest—not that Emily had lain with another man before, but that the man in question had seduced her so callously.
He might have been able to forgive many things, but he could not forgive Marlbury hurting the woman he loved.
“That was for her,” Oliver hissed. He swung again, planting his fist in Marlbury’s side. Marlbury choked, doubling over, and Oliver kicked him to the ground. “And that was for me.”
Marlbury coughed and spat. “All this over a girl?”
“All this because you never learnt basic respect, and I never thought to teach it to you.”
“Respect?” Marlbury choked a laugh tinged with insanity. “We are the same, you and I. You know it and I know it. I wouldn’t have even chased the girl if you hadn’t wanted her first.”
They might have been more similar once, but Oliver barely recognised the man he had been. And there was one crucial difference. “No,” he said. “I intended to marry her. You intended to use and discard her, just the same way you used and discarded Emily.” Disgusted with Marlbury and the conversation, he turned to leave, wiping the blood on his cheek with the back of his hand.
“So you’ll marry the shrew?” Marlbury slurred, staggering to his feet. “Is that it?”
Oliver turned and bowed, channelling Henry’s icy disdain. “If she deigns to have me, I will be the most fortunate of men,” he said, and grinned. “Oh, and one more thing. Your father will be hearing of this. Pack your bags, Marlbury; I doubt he’ll have youremain in London much longer. I wouldn’t even be surprised if he disinherited you. And good riddance.”
Isabella huddled in a corner of the carriage, Emily’s cloak around her shoulders. Oliver dabbed at his cheek with a handkerchief, wiping away the worst of the blood. He was fortunate the glass hadn’t gone into his eye, but the injury didn’t seem to bother him overmuch.
Emily kept replacing the scene in her head, the way Marlbury had raised the glass and brought it down on Oliver’s face. The way her finger had squeezed the trigger without even meaning to; the jump of the gun in her hands.
Oliver, promising he would ask her to marry him so long as she told him she loved him. Asking her not to kill Marlbury, as though he had thought it was a possibility.
And Isabella. For a moment, Emily had thought Isabella would choose Marlbury over her. Over herfamily. Even knowing that Marlbury was a good-for-nothing rake, Emily had thought Isabella would choose to stay with him.
Oliver hissed a breath as he dabbed at his cut. “I’m all right,” he said before she could even ask. “It’ll heal into a very fetching scar.”
