But while their eyes were warm and full of love, when Felicity looked at Fitzgilbert, all she saw was emptiness. It put her to mind of her late husband and her hands began to shake before she shoved them behind her back.
“I expected a call from someone in your wretched family,” Fitzgilbert said as he shut the door behind himself. “But not you, Lady Barbridge. I am rarely surprised anymore, so good show.”
She flinched at his cold tone, at the wicked smile that turned up his lips when he spoke those words. He made her want to run. To hide. To surrender to whatever fate he would deem she suffer.
But then she thought of Asher. Asher, who believed she had strength. She thought of her family, who would fall alongside of her if she let this go on.
And somehow she thrust her shoulders back and found a way to stand up for herself.
“You and I both know why I’ve come,” she said.
He arched a brow. “I didn’t question why you were here, my lady. Just why you would be alone when you did it. Those idiots my granddaughters married and your failure of an older brother couldn’t havereallythought to send you here unprotected.”
She pressed her lips together, refusing to rise to his bait. “They do not know I’m here, Mr. Fitzgilbert. I thought perhaps you and I should talk, considering you have something of mine.”
His smile broadened as he moved farther into the room. He settled himself into a chair, steepling his fingers in his lap as he looked up at her in mocking. “Something of yours, my lady? I don’t think so. You see, it’s mine now. I bought it.”
“Yes, I realize that,” she said, taking a seat across from him without asking his leave. She leaned forward, forcing herself to hold his stare, gathering strength once more from Asher’s belief in her before she continued, “And I’m sure you have your reasons for doing so.”
“Your family stole my granddaughters out from under me,” Fitzgilbert said. “My leverage in Society was the value of their hands. You took it and now you’ll pay.Thatis my reason.”
She shivered. She’d only known one other man in her life who was so cold. She’d been forced to kill him. Today she had no weapon and she was beginning to question whether she needed one.
“Let us not discuss my family right now,” she said. “I know that you also have a secret, one you bought alongside mine.”
“Yes,” he said with another of those smiles. “I do.”
“I imagine when your daughter left you, when she ran off with a servant, it must have crushed you,” Felicity said. “Rank is clearly of importance to you. And I suppose you must have also worried about her future. You’ve protected that secret a long time, far longer than I’ve protected mine. You’ve fought to keep it from coming out, to Society and also to Celia and Rosalinde. I…” She swallowed, for what she was about to say was distasteful and she couldn’t let that be obvious. “Iunderstandthat. I understand the need to protect yourself and those around you. You and I are not so much unalike.”
His eyes went wide, and then he laughed. It was an ugly sound, born out of anger or suffering rather than true humor or goodness. It was the sound of mocking, not joy.
“You have never said a truer thing in your life, my lady,” he said at last. “Wearealike. But not for the reason you want to think we are.”
Felicity took a long breath. “How then, Mr. Fitzgilbert?”
He pushed to his feet and she tensed as he moved toward her, ready for an attack. But it didn’t come. Instead, he walked past her, making her get up and turn to watch him.
“You come here without Grayson Danford, John Dane and the Earl of Stenfax, and I think you believe that you can appeal to my kindness. Or some deep, hidden love for my family that has kept me protecting my secret all these years. But you don’t understand one vital thing, Lady Barbridge.”
“And what is that?” she asked, her hopes sinking, her heart breaking, a full understanding of what a monster this man was already clear even before he said whatever vile thing would follow.
“I never loved my family,” he spat out. “I loved what they could provide for my prowess and my comfort. Those girls, my feckless whore of a daughter and my foolish grandchildren, they all betrayed me. And now I’m going to useyouto make them pay.”
Felicity couldn’t help it—she flinched, even though she knew from bitter experience that the expression of her pain was exactly what made this man happier than anything.
“You would destroy my entire family just to hurt Celia and Rosalinde?” she whispered.
He nodded. “Indeed I would, my dear. They cannot be allowed to escape from their duty without paying the cost. And this is the cost.Youare the cost.”
The door flew open behind them and Felicity spun around as Fitzgilbert’s servant rushed in. “Sir, sir, I tried to stop them, but—”
He didn’t get to finish before Asher came striding through the door with John on his heels. Felicity caught her breath at the cold and furious expression on his face. One that disappeared into shock when he saw her standing there.
“Felicity?” he said.
John said nothing. He lunged toward her with a look of horror on his face, but before he could reach her, Felicity felt an arm come around her from behind.
And the cold steel of a pistol barrel press to her temple as Fitzgilbert drew her back against him with a chuckle.
