He cupped her chin, and then he leaned down and kissed her. Hard. Heavy. Swiftly over, but powerfully felt.
She dropped her hands away from his arms and was about to ask him if he was hit when she noticed the wetness on her palm. Blood.
“Oscar,” she said, sitting up. “You’re injured.”
He glanced down at the hole in his jacket. Blood seeped from the wound beneath. The others were calling out now, indicating they were unharmed, and she grabbed his arm with both hands, putting pressure on the wound as they rose from behind the couch.
“He’s cut,” she said.
“That’s not a cut,” Mr. Huntington replied as he moved forward. He was unwinding his cravat as he went. “You’ve been shot.”
Imogen could scarcely hear over the rush of blood to her ears. The rush of terror as Oscar looked down at his arm with a shrug. “It seems I have.”
“Oscar!” Imogen cried out.
He ignored her as he removed the jacket and he and Huntington examined the wound together. The Duchess of Willowby came to Huntington’s elbow and also looked closely. Imogen swallowed at the sight of the horrible hole there in his upper arm, closer to his left shoulder than to his elbow.
“It went through,” Oscar said. She saw him flinch slightly, but that was the only indication he gave that there was pain. “Wrap it, if you will, and I’ll have it looked at later.”
Imogen stared at him. How could he be so dismissive of the fact that he’d beenshot? Because of her. The others seemed equally taken aback, but Huntington shook his head and wrapped the arm with his discarded cravat as he had been asked. Oscar hardly reacted as he did so, but instead looked around the room.
Imogen followed his gaze, and her heart sank. This beautiful room in the club he had spent so much of his life building was destroyed. The window was shattered, there were bullet holes in furniture, the decorations had been shredded by broken glass.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered.
Imogen bent her head, guilt ravaging her the same way the attack had ravaged all he’d built. “I’m sorry.”
His brow wrinkled, but the look of annoyance on his face didn’t seem to change as he said, “Don’t.”
She could hardly breathe as he turned his gaze away from hers. He’d been so passionately worried for her, but now he put the wall up again. She was fine, but he had lost so much because of her. There was no wonder he might wish to be as far from her as possible.
Willowby had moved to the window and was carefully peering out from around the edge of the broken glass to the street below. “I don’t see anyone. There must have been more than one assailant for all this carnage. Diana, Barber, we should go down and question witnesses on the street. Huntington, does that wound need more attention?”
Huntington finished tying off the cravat. “It’s fine for now, though he’ll need a doctor later.”
Huntington kept talking. They were all making arrangements now to interview witnesses to the attack. To check on Oscar’s servants in the back of the club. To send for more men to search for the culprits.
Imogen ignored it all. She could do nothing else but just stare at Oscar, his wound still seeping through the tight bandage. She watched him talk, watched him move as he took command of these strangers in his space.
He had been hurt because of her. He could have died because of her. And in that moment, she knew she loved him. She had fallen in love with him, and there was no changing that even if it was foolish and could only end in heartbreak.
He was still talking, completely oblivious to what she now knew was true. “…right now, though, I need to take Imogen away.”
She blinked, drawn away from the startling truth of her heart and back to the room. He would take her away? Even after all the trouble she’d caused, he still wanted to protect her? Didn’t that mean something?
Aurora had been standing in Nicholas Gillingham’s arms, and now she staggered closer. “No, wait! Is that for the best?”
The others exchanged a look, and then Willowby, Barber and Huntington left the room. That left only the Duchess of Willowby, Aurora and Gillingham, for it seemed Mrs. Huntington had also gone out to check on the servants, as Imogen was coming to her realization about her feelings.
The duchess approached Oscar. She was a pretty woman, petite and curvaceous, with a kind face. An observant face, however, and Imogen realized she was trying to read the man standing before her. She almost snorted at the idea. Oscar took time to know. To understand. This woman wouldn’t do it after only knowing him five minutes. “Mr. Fitzhugh, obviously this event has been upsetting.”
Oscar tensed and glared at her. “Upsetting, Your Grace? You think this isupsetting?”
The duchess might not have been able to understand him, but Imogen did. She saw that he was at his boiling point. That the day’s events had dragged him to the edge of his vast control.
“Oscar,” Imogen said softly as she took his hand. He turned his head, his jaw clenching, but he didn’t blow up. Imogen looked at the duchess. “Your Grace, he has protected me well in the last few weeks. Perhaps it would be better for me to go with him. I’ve endangered enough people as it is.”
Of course, she had endangered Oscar, too.
