“I know,” he said simply. “Stay behind me.”
He turned.
The three men from the tavern materialized out of the fog, breathing hard, their faces pulling into slow, ugly smiles when they saw him. The leader’s nose had already begun to swell, she noted with grim satisfaction.
“Ah. Another fancy lord. It must be our lucky day,” the leader declared, looking darkly amused. “Step aside. This girl is ours.”
Cassian said nothing. He did not step aside. He simply stood there, and something in his stillness made the men slow their advance. He was no longer leaning on his cane.
He had told his friends, not three hours ago, that desire would never dictate his actions. And here he was. Standing in a rookery in the middle of the night, his hip on fire, three men between him and whatever came next, because a woman he had married for revenge had walked into the dark.
He had not reasoned his way here. He had not weighed the merits. He had simply moved the moment he saw her.
“She belongs to me,” he said, quietly enough that the men had to strain to hear it. “And I am already in a foul enough mood tonight. You may test that, if you like. I find I have very little patience left for gutter rats.”
Chapter 15
The leader spat on the cobblestones. His eyes moved to the silver-topped cane, then to the silk, then to Cassian’s leg, and whatever uncertainty had flickered across his face hardened into a smirk.
“Your kind don’t come down here for good reason, fancy lord,” he said. “Three of us, one of you, and a hitch in your step that tells me you can’t run far. Hand over the girl and your purse, and we’ll leave you with enough teeth to eat breakfast.”
Cassian smiled thinly, knowing full well what look unsettled men on the battlefield. Fog swirled around his legs. It looked either like a phantom was rising from the filthy mud or like his legs were gaining power.
“Ah, is that what this is all about? You think you can take anything from a man with a hitch in his step? Do you know that this hitch can be an advantage?” he asked calmly. “Well, it certainly means I am not inclined to chase you, but it also means you cannot run.”
“Cassian.” Juliana’s fingers dug into his arm, her voice low and urgent. “Please, let us just go.”
He covered her hand with his. Then he stepped forward.
It was too late; the Duke was already incensed. Nobody talked to him the way the thug did. He knew it was unwise, but he had to do something about it.
It was not the mockery of his leg that decided it. He had endured far worse from far better men without flinching, but the way the man’s gaze dragged over Juliana. It was almost as if the thug thought he had a right to her, which was far from the truth.
These men would not breathe near his wife.
“Step behind me,” he said quietly, expecting a protest from his headstrong wife. None came. “It is one thing to insult my leg, but I cannot stand them looking at you as if they had a chance of spiriting you away.”
When no protest came, he turned to face the three men.
They came at once, which he had expected. There was a blade in the leader’s hand, which he had also expected. Whattheyhad not expected, clearly, was that a man with a hitch in his step might have spent five years on the Continent learning precisely how to use that particular disadvantage to his favor.
He shifted his weight and brought the cane up in a short, savage arc. The silver head caught the leader beneath the chin with a crack that rang off the alley walls like a pistol shot, and the man fell hard in the filth, the blade clattering away into the dark.
Cassian did not wait to watch him fall.
The second lunged. He turned into the blow, taking it across his shoulder rather than his jaw, and drove the blunt tip of the cane into the man’s middle with enough force to fold him in half. The third made his move. Cassian caught his wrist, twisted sharply, and put his elbow into the man’s chest. Something cracked. The thug went down with a sound that was more surprise than pain.
The alley went quiet.
All three lay in the mud at various stages of ruin. The fog drifted over them, indifferent. Somewhere distant, a horse whinnied.
His hip was a white-hot agony. He set his jaw and ignored it entirely.
He pressed the cane across the leader’s throat, not hard enough to crush, but hard enough to make his meaning plain.
“Do not judge a man by his gait,” he said pleasantly. “And do not threaten to take another’s wife. You may thank whatever gods you keep that I am in a considerable hurry tonight.” He pressed down just slightly. “If I see your faces anywhere near my wife again, I shall make sure you are left without eyes.”
He did not wait for an answer. He straightened, turned, and held out his hand to Juliana.
