But she saw it.
“What?” she asked, glancing around the room.
Her brother rubbed the back of his neck.
Culross commiserated.
That’s where he carried his suffering—and his heart.
The bloody fucking irony.
“In a week’s time, we meet at dawn. Name your seconds.”
Meghan paled.
“What?”
Her brother reached for her.
“You have to understand—”
Meghan slapped the gentleman’s battered knuckles.
“I understand no such bloody thing,” she hissed.
“You stupid, stupid men!”
“There is no other choice,” Captain McQuoid put in quietly beside Culross.
“Oh, please do us the favor, Cousin, of you giving lessons on honor when you were the one who helped Linnie sneak off from her husband to join August,” Meghan spat, effectively silencing McQuoid.
She wasn’t even near done.
“In fact, if you weren’t all so fixated on making matches with the sisters and cousins you profess to love, none of this mess would have begun.”
Color hit the gentleman’s cheeks.
He clasped his hands behind his back and rocked.
Meghan tossed her shoulders back.
“I will tell you what is going to happen,” she said coolly.
“This”—she swirled her finger between Culross and Captain McQuoid—“ends now. With me.”
“If you kill him, it continues with August’s brother, Lord Kerr, and then when does it stop? Hmm?”
Meghan didn’t care for their answer.
“It ends with me.”
Her brothers’ expressions grew blacker.
Culross understood their plight.
Culross deserved death.
But then there was Meghan.
