Martin’s face changed, softened in a terrible parody of gentleness. “You are frightened. That is all.”
“No.” Diana shook her head slowly, tears stinging anew, for the friend she had thought she had, the years she had trusted him, the kindness she had believed real. “No, I am seeing you clearly for the first time, and I do not recognize what I see.”
Pain flashed across his face. Then anger devoured it. “You do know me.”
“I knew a man I trusted.”
“You can trust me.”
“I could,” she said, her voice breaking now despite every effort to keep it steady, “once. But now…” She drew in a shaking breath. “Now you are a monster.”
Martin froze.
Something passed over his face, as though the final barrier between fantasy and consequence had at last shattered. Even the air seemed to change with it. Diana felt Alexander tense beside her at once, every line of him sharpening.
“Do not come nearer,” Alexander said.
Martin’s eyes did not leave Diana’s face. “If I cannot have her?—”
The words were not finished before his hand went inside his coat.
Alexander moved first, his body turning toward her just as Diana’s breath caught, sharp and startled in her chest. At the same time, Martin reached into his coat and drew out a pistol, lifting it with a steady hand. The moment tightened around them, the world seeming to hold its breath.
The road. The hedges. The two halted carriages. The horses tossing their heads in the cold air. Alexander half turned before her, one arm already moving as though to throw her behind him. Martin is standing opposite with his face transformed by obsession and despair. The black mouth of the pistol lifting, lifting?—
And then it pointedat her.
The breath left Diana’s body in a sharp, soundless shock. She stared at the weapon, at the terrible steadiness of Martin’s hand,and for one frozen instant, the whole world narrowed to that single horrifying truth.
His voice, when it came, was too quiet.
“If I cannot have you,” he said, “no one can.”
CHAPTER 28
“Alexander—” The word tore from Diana before she could stop it, sharp with terror as the pistol fired.
The sound split the air, deafening, brutal, and in that same instant, Alexander moved.
One moment, he stood before her, tense and ready, and the next, he was already lunging forward, his body turning into the path of the shot with a speed that seemed almost impossible. The impact came with a sickening force. She saw it. She felt it, as if the bullet had struck through her as well. His body jerked, his shoulder snapping back under the force, and a dark bloom spread instantly through the fabric of his coat.
But he did not stop.
Before the echo of the shot had even faded, he was already upon Martin. He hit him with the full weight of his body, driving himbackward with a force that knocked the breath from the other man in a harsh, strangled sound.
The pistol flew from Martin’s hand, skidding across the dirt with a dull metallic scrape.
Diana’s breath came fast, sharp, her pulse roaring in her ears, but she moved without thinking, her body propelled by something deeper than fear. She saw the weapon where it had fallen and lunged for it, her skirts tangling around her legs as she dropped to her knees in the dirt. Her fingers closed around the cold metal, shockingly heavy in her grasp, and for a moment she simply stared at it, at the terrible reality of what it represented.
Then she lifted her head.
Alexander had Martin on the ground, one knee braced against his chest, his good arm locking Martin’s collar in a brutal grip. Blood was already soaking through his coat, dark and spreading, but it did nothing to slow him. If anything, it made him more terrifying. His face was set, hard and merciless, his green eyes blazing with violence.
“You will not touch her again,” he said.
His voice was low.
Martin struggled beneath him, fury twisting his features. “You think this ends here?” he spat. “You think you can keep her from me?—”
