“Do we have your permission to call you mama?” Millie asked.
“We’ve never had a mama. You would be our first.” Lillie’s smile was hopeful.
She bit her lip, holding back the emotions that threatened to overwhelm her. “I would be honoured to be your mama. May I call you my daughters?”
“Cor!” The girls said in unison and hugged her tight, squeezing her from each side as if they would never let her go. She would certainly never release them, no matter how much she drove them to distraction when they hit the marriage mart.
Glass breaking in the foyer brought her to her feet instantly. “Girls, stay here.” She ran across the room and opened the door a crack to peek out. Charlie was struggling with two burley men attempting to force their way into the residence. Despite how well-formed Astley’s footman was, he was no match for two men of equal stature, and meaner spirits. Caillen turned around to grab the girls and ran into the garden. The door at her back flew open and struck her, sending her down to her knees on the carpet.
“Bloody bastard! Bloody bastard!” Charlotte screamed from her corner perch.
Caillen saw the fear on Millie and Lillie’s faces as they attempted to crawl over the back of the settee. Their weight sentthe settee crashing to the floor and the girls sprawling across the carpet.
Caillen rolled away from the door when she saw a third intruder for the first time standing over her.
“Well, well, well. Look what we ‘ave ‘ere.” The obsidian eyes of the man in front of her were nothing like Simon’s. This man’s eyes were darkened by the depravity of his soul. The pistol in his hands, pointed at the girls, confirmed his turpitude.
“What do you want?” She demanded. The girls rushed over, whimpering behind her, and she gave them a staying hand gesture to calm them.
“I’ve come fer me due, darlin’. Youse owe me.”
“Sir, you are in the wrong household. I don’t owe you a farthing.”
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. I’m ‘ere to collect me due from more than ten years back.”
Crookes. Dear God, why was the man so obsessed with her family? “What have we done to you?”
“Done to me?” He let out a laugh that held no mirth. Just pure malice. “I killed your father fer the price of receiving six brats. I never got the brats.”
“You killed my father because of his daughters?”
“Six bitches with manners be worth a pretty shilling,” he sneered.
Never before had she wanted to see a man drawn and quartered. “Again, I will ask you to leave, before I have my footman throw you out.” Slowly she moved toward her pistol stuffed in the cushion of the chair.
Crookes circled around her, getting closer. More glass crashed in the foyer as grunts and yelling rang through the house. “I don’t think ye strappin’ footman will be much ‘elp ta ye. ‘E seems to ‘ave ‘is ‘ands full. Lookin’ at ye now, I see ye’ be a bit long in the tooth fer me purposes. I think I’ll be takin’‘em instead.” He nodded at the twins behind her, and her blood curdled.
“Over my dead body,” she spat.
He shook his head as if it was little consequence to him. “That can be arranged.” He lifted the pistol and she charged.
The gun exploded, smoke billowing in the air as she ran at him with everything she had. His shot missed. He swung the pistol at her head. She ducked, but the gun struck the top of her forehead and pain radiated through her skull. Her vision blurred. She reached out.
“Ye stupid bitch!” He yelled and punched her in the nose. Her vision darkened as she fell, striking the table with the back of her head.
Sounds became muffled. She lay on the floor, warm liquid pouring down her face as the tang of copper filled her mouth. The girls cried out, but she couldn’t move.
She turned her head toward the sounds and saw Crookes holding the girls with one fist tightly wrapped around both their braids. The girls screamed and cried and struggled as Crookes dragged them to the garden door by their hair.
Caillen crawled to the chair where the gun was hidden.
That’s when she saw Sébastien creeping across the room. He dove at the girls, ripping their hair from the man’s hand and tackling them to ground. She grabbed the gun and stumbled to her feet as Crookes' angry roar filled the room. He raised his pistol toward her three children. She fired as she charged him, an unholy scream exploding from her.
The man fell over howling and writhing in agony.
Caillen ran toward her crying children, urging them to their feet as she pushed them out the back door and into the garden.
“Shhhh,” she said. “Run toward the gate! Everything will be alright.” She wrapped her arms around their shaking bodies as they stumbled their way to the back gate.
