Page 85 of An Offer By the Beastly Duke

Charles froze instantly, his entire body stiffening above her.

Penelope heard it too, cutting through the darkness like a holy savior.

Malcolm.

A wave of relief so violent it physically dizzied her hit her chest, her knees nearly giving out beneath the potting table.

Charles looked toward the distant front doors, a sudden, blinding panic flashing across his aristocratic features for the very first time.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Malcolm heard Hector first.

The dog’s frantic, booming barks tore through the gray afternoon rain, sharp and echoing enough to make every thoroughbred in the stable yard rear and startle. Malcolm pulled his dark stallion’s mount hard to a sudden stop, the iron horseshoes skidding violently against the mud.

“What the…?” Malcolm muttered, his rugged features hardening.

Then, through the veil of downpouring rain, he saw Nicholas.

The little boy came sprinting wildly across the vast expanse of the south lawn. He was soaked completely through, his small face bone-white with an absolute, paralyzing terror. Hector raced in frantic, bounding leaps directly beside him.

“Papa! Papa!”

Every single muscle in Malcolm’s massive body instantly locked like cold iron. Nicholas stumbled blindly in the deep mud, nearly throwing himself headfirst into the gravel, but Malcolm hit the ground running before his stallion had even fully stopped moving.

“Nicholas!”

The boy crashed directly into his chest with so much momentum that Malcolm nearly lost his balance, his large hands reaching down to instantly steady the child. Nicholas gripped Malcolm’s wet leather riding coat with a desperate, white-knuckled strength.

“It’s Mama,” Nicholas gasped, his chest heaving so violently he could barely force the words past his trembling lips. “The glasshouse, Uncle Charles, he is there!”

Malcolm was already moving before the sentence was fully finished, his boots tearing up the turf.

“Stay with Barrow!” he barked over his shoulder toward the nearest stable groom, his voice a lethal command. “Take the boy to the house! Do not let him out of your sight for a single damn second!”

Nicholas grabbed for his sleeve one last time, his voice breaking. “Papa!”

Malcolm crouched with lightning speed, fast enough to look the boy directly in the eyes, his hands steady on his frame. “You did well, son.”

The word son left his throat entirely without conscious thought, heavy and absolute. Nicholas’s small face crumpled with a mixture of profound, frightened relief and exhaustion.

Then Malcolm ran.

The heavy iron doors of the old glasshouse didn’t just open, they burst entirely inward beneath the crushing weight of Malcolm’s shoulder, the iron bolt shearing clean off the stone frame.

The rain hammered the overhead panes like a volley of musketry. Broken terracotta pottery and dark, spilled earth covered the pristine stone floor. And there, near the center of the path, Charles had Penelope pinned brutally against a wooden potting table.

Her elegant green silk gown hung torn at one shoulder, exposing the pale skin beneath. Her chocolate-brown hair had come loose entirely from its pins, cascading down her back in a wild tangle. One side of her delicate face was flushed a violent, swollen red where she had been viciously struck, and Charles’s greedy hands were roaming across her body.

Something deep inside Malcolm’s soul snapped cleanly in two. He snarled, a sound more animalistic than the name the ton knew him by.

Charles looked up at the sound of the crash, a sudden, blinding panic flaring in his eyes.

Malcolm crossed the remaining distance in three predatory strides, unleashed a roar of pure, unadulterated savagery, and hit him once. The punch landed squarely across Charles’s jaw with a sickening, bone-crushing crack.

Charles’s head snapped violently sideways. His entire body was lifted completely off balance, thrown backward through the air into the rigid iron supports of the greenhouse before collapsing hard and unconscious onto the wet stone floor.

Penelope gasped sharply, her hands flying to her chest as she trembled violently against the table.