The Other Duke (24 page)

She settled the gun harder into her shoulder and Serafina took a step forward.

“Your son was a bastard!” she screamed. “An abusive idiot, and I celebrated his death. He was not half the man as Raphael Flynn.”

The result of her accusation was exactly as she had hoped. Hesper let out a primal, guttural sound and swung her gun up and away from Rafe.

“I’ll kill you!” she screamed.

The next moment seemed to move in half time. As Hesper began to press the trigger of her rifle, Serafina pulled her pistol from the folds of her skirt and aimed it at the other woman’s chest.

She heard the massive explosion of both guns firing in time and squeezed her eyes shut. She braced herself to be hit by the heat and pain of the round lead ball that would tear through her flesh and render her hoped-for future mercilessly short.

But there was nothing. She heard the zing of a ricochet off the wall behind her. Slowly, she opened her eyes.

Hesper lay on her back, eyes open and glazed. Serafina’s bullet had hit her straight in the chest. The rifle was at her side, smoking from being fired. But the reason the projectile hadn’t hit her was that Rafe’s hand was wrapped firmly around the other woman’s ankle. He had yanked her off balance as she shot and made her fire wildly.

He lifted his head. His face was a mess of blood, pale and drawn as he looked at her.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, his tone strained.

“No,” she panted. “Rafe…”

“Good,” he groaned, and then collapsed back against the paved walkway.

“Rafe!” she repeated, this time on a scream. She dropped to her knees and fought to turn him over on his back. She cradled his bleeding head in her lap and tore at his shirt to make something to staunch the seeping shoulder wound.

Behind her, across the street, she heard doors open, people rushing out now that the gunfire was over.

“Someone ran for the Guard after the first shot,” one man said as he moved to look over Hesper and then to Rafe. “What were they fighting over?”

Serafina ignored him as she smoothed her hand over Rafe’s cheek. “Rafe, I love you. I love you. Please hear me. Please don’t leave me. I love you. I can’t lose you. Please.”

But he said nothing, he did nothing, and he didn’t move even an inch.

The parlor at the bottom of the stairs was crowded to say the least, but it wasn’t noisy. In fact, the silence seemed eerie and unnatural to Serafina. She paced across the floor and felt five pairs of eyes upon her with every step.

Annabelle and her mother sat on the settee, ignoring the tea and mounds of biscuits the servants had placed there as some kind of offering of solace and solidarity. Serafina’s father was at the fireplace, alternating between staring into the flames and watching her.

And Crispin stood at the doorway with the inspector from the guard, a thin, direct man named Simpson who had questioned Serafina about the death of the dowager duchess of Hartholm.

She could hardly recall what she had said to the man, but was grateful to her uncharacteristically pale brother-in-law for taking over the duty of dealing with the Guard and its representatives.

They spoke too quietly for her to hear for a moment, and then the inspector crossed the room to her.

“Your Grace, I will leave you now. There may be a few questions I’ll have later and I will be sure to call on you if they arise.”

She stared at him, for it took too long for his words to sink in past the fog of her worry. “Will you arrest me, then?”

At that moment, she didn’t care if she was to be taken into custody, but she wanted it to be done after she knew that Rafe, upstairs with the doctor, would survive his injuries.

The young man shook his head and actually looked surprised at her question. “No, my lady. The statements from those across from the park who saw the altercation from their windows, along with your explanation makes it clear what happened was unavoidable self-defense. The matter will be closed once I file my report.”

She might have felt relief in that statement, but there was no relief at present. There would be none until the doctor returned.

“I hope your husband will make a recovery, Your Grace.” The officer tipped his hat to her. “Good day.”

She nodded, though she hardly noticed when he walked away. She turned back to her window and stared out at the garden without seeing it, either.

“Serafina?”

She jolted at the sudden touch of a hand on her elbow and turned to find her father at her side. She sucked in a breath. “I’m sorry, Father, but I cannot hear haranguing at present.”

His eyes flashed down, as if with guilt. “No. No, that isn’t my intention. I wanted to say—to say that I am sorry.”

She blinked. “Sorry?”

“I am the one who pushed you toward Cyril and into the path of his mother. I only wanted to give you a better life.”

“You wanted to give yourself a better life.”

He hesitated, but did not snap at her as he might have a day before. He only sighed. “Yes. I wanted to further my own desires. But I am truly sorry that it has ended this way.”

She jerked her gaze to him. “Ended. It is not ended.”

He caught her hand, and she stared down at their intertwined fingers. It was the first time she realized her gown was still covered in blood. Rafe’s blood.

She could hardly breathe as she extracted her hand. “He
will
live,” she said firmly.

Her father nodded. “I’m certain you are correct.”

He moved away from her, and now it was Crispin who walked up to take his place.

“You should go up to change,” he said softly. “Your maid is ready to help you wash and—”

“I can’t be in a state of undress,” she whispered, “where I can’t go to him in a moment’s notice.”

Crispin tilted his head as he looked at her. “You love my brother.”

She nodded, but now the tears sprung to her eyes. “Do you think he knows? Do you think he heard me tell him?”

Crispin swallowed, and she saw his tears sparkle in his eyes too. “I hope so. It would give him a reason to fight.”

They stared at each other, silent in their grief and support, until they were interrupted by the sound of a clearing throat at the door. When Serafina saw it was the doctor, she rushed forward with a cry.

“What is it?” she asked, trying to read his expression but unable.

“I have stitched his head wound. As for his shoulder, we are lucky that the bullet went straight through and did not damage his bones,” the man said.

“But will he live?” she asked, holding her breath.

He nodded. “Yes.”

She heard nothing more, leaving the rest of the family behind as she bolted up the stairs and down the hall to the bedroom they had shared for over a month. The door was open and she all but bowled over Rafe’s valet as she skidded inside. The servant smiled weakly and then left, closing the door behind him.

Rafe was propped up on his pillows, eyes shut. He was no longer in his bloody clothes, but was bare-chested with the sheet pulled up to cover his stomach. His shoulder was bandaged and his arm pressed against his chest in a sling.

“Are you going to stand there all day or come and sit with me?” he asked.

She jolted at his voice, for she had thought him still unconscious. But the sound of it was like music to her ears, and she rushed to him as he opened his blue eyes and smiled at her.

The smile fell when he saw her gown. “Were you injured?” he asked, sitting up and then wincing.

She touched his hand and urged him back. “No, no, the blood is yours. I didn’t want to clean up for fear the doctor would have news before I had changed and I would not get to—to—”

She broke off as the tears she had been holding back began to stream down her face.

He pulled her to the bed beside him and wrapped his good arm around her. “Shhh, shhh, love. I’m fine. I will be fine. Though maybe a little scarred.”

She looked at the stitches on his head with a frown. “I’ve heard some ladies find a scar rakish,” she managed to quip.

He smiled. “Do you?”

“On you? Most definitely.” She couldn’t believe she was laughing with him when they had both nearly been murdered just a few hours before.

“Then I will wear it with pride,” he said. After a moment, his laughter faded. “You saved my life. By telling my aunt how much you truly hated her son.”

She nodded. “At least I got to share that fact before she left this earth. And it made her turn the gun away from you. But you saved me too. Grabbing her ankle made her misfire.”

He stroked her cheek. “You said something else to her too, Serafina. Even through my fog, I heard it. You said you were with child. Is that true?”

She looked up at him and once again was hit with a pang of longing to make what had been a lie into an utter truth.

“No,” she whispered. “At least, not that I know of. I only wanted her to turn her hate away from you. I would have said or done
anything
to save you.”

“Including sacrifice yourself,” he said, his face falling. “Even though I told you to run away.”

“Would you have run and left me if our roles were reversed?”

He smiled. “No. But we are different, you see. I love you, Serafina, and for you, I would die.”

“You very nearly did,” she said with a shudder. “But we are not so very different.”

She felt him tense against her, though the smooth stroke of his hand over her cheek did not change. “Aren’t we?” he said, his voice strained with hope and fear.

She sat up and looked at him straight on. “Are you saying you didn’t hear what I said to you after you collapsed the second time?”

He shook his head. “It was only blackness once I knew you were safe.”

She leaned in, nearly kissing him but not quite. She held his gaze solidly as she said, “I begged you not to leave me, Rafe. I told you I loved you.”

He tilted his head, edging even closer than she was. She felt his breath on her skin, felt his warmth and his life. Having been so close to losing him, she reveled in his nearness.

“Did you mean it?” he murmured.

She cupped his cheeks gently and met his eyes. “I meant every word, Raphael Flynn. I love you with all my heart, and it thrills me and terrifies me. But since I almost lost you already, I cannot bear to think of losing you again. I would rather tell you my heart and hope that you will keep it safe than resist what you have already offered me and live in isolation from you.”

His gaze lit up, filled with the love he had already declared and with the promise of everything she had ever desired and thought she would live without. She saw in his eyes the children they would have, the home they would make, the laughter they would share, the passion that would stoke them on for years to come, decades. She saw it all, and she could no longer resist leaning in for the kiss they had been teasing about.

His good arm came around her, holding her close as their mouths tangled in a desperate meeting that spoke of fear and desperation and of love, always love.

When they broke apart, she smiled as she traced the lines of his face with her fingertips once more.

“Well, that is resolved,” she said.

He laughed. “What is resolved?”

“We love each other and we shall be happy together—I hope in this house rather than the ducal home—for the rest of our days.”

He settled back on the pillows with a great sigh. “Yes, that is resolved.”

“Then we should likely allow your family in. I know they have been as terrified as I have been as we awaited the doctor. I have no doubt they are huddled about your door waiting to have their turn to see you are whole and unharmed.”

He caught her elbow and pulled her down across his body. His fingers threaded into her hair and just before he kissed her again, he whispered, “Let them wait just a moment longer, Sera. Let them wait.”

And he kissed her.

Six months later

Rafe strode into the parlor and grinned at the sight of Serafina reading on the settee, feet tucked beneath her. Every time he walked into this vision, it thrilled him beyond reason.

She glanced up with the smile that lit up his life on a daily basis and moved to get up, but he crossed to her and sat down to keep her in her spot.

“
You
are to be resting,” he said with a playfully stern glare as he placed a hand over the slight swell of her belly.

At four months, she had just begun to show her condition, and now that he could see true evidence of the baby inside her, he wanted to dote on her in a way that would have made his old, rakish self roll his eyes.

She smiled as he brushed a brief kiss over her lips. “I’m fine. You fret like a mother hen.”

He laughed. “I will show you I’m nothing like a mother hen.”

“Cock of the walk is more like it,” she said through her own laughter.

He arched a brow. “Saucy wench.”

“So what did your sister want to see you about?”

He leaned forward and poured himself some tea and grabbed a biscuit from her plate. She arched a brow at him, but said nothing as he wolfed down half in one bite. “Annabelle has announced she would like a Season.”

“A Season, as in, with us as chaperone?” she asked, blinking in disbelief at him.

He laughed. “With
me
as chaperone. You will be round and ready to pop by then.”

“I’m not sure she’ll get much help from either of us,” Serafina said. “The
ton
still buzzes about your aunt’s attack and subsequent death. We are a scandal of epic proportions.”

He lifted his brows. “True or not, that has not slowed the invitations made to us. Annabelle knows from experience that this family tends to live in a constant state of notoriety, so I suppose she believes the sooner, the better—before Crispin decides to publicly declare his love for a horse or Mama takes up walking the boards.”

“I think your mother would be a fine actress,” Serafina teased.

He smiled again. The past six months together had seemed to put all her fears at ease. And he was more in love with her than he had ever been. A fact he put into practice by settling his plate aside and slowing easing himself over her.

She wrapped her arms around him without hesitation and smiled up at him. He saw her gaze linger on the scar on his forehead, but she didn’t shudder as she had for so many weeks after the attack that had nearly killed them both.

“What about you?” he whispered.

“As an actress?” she teased softly. “Oh no, I never have to act anymore, Your Grace. My feelings are perfectly true.”

“And they are?” he pressed.

She drew him down, closer and closer until her lips brushed his. “That I love you more than anything. And I would like to show you just how much this very moment.”

He said nothing more. He required nothing more. He merely melted into her kiss and showed her how much her love was appreciated and returned.