Silence.
“Aren’t they?”
Grandmama and Grandpapa exchanged a look, a meaningful look.
“They’re busy this morning,” Grandpapa said.
A hesitation punctuated his words. An evasion?
“What do you mean ‘busy’? Tobias is never busy. He a prize-winning layabout.” And Grayson, while he had the potential for busyness, well, he should be with her. She knew he’d want to be, to say goodbye, to reassure her. “What’s going on?”
Grandmama reached out a hand and rubbed her forearm soothingly. “Only what should, love.”
Oh, God. It was all crystal clear now. Henrietta knew exactly what kept Tobias and Grayson so busy this morning. She shivered, feeling the hands grabbing her, knowing exactly where the finger-shaped bruises were on her arms. “Remind me how many duels my brother has fought for me,” Henrietta said softly.
“Three, I believe,” Grandpapa supplied.
“Soon to be four, I take it.”
Her grandparents’ silence confirmed her fears.
“Where is the duel to take place? Wait, no.” She waved her hand, erasing the unnecessary question. Tobias was a creature of habit. Tradition, he called it. He’d fight a duel in only one location. Green Park.
And Tobias and Grayson were there right now, or on their way, both eager to shoot Stubly through the chest.
As far as she knew, Tobias had never actually shot anyone before or been shot, for that matter. In the three other duels, the men had known they were guilty of insulting an innocent girl. Or more likely, they’d not wanted to upset the richest young rogue in London. All three had purposefully missed.
Stubly wouldn’t purposefully miss. He and the mysterious duchess wanted nothing less than Henrietta’s life. She was a target, which meant Tobias and Grayson were targets as well.
She squeezed her eyes closed and made a decision. “I’ll go to Manchester,” she announced. “Please let me know as soon, as may be, the outcome of the duel.” She pecked Grandpapa’s cheek and embraced Grandmama in a tight hug, gave them both her brightest smile, then settled into the carriage.
When the carriage rattled along beside Hyde Park several minutes later, she rapped the roof. It rolled to a stop, and she met the coachman’s inquisitive gaze with an apologetic one of her own. “I’m so sorry,” she said, picking up her skirts and jumping to the ground. “There’s something I must do.” And she took off running in the opposite direction, toward Green Park.
She couldn’t let Tobias and Grayson get shot by the likes of Stubly. She couldn’t let them be hanged, either, for shooting and killing a peer. And as much as she wouldn’t mind seeing Stubly shot, or shooting him herself, it wasn’t worth the lives of the men she loved.
The events of the first duel with Stubly seemed to be repeating themselves, but a million times worse than before. She wouldn’t get there after the duel this time. She’d have to get there before. She’d have to stop it from happening at all.
Chapter 27
Grayson practiced what he would say to Stubly for the thousandth time, determined to get the words right in order to let the man know exactly what he thought of him before raising the pistol to his chest, pointing the deadly weapon at his heart.
“You are a worm. The bullet I’m about to—”
Tobias stomped up to the coach, silencing Grayson mid-sentence. Thank God. His words were nothing more than melodramatic drivel, true but silly.
“The doctor’s here, Gray.”
Grayson looked out the carriage window into the foggy fields of Green Park.
Tobias flexed his fingers. “And there’s Stubly and his second.”
Grayson lumbered out of the coach, looking at the men gathered on the other side of the field. Before he could get both feet on the ground a force slammed into him, propelling him back inside. “What the—”
Henrietta, stern faced and pale, rose above him.
“Henrietta?”
She pushed her hood back and sat opposite him, closing them into the carriage. Her cheeks flushed from exertion and her chest heaved up and down with labored breathing.
