Page 107 of Marigold and the Marquess
Leo was surprised she had obeyed him, but she must have heard the ferocity in his tone and dared not protest.
Bloody hell.
If Mallow was growling, it meant Cummings was here and had likely come for Marigold.
Had his cousin been watching their home and known he had left town? What he could not have realized until this moment was that he had returned. Nor had his cousin expected Marigold to attend Lord Finchley’s ball without him. Fortunately, she chose not to stay home while her fool of a husband ran off to Exeter on a wild goose chase.
Had his cousin decided on a whim to take Mallow when he could not find Marigold at home? It seemed likely.
Sick bastard.
Leo hopped over Lady Eloise’s high gate and followed the sound of Mallow’s barking. The little imp had easily crawled beneath the gate and was now growling and baring his teeth at a shadow behind Eloise’s prized lilac trees.
As Leo approached, a dim light suddenly filtered into the garden. Someone had lit a lamp in Eloise’s parlor.Blast.Until this moment, the garden had been plunged in a moonless darkness, allowing Leo to approach the shadow without being seen. He now noticed the glint of steel in the man’s hand and dove just as a shot rang out.
A burning sensation exploded in his left shoulder.
He was too riled to care and fired a shot in response. But he knew he had missed when Mallow, still barking, tore back onto the street.
Leo always carried two pistols as well as two knives. He now removed the second pistol from its sheath, warned Eloise’s butler to get back inside when he opened the parlor doors leading onto her terrace to peer out, and then Leo took off after the prowler who could only be his cousin.
But getting shot had slowed him down more than he liked to admit. He was bleeding and his head was spinning, but he was not letting the bastard get away.
Eloise’s gate was open by the time he reached it, and Mallow was already halfway down the street, growling at an escaping form.
The moon was hidden behind a blanket of clouds. If not for a lone lamp glowing at the end of the street, Leo would never have been able to make out the retreating form.
More lamps were now being lit among the Chipping Way townhouses, for the shots exchanged had awakened the neighbors who were now peering out their windows.
He hoped they would remain indoors to allow him a clean shot of the villain, but his heart sank when he saw two people emerge from his home. Sterling was holding a lantern while Marigold held a rifle that appeared to be twice her size. Did she know how to fire the weapon? She would break her shoulder from the force of the recoil if she did not hold it properly, assuming she got off a shot before Cummings shot her. “I told you to get back inside!”
“Get down, Leo!” she cried and raised the rifle.
Another shot split the air and someone shrieked in pain. It was a high-pitched shriek, and he could not tell whether it was a man or a woman’s cry.
“Damn it, Marigold! Did you hurt yourself? Get back inside!”
“It wasn’t me,” she called back.
The man was still moving. In fact, now limping toward Marigold with pistol raised. Leo ran toward him, but he was too far away to tackle him. He raised his arm and aimed his pistol to take his shot. The pistol jammed. He tossed it aside and took out his knife. “Cummings! Here I am. Why don’t you come after me?”
“With pleasure, Muir.” His cousin turned and aimed his pistol at Leo, his face distorted with hatred.
Leo was about to hurl his knife straight into his cousin’s heart, when another shot rang out. His cousin laughed as it appeared to miss him, but suddenly shrieked again and then dropped like a stone. His head hit the street with a sharp crack and then a splattering sound. Had the shot struck him, after all? Well, it did not matter since the fall had finished the job. His skull was split open and his brains now oozed onto the cobblestones.
Leo carefully approached the prone form and saw his neighbor, Romulus Brayden, also cautiously advancing. “I did not think your shot got him,” Leo muttered, now leaning over his cousin’s motionless body.
“It wasn’t mine,” Romulus said, “I only fired the first one that grazed his leg.”
They both stared at Marigold as she ran forward dragging the heavy rifle. Sterling was at her heels, the lantern swaying back and forth in his hand. Her eyes looked wild in the golden light. She appeared horror-stricken and about to faint. “Did I kill him? Oh, Leo! Am I a murderess?”
“For defending yourself and your husband from a madman? No, love. No one would ever consider it murder.”
“I only meant to distract him by shooting over his head.” She seemed ready to toss up her accounts.
“You didn’t aim high enough,” Romulus muttered.
“You didn’t do this,” Leo said, grabbing her rifle and catching her in his arms just as her knees began to buckle. “Sweetheart, don’t faint on me.”
