Between the Duke and the Devil

by Devon, Eva

  The mirth died from Caxton’s face. In fact, a sick sort of dread paled his features.

  “Are ye feeling unwell?” Tristan queried.

  “Don’t be absurd.”

  Tristan smiled. A cat’s smile, designed to provoke. “Again?”

  “Of course,” Caxton bit out.

  “Ye ken,” Tristan began as he leaned forward ever so slightly. “I have an idea.”

  “Do you?” Caxton asked, a slight muscular twitch marring his strong jaw.

  “There’s something I desire.”

  “What’s that?” Caxton gritted, even as perspiration began to dot his brow. “Surely you have enough houses of your own.”

  “Enough to fill several counties but. . .” He pulled a small piece of paper from his pocket and a pencil. He scrawled a name. “This is what I want.”

  Caxton took the paper, stared at the name then crumpled the parchment. There was no immediate reply. Rather, the other man sat, his chest rising and falling in short breaths.

  “No,” Caxton said.

  “No?”

  “No,” Caxton said flatly.

  Tristan cocked his head to the side. “What if I wager all yer losses in return for that?”

  Caxton snorted. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “I’m no’. I mean it.”

  Caxton scowled. “No.”

  “As ye prefer.” Tristan shrugged before taking a slow sip of brandy. “I’d like to raise the stakes to ten thousand.”

  It was a sum he knew Caxton couldn’t afford. The man would be completely ruined. But if he didn’t accept, he’d have to walk away now, a loser, and half the room was presently watching.

  “I’ll take yer IOU,” Ardore declared generously, savoring the feeling of slipping the knife in slowly. It wasn’t enough though. He wouldn’t be satisfied until the man sitting across from him was destroyed. “Or do ye have a house to wager with. I could always collect another few of those.”

  Caxton glared. His jaw tightened and his gaze swung to Annabelle’s uncle across the room. Beaton seemed to have only an inkling that his man was in deep.

  “Well?” Tristan drawled.

  Caxton gave a tight nod. “You can’t always win.”

  Tristan said nothing. Instead, he simply waited.

  Caxton took up the cup, shook it sharply then slammed it upside down. He lifted it from the felt. A shout of triumph bit past his lips.

  “Eleven!”

  Tristan said nothing, made no reaction, as he swept up the dice then the cup, tossed the dice in and shook once.

  He tossed the playing pieces.

  They rolled and when they stilled. The air seemed to steal out of the room and total silence fell.

  Twelve.

  Caxton blinked. “It’s not possible.”

  “It is,” Tristan replied simply as he stood. “Now, to collect. Och. Terribly hard to be a loser, isna it, old boy.”

  Caxton stood abruptly and smashed the dice and cup to the floor. “I ought to call you out.”

  “For what?” Tristan taunted. “For yer bad judgement.”

  A vein pulsed in Caxton’s forehead. “For. . . for. . .”

  The entire room was staring at them.

  “For. . . for. . . have ye lost yer wits as well as yer coin?”

  “Dawn,” Caxton snapped.

  “If ye insist.”

  Tristan stood and strode from the table, leaving the crowd agape. . . feeling as if, finally, the path he’d walked upon for the last year was about to have true meaning. It didn’t matter that this hadn’t been his original plan. All that mattered was that, finally, the time was here.

  Finally.

  Finally, Caxton was going to die.

  Chapter 6

  Annabelle couldn’t breathe.

  Not as the floor felt like it was slipping out from under her.

  My God.

  Ardore was going to die.

  Her nails dug into her palms and she forced herself to draw in a deep breath.

  Did he not understand?

  There was naught honorable about Caxton or her uncle. There was no way that the duel come the dawn would be fair.

  Something would happen.

  Somehow.

  And Ardore would be dead.

  And she’d go on being a pawn.

  She frowned.

  What had Ardore asked for in that last bet? What had caused Caxton such fury?

  The mad part of her, the good part, a part she seldom gave rein to now, demanded she go after him. Warn him.

  A hand snaked out and grabbed her arm.

  “You’re telling, my dear.”

  She winced at the sound of her uncle’s voice hissing in her ear.

  “You looked very concerned about the outcome of that game.”

  “Caxton is to be my husband,” she said calmly, even as she willed herself not to tremble. “I should care, should I not?”

  “You loathe him,” her uncle mocked.

  “He’s my path to power and your power, is he not?” she reminded, clinging to whatever she had to reason with to keep herself safe in this moment.

  Her uncle narrowed his eyes. “You have not had words with Ardore?”

  “When could I have done so?” she scoffed.

  “A clever thing like you?” A smirk quirked his lips. “I’m sure you could have managed it.”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Fine then.” Her uncle’s lined forehead creased even deeper, his snowy hair slightly feathering out of its perfectly-groomed coif. “I didn’t think the night would end in a bit of blood sport. Do you think we should take bets?”

  She swallowed back her disgust. Her uncle was a villain. Pure and simple. He cared for nothing and no one. She wondered what had made him thus. She knew what had caused her to become hard. But he? She had no idea.

  “Of course we should,” she said confidently. She had to appear as if she gave not one jot for Ardore. If she stepped out of line, she didn’t quite put it past her uncle to ensure she suffered some sort of accident.

  For now, he’d just punish her.

  He needed her still.

  But. . . if she went too far.

  He was a vicious man.

  A vengeful man.

  “I think I best attend the prince,” her uncle said at last. “Do you think he’d like to bet?”

  “I do not know if that is the prince’s preference,” she said honestly.

  “You’re correct.” Her uncle sighed, reflecting on the wisdom of such an action. “A few discreet people. People who love a bit of blood.”

  She looked away. She knew the men he meant. Men who bet on dogs. On humans beating each other to death. There were men who loved blood. No matter what anyone told her, she knew that the hunger for blood was deep in men’s souls.

  “I must freshen up,” she said.

  “Good.” Her uncle withdrew his hand from her arm. “You do seem to be drooping. Return as soon as you may. The prince will need your attention then. You’ve avoided him artfully long enough.”

  She nodded and made her way from the room, reminding herself to walk slowly. Carefully. Seductively.

  It was no easy thing when she longed to fly from the company and seek out Ardore to warn him.

  When she came to the dark outer corridor, she rushed down it.

  She needed air again.

  A sight of the stars.

  A reminder that all that she was doing wasn’t entirely evil.

  She wasn’t evil. She wasn’t. Not like her uncle.

  And as she wandered out and slipped into the freezing night, not giving a damn that she had no cloak, she knew what she had to do.

  Unless she wished to cast herself away entirely, she had to warn Ardore.

  If she didn’t, she’d condemn herself to her uncle’s fate. A soulless existence where she’d do anything to survive.

  And she would do close to anything. . . but somehow. . . tonight, with Ardore in the room, she longed for something
more.

  Her slippers clattered along the fine pebbles of the raked walk.

  She drew in frigid breath after frigid breath, but the calm that came from such outings didn’t come.

  So, she turned her gaze to the stars, searching, desperate for calm, for purpose.

  Once, long ago, she hadn’t been able to see the stars.

  Now, their shine did naught to dim the pain in her heart.

  “Ye’re running from something.”

  She gasped and whipped towards Ardore’s voice.

  He stood in the shadows of a copse of willow trees. Their fingerlike branches, which dropped close to the earth, swayed in their macabre winter’s dance, nearly obscured him from view.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded, relieved it was him.

  “Planning.”

  “Contemplating your death?” she whispered. She rushed forward and pulled back the veil of naked branches, which would soon bud with the first touch of spring, so that she, too, might be better hidden.

  His dark eyes pierced her. “I’ve come too far to die.”

  “Bold words,” she countered. “Foolish words. We can all die, Your Grace.”

  His lips curled in a slow smile. “Oh, I am a mortal, but Caxton will no’ be my death.”

  “You’ll be his?” she queried, astonished he was so confident in this.

  He nodded.

  How she longed to wring his neck with exasperation. Clearly, the duke did not know the worm of corruption in men’s hearts and how far they might go. Not as she did. “You know they will not allow such an easy end.”

  “Easy?” he queried. “I have been planning this for some time.”

  “More fool you then to think you will kill him in my uncle’s home.” She swallowed. “They will kill you.”

  “How?” he barked. The arrogance of his rank and status was fully on display.

  She almost wished to cry. A man like Ardore would never understand what it was to be without his inherent power.

  She swallowed. “A poorly primed pistol. A poisoned blade. You cannot win.”

  He shook his head. “I canna lose.”

  “Oh, but you can,” she assured, her heart twisting. “The good always lose.”

  “I am no’ good,” he said softly, his gaze assessing her anew.

  “You are,” she protested ruefully. “Oh, you are. I see it. I care not what people say of you or what you wish others to believe. I see it in your eyes. I feel it in your presence.”

  “Then it is ye who are mistaken.”

  “Am I?” she demanded. “Would you hurt me then?”

  “No, Annabelle. No’ ye.” He sighed. “I see it in yer eyes, too. Ye are no villain. Ye are a victim.”

  A victim. It was such a galling proclamation. “I am no mewling babe. I have made my choices.”

  “Ye were forced.”

  She drew up. “I went willingly.”

  “This isna the song ye sang earlier,” he reminded, apparently determined to see her as some helpless creature.

  “Oh, my path has been created for me,” she agreed. “I had little choice. But make no mistake. I chose it. I chose this over a different hell. I chose a comfortable hell but I find. . . I find I cannot dwell in it with your blood on my hands.”

  He stilled. In the following silence, it felt as if the entire universe vanished but for them.

  “Why should my blood matter so much?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” she insisted, frightened of the powerful emotions suddenly stealing through her. She saw him and he saw her, in that moment, in a way that she’d never known in her whole life.

  “I do,” he said, his voice so low she almost did not hear.

  “Why then?” she begged. “Tell me?”

  And with her question hanging in the punishing cold, he drew her to him and stole her mouth in a hot, searing kiss. His hands held her fast to him, her body now crushed to his.

  To her shock, she didn’t resist. Oh, no, she gave in.

  All her life, she’d never known this sort of pleasure. This sort of abandon with a man who she might choose. A man who lit her blood on fire.

  Always, such things had been a cold game to play.

  Now, ’twas as if the sun had come to melt her cold landscape. But even as she kissed him, taking everything he had to offer and then demand more as she clung to his shoulders, she knew that no matter how he kissed her, no matter their sudden passion, passion couldn’t save them.

  In fact, passion might very well destroy them.

  She tore her lips from his and pushed away.

  “Madness,” she rasped.

  “Yes, madness,” he agreed.

  “Please, we cannot do this,” she proclaimed, determined to make him see. “I only wish to warn you. I was going to you, even now.”

  “Were ye?” he asked, his face transformed from the hard, unyielding mask into something she could barely countenance.

  It was a look any woman would have longed for.

  She licked her lips. “Yes. I have hurt so many people, Your Grace. I have aided in their destruction. But I cannot do it to you. I cannot do it to anyone any longer. I have seen the end of the path that I am on this night, and it will be ugly and brutal if I do not tread with care.”

  “Yet, ye would help me.”

  She laughed, a cold dry sound. “I find that I must. Against my better judgement. I look at you, and I cannot use just my head.”

  “Ye will be relieved to ken I feel the same.”

  “I am not relieved.” She groaned. “I wish you to go away from here and never return. I wish you to leave me to my fate now that you have been warned.”

  He shook his head, cupping her cheek in his palm. “I canna.”

  “You can,” she very nearly begged. “Please, do.”

  “Ah, but there is just one thing.”

  She searched his features, trying to understand. “And what is that?”

  A slow, wicked smile curled his lips. “Oh, Annabelle. It’s quite simple. Ye belong to me.”

  Chapter 7

  Ye belong to me.

  Those words burned through him like heavenly fire.

  It had been a risky decision. A decision he would pay for, he was certain. In many ways, as Caxton came to wonder how he knew that Annabelle was promised to him. But none of that mattered because, in a few hours, he was going to kill Caxton. And when he left this godforsaken estate, Annabelle was coming with him.

  He’d destroy her uncle next.

  Impulse, a tenet which never guided him, had sent him down this road and he was glad for it, despite the dread of the unknown.

  He’d free her.

  She wouldn’t be destroyed like his sister or the host of other young women that had fallen prey to Caxton and his ilk.

  This time, Caxton would be the one to be ravished. . . by cold hard steel. And it was going to give Tristan so much pleasure.

  But that didn’t stop the jolt he received gazing into her flashing cobalt eyes.

  There was no gratitude. No flare of hope. Only the flash of lightning and fury.

  “I belong to you?” she asked.

  “Ye do,” he agreed.

  “How?” she challenged.

  She was clever, his Annabelle. For she understood that more lay in his meaning than what was initially apparent.

  “Did ye see the paper I slipped Caxton?” he asked.

  She paled. “I did.”

  “Yer name was on it.”

  She gaped at him and the brief hint of softness that had transformed her face after their kiss transformed into the hardness of a perfect, cold statue. “You gambled for me?”

  “Ye were the last wager,” he confirmed. “Ye for all the coin he’d lost. Thousands and thousands.”

  “My price is high,” she bit out. “It’s true. My uncle taught me that long ago.”

  He winced. “I didna—”

  “Come now, let us not be shy,” she said abruptly. “Women are always se
en in terms of monetary value. What am I worth exactly? Ten thousand? Twenty?”

  “Closer to forty thousand.” He kept hold her, as if somehow his touch could bridge her anger. “I’d have paid even more.”

  “Why?” She gazed up at him, confused. “To preserve me?”

  “Yes.”

  Her face hardened. “You cannot save what is lost.”

  He swallowed, unsure of her meaning. “What would ye have me do? Leave ye here? With them? To be abused?”

  “I do not know,” she replied honestly. “A maiden fair would no doubt lavish you with gratitude. But I am not a maiden fair and you are not a knight. What is it, then, that we should do? Do you wish me to seduce the prince for you? Is that it?”

  Anger choked him and he couldn’t respond as her reply fully made itself plain.

  “Is—that—what they planned?” he managed to ask.

  “Of course. Once I’d married Caxton, I was to be the prince’s mistress and win all sorts of favors.” Her gaze narrowed. “Is that what you wish me to do for you?”

  His jaw tightened as fury pumped through him. “That is precisely the opposite that I wish for ye.”

  “The opposite?” she whispered, clearly not understanding him.

  “Ye are no’ to be used,” he growled.

  “Used?” she repeated. “If I let you save me—”

  “I’ve already saved ye.”

  She let out a dry huff of a breath. “Tell that to my uncle.”

  “Why doona ye wish to be saved?” he demanded. Why couldn’t she see that all he wished was to help her?

  “Because I do not trust you,” she gritted. “I do not know what your purpose for me is.”

  “Purpose,” he echoed.

  “Purpose,” she said pointedly. “Yes. If not the prince then what? You wish me to be your mistress or will you cast me out after you save me? Will I fend for myself? For you see, I know what I must contend with and a prince’s bed is not such a very terrible fate, my lord.”

  He blinked, suddenly shaken. It had not occurred to him that she might not wish his aid. “Ye wish it?”

  “I wish for it as much as I wish to sell my slit on the street or have it forcibly taken from me,” she said forcefully and without apology. “A woman on her own, with no family, no funds, nothing, has no recourse and no defense. She scarce has an identity.”