Her lips twitched, but she stilled them. This was a serious matter.
“Apollo,” she said warningly, setting the tray on the bed next to him. The chain was long enough that he could easily reach a covered commode not that far away and the brazier, but nothing else. “Who did this? Maximus?”
He didn’t deign to reply, tearing into the bread before halting for a moment and then beginning to eat again almost daintily.
Artemis frowned at his odd behavior, but was distracted by the chain clinking against the stone floor as he shifted to reach for the teacup. “Apollo! Answer me, please. Why would he chain you?”
He gazed at her over his teacup’s rim as he sipped before shrugging and putting down the cup. He picked up the notebook that had been left on the floor by the cot and scratched something out with a pencil before handing it to her.
Artemis glanced at what he’d written.
I’m mad.
She scoffed, thrusting the notebook back at him. “You know you’re not.”
He paused, his fingers upon the little book, to flick his eyes at her, and she saw them soften. Then he pulled the notebook from her hands and wrote something else.
She sat beside him to read.
Only you, sister dear, think me sane. I love you for it.
She swallowed and leaned over to buss him on the cheek. At least he’d shaved. “And I love you, too, though you drive me half mad.”
He snorted and dug into the eggs.
“Apollo?” she asked softly. “What happened in Bedlam? Why were you beaten so badly?”
He took another bite, refusing to meet her eyes.
She sighed and watched him. Even if he was too stubborn to recount what had caused a boot to be thrust into his throat, she was glad that he was safe and had enough food.
She glanced again at the chain on his ankle. He might be safe, but he was chained like an animal again, and that simply wouldn’t do. “I’ll talk to Maximus. He’ll understand that you were wrongly accused and not mad at all.” She said it confidently, even though she was beginning to doubt that Maximus would ever change his mind. And if he didn’t? She couldn’t leave her brother chained here—it was little better than Bedlam.
He chewed, looking at her narrowly, and for some reason his expression made her nervous.
He picked up the notebook and wrote one word: MAXIMUS?
She could feel heat climbing her cheeks. “He’s a friend.”
He cocked a sardonic eyebrow as he scribbled, the pencil hitting the paper with an audible thump when he made the period. He must accord you a very good friend indeed to rescue me from Bedlam on your word.
“I suppose he thought it a good deed.”
He arched an incredulous eyebrow before writing, I’ve lost my voice, not my power of reason.
“Well, of course not.”
But he kept writing. I don’t like such closeness with a duke.
She lifted her chin. “Would you have me only associate with earls and viscounts, then?”
He bumped her shoulder with his, and wrote, Very funny. You know what I mean.
He was the dearest person in the world to her, and she hated to lie to him. Still, the truth would do nothing but anger him. “Don’t worry about me, darling. A duke would never be interested in a lady’s companion. You know Lady Phoebe is my friend. I’m here to act as her companion while her cousin, Miss Picklewood, is away. Nothing more.”
He stared at her suspiciously until she pointed out that his tea would grow cold if he didn’t finish his breakfast. After that they sat together in companionable silence as she watched him eat.
But she couldn’t shake her own words, for without meaning to she’d spoken the truth: a duke truly didn’t have any reason to consort with her. Maximus had never said anything about making their arrangement more permanent. What if he only wished to bed her for a few nights and nothing more? What would she do then? What they’d done made it impossible for her to live again as Penelope’s companion—even if her cousin never found out the truth. Artemis simply couldn’t deceive Penelope in such an awful manner.
Her actions had laid waste to her former life.
MAXIMUS FELT HIS heart beat faster that night as he made his way through the shadows of London dressed as the Ghost of St. Giles. It was as if he could no longer keep a raging beast inside. Nearly twenty years—more than half his life—he’d spent in this hunt. He’d not married, not sought out friendship or lovers. All his time, all his thought, all his soul was bent on one thing:
Avenging his parents. Finding their killer. Making the world somehow right again.
And tonight, now, he was as close as he’d ever been to failure.
It began to rain as if the heavens themselves wept at his weakness.
He paused, tilting his face to the night sky, feeling the drops run cold down his face. How long? Lord, how long must he search? Was Craven right? Had he done penance enough or would he forever toil?
A shout came from nearby, and without turning he ran into the night. The cobblestones were slippery beneath his boots, and his short cape whipped away behind him as if mocking his attempt at flight. The rain was relentless, but that didn’t stop the denizens of London from coming out. He passed two dandies mincing their way along, holding their cloaks over their heads. Maximus merely ducked to the side when one pointed and yelled. A horse shied as he passed, as if the animal knew the blackness blown over his soul.
More people up ahead. He’d come out too early.
Maximus darted to the right and grasped a pillar supporting an overhanging second story. He pulled himself up only to find himself face-to-face with a fair-haired child in a nightgown at the window. He paused, startled, as the child stuck a finger in her mouth and simply stared, then he began climbing again. The tiled roof was slippery, but he hoisted himself up and over the edge and began running. The rain beat down, soaking his tunic, making the shingles slippery, turning the world into a house of mourning.
Below, the people streamed through the rain, miserable and wet, while above he leaped from rooftop to rooftop, soaring through the air, risking with each jump a fatal fall to the ground.
He neared St. Giles. He knew because he could smell it: the stink of the channel, the rot of bodies living on nothing but despair and gin—always gin. He fancied he could smell the stench of the liquor itself, foul and burning, with the sweet note of juniper. Gin pervaded this entire area, drowning it in disease and death.
The thought made him want to vomit.
He stalked the night, running through the rain, haunting the rooftops of St. Giles for minutes, days, a lifetime, perhaps even forgetting what he’d come here for.
Until he found it—or rather him.
Below, in a yard so small it had no name, he saw the highwayman called Old Scratch. The man was mounted and had a whimpering youth cornered, his pistol aimed at the boy’s head.
Maximus acted on instinct and entirely without plan. He half-slid, half-climbed down the side of the building, dropping between the boy and Old Scratch.
Without hesitation Old Scratch turned his pistol on Maximus and fired.
Or tried to.
Maximus grinned, rain sliding into his mouth. “Your powder’s wet.”
The boy scrambled to his feet and fled.
Old Scratch tilted his head. “So ’tis.”
His voice was muffled by the wet scarf bound around the lower half of his face. He seemed entirely unafraid.
Maximus stepped closer and, though the light was dim, he finally got a clear look at the emerald pinned at the other man’s throat. Saw it and recognized it.
He stilled, his nostrils flaring. Finally. Dear God, finally.
His gaze flicked up to the obscured eyes of the man on the horse. “You have something that’s mine.”
“Do I?”
“That,” Maximus said, pointing with his chin. “That emerald belonged to my mother. The last of two. Do you have the other one still as well?”
Whatever he’d expected from Old Scratch, it wasn’t the reaction he got: the man threw back his head and bellowed with laughter, the sound echoing off the tilting brick walls that surrounded them. “Oh, Your Grace, I should’ve recognized you. But then, you’re not the sniveling boy you were nineteen years ago, are you?”
“No, I’m not,” Maximus said grimly.
“But you’re just as foolish,” the Devil taunted him. “If you want the last of your mother’s emeralds, I’d suggest searching within your own house.”
Maximus had had enough. He drew his sword and charged.
Old Scratch yanked on the reins and his horse reared, iron-shod hooves flashing in the night. Maximus ducked, trying to edge around the great beast to reach its master, but the highwayman wheeled his horse and gave it spur, galloping down the only alley leading out of the yard.
Maximus whirled and leaped to a corner where two walls met. He jumped and climbed, his fingers hurriedly searching for holds in the dark. He could hear the hoofbeats retreating, the sound fading. If he didn’t make the roof soon, he’d lose the man and horse in the maze of narrow streets that made up St. Giles.
Desperately, he reached for a fingerhold over his head. The brick gave without warning, coming entirely off the wall and with it his hold on the building. He fell backward, scrabbling like a rat, his fingernails scraping against the brick.
He hit the muddy ground with a thump that sent sparks flying across his vision.
And then he lay there, flat on his back in the filthy yard, his hands and back and shoulders aching, with the rain falling coldly in his face.
The moon had disappeared from the midnight sky.
ARTEMIS WOKE TO the feel of strong arms grasping her tight and lifting her from her bed. She should’ve been alarmed, but all she felt was a strange rightness. She looked up as Maximus carried her into the corridor outside her room. His face was set in grim lines, his eyes drawn and old, his mouth flat. He wore his banyan, its silk smooth beneath her cheek. She could hear his heart beating, strong and steady.
She reached up and traced the groove beside his mouth.
His gaze flicked down to hers, and the naked savagery she saw there made her gasp.
He shouldered open his door and strode to his bed, placing her there like a prize of war.
He stood over her and tore the clothes from his body. “Take it off.”
She sat up to pull her chemise over her head.
Only just in time. Naked, he crawled over her, his body hot and hard. “Never sleep anywhere but in my bed.”
She might have protested, but he turned her roughly so that she lay on her stomach, her cheek pressed into his pillow.
He lay on top of her, his upper body braced on his arms but his hips and legs weighing her down. Trapping and holding her.
“You’re mine,” he said, laying his cheek against hers. “Mine and no one else’s.”
“Maximus,” she warned.
“Yield, Diana,” he whispered, parting her legs. She could feel the thick heat of his cock pressed hard on her bottom. “Yield, warrior maiden.”
“I’m not a maiden. You took that.”
“And I would again,” he growled. “I’d steal you away and keep you in a castle far from here. Far from any other man. I’d guard you jealously and every night come to your bed and put my cock into your cunny and fuck you until dawn.”
The crude words, the near-mad sentiment, should’ve frightened her. Perhaps there was something amiss with her makeup, for they merely made her warm. No, hot. Near burning. It was all she could do to stop herself from squirming beneath him.
“Do you want that, Diana?” he muttered into her ear, his breath humid on her skin. “Do you want to be mine and only mine, away from this cursed world, in a place inhabited by just we two?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, her voice fierce.
He levered himself up. “I’d go a-hunting in the day and kill a fine stag. I’d bring it back to our hidden castle and dress it and cook it over a fire and then I’d sit you on my lap and feed you, morsel by morsel. All your sustenance would be by my hand and mine alone.”