Brazen and the Beast (The Bareknuckle Bastards 2)

“You wanted to save them.”

“Yes,” he said. “Of course.”

Saviour. Not just his name. His whole being.

“He’d give us treats, then take them away. Gifts. Toys. Animals. Anything we liked. He loved forcing us to beg for what we loved.” Whit looked to her. “You tease me about my lemon sweets? They’re because of him. Thank you for the raspberries.”

“Of course.” She nodded. She wished she could keep him in sweets forever. She wished she could pull him close and hold him tight, but he wouldn’t allow it, this proud, wonderful man.

“I couldn’t keep up after a while, and I started making plans to escape. I knew that if I could make it back here—back to Holborn—I could find my mother. And we could run. That was my plan. To get back here and run.”

Hattie would have given anything she had. Business, boats, fortune, future—all of it—to change what he was about to say. But still, it came. “He told me that if I stayed, he would keep her alive. It became clear I wasn’t there to win. That I was never in the running to be duke. He hated that I took after my mother. Raged that I was too small. Too dark. He brought me to train the others. I was there for Devil and Ewan to fight, and if I did it well, if I took the beatings, if I lost the competition, I would be able to go home to my mother, and with money to save her from the life into which she’d been forced.”

He went quiet for a long time, and Hattie ached in the silence for the beautiful boy he’d been, and the magnificent man he’d become.

“I would be able to save her.” It had been a lie. Hattie didn’t need the confirmation. She knew in her soul that it had been a lie.

“He was a monster,” she said. “A fetid, rotten, coward of a man.”

Whit looked surprised. “You’re angry.”

“Of course I am! You were children! And he was a grown man with money and power. What kind of a person manipulates children! His own children!”

“One who wants an heir.”

“Heirs are nothing once you are a corpse,” she snapped before realization dawned. “Wait. Heirs. You ran. With Devil. And Grace.”

He nodded.

“Ewan became heir. A duke. He betrayed you.”

Another nod.

“And now? Where is he?”

“I don’t know.” The words were full of frustration.

Understanding flared. “But he’s here. Close.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw. “I won’t let him hurt you. I will keep you safe.”

And there it was. Her answer. “That’s what this is; you keep me safe from him.”

He met her eyes. “Until my dying breath.”

She shook her head. “I am not afraid of him.”

“You should be. I am.”

“It is he who should be afraid of me,” she vowed, fury coming hot and powerful. “I should like to have a good go at him with my bare hands.”

His eyes went wide, and he huffed a little, surprised laugh. “You are very angry.”

“Don’t you dare laugh. This isn’t amusing. Don’t you see? They have taken enough from you. I shan’t let him take from me, too.” She was vibrating with rage, unable to control herself or the tears that came around the wicked knot in her throat. “I should like to find them and destroy them. I should like to take one of your very sharpest knives and seat it directly into their black hearts.”

He reached for her. “Love, don’t cry. It’s in the past.”

“It’s not,” she said, batting his hand away. “You’ve carried this for years. You’ll carry it forever. And I loathe it. I loathe them. You cannot possibly think I would hear this story, about the man I love and the people he loves, and not wish to do severe bodily harm to everyone who thought to cross him.”

He stilled. “Hattie.”

She didn’t notice. She was too far gone. “Ruining the lives of children? For a goddamn title? What utter nonsense. My only consolation is that your father, I am happy to say, is rotting quite miserably in hell.”

“Hattie,” he said, low and tight, as though he had something urgent to say.

“What?” she asked, her breath fast and furious.

“You love me?”

Heat flashed through her, followed by cold, and then pure panic. “What? No. What?” She paused, her breath coming harsh. “What?”

His beautiful eyes lit in amusement. “You said you loved me, Hattie. Do you love me?”

“I didn’t say that.” She hadn’t. Had she?

“You did, but that’s not the relevant issue at this point.”

“What is?”

“Do you love me?”

“I . . .” She paused. “I hate your father.”

He smiled. “Well, he is dead. So you win on that score.” He reached for her then, pulling her close.

“Was it a very painful death?” She spoke to his shoulder, loving the way his arms wrapped around her. She was desperate for his touch—for the proof that he’d survived the hell of his childhood and stood here, healthy and strong.

He pressed a kiss to her temple. “Agonizing. Tell me you love me.”

She sank into his heat, unable to resist the hard, welcome planes of him. He was so big, and she liked it far too much. She liked him far too much. Loved him more than she should, as he would never reciprocate. “No,” she whispered.

He tilted her chin up to face him. “Please?”

“No.” She shook her head.

He leaned down and kissed her, small and soft and perfect. “Why not?”

Because you don’t love me back. The words he’d spoken in his rooms the other night were etched in her memory. I can’t love you. She wouldn’t say it to him. Not if he couldn’t say it back.

“Because I don’t want to be more of a burden.”

“How would that ever burden me?”

“You’ve spent your whole life protecting people. Feeling responsible for them. Saving them. Giving of yourself, even when you needn’t. And I don’t want to be a part of that. I don’t want to be another person you feel responsible to. I don’t want to be another person you belong to, because you can’t help yourself.” She took a deep breath, wishing for calm. “I don’t want to be a chore.”

He stiffened, the cool breeze whipping around them, and for a moment Hattie thought that he might release her. She supposed that was reasonable. She supposed she should pull away from him, as she’d just made the very important point that she didn’t want to be his burden.

But the truth was, she didn’t want to pull away from him.

She wanted to stay with him.

Forever.

Because she loved him. Because she wanted to keep him safe.

His arms tightened around her, and she inhaled, filling her lungs with him—lemon and bay and his delicious warm spice. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to him, the mast at his back making an already sturdy, strong man even sturdier. Even stronger.

“The Siren,” he said after an age. The words lost in the breeze coming off the river, but there, at her ear. “The ship is called the Siren.”

She nodded. “It’s the largest of the six you bought to punish me.”