Duke of Decadence (Lords of Scandal 9)

Bash exited his carriage looking tall and so handsome in the moonlight. “Step away from that door,” he bellowed.

Her sisters joined her at the window. “Oh, Eliza’s right. He is going to marry you,” Emily sighed. “How wonderfully romantic.”

“Uncle Malcolm just said he’s selling our house,” Abigail said, her voice clipped. “Let’s be outraged, shall we?”

“His Grace will stop him.” Emily asserted as she pointed toward the street.

“This is my door,” Uncle Malcolm spun about. “I don’t know why you’re meddling but not even you can stop this. I’ve had Lucas pronounced dead.”

Isabella gasped. He’d had their father declared deceased? Those words cut deep because she feared it was true but even if it wasn’t, the declaration gave Uncle Malcolm a great deal of power.

“You’d turn your own nieces out onto the street?” Bash asked. “What kind of man are you?”

Uncle Malcolm shook his fist. “The bastard cut me out of everything. The business, the inheritance. This is the only thing he’s left unprotected and I’ll make him pay for what he’s done.”

“The business is protected but we’re not?” Eliza grit out between her teeth. “That’s rich.”

“Papa thought Mama would protect us,” Emily said, sounding uncharacteristically defensive. She crossed her arms over her chest.

Abigail smacked the window frame. “I’m with Eliza on this one. How are we going to attract husbands without a home to entertain them in?”

The conversation continued below. Bash’s voice was easy to hear from their second story. “I’ve little doubt in my mind that he had very good reasons. In fact, I’m certain I know what they are.”

“I don’t give a damn what you know. And I can’t stop you from meddling, but I know you arranged for my nieces to be introduced into society. Think you’ll marry them off, do you? Make them safe and sound? How will you do that without a home for them?”

Uncle Malcolm’s voice rose with every word, maniacal glee making him sound almost mad.

“Why does he want to hurt us so much?” Isabella asked.

“Papa was forever getting in his way,” Abigail answered.

“I’ll buy the house,” Bash said, standing tall and straight. “You’ll get your piece, and everyone will be happy.”

“I don’t want them to be happy,” her uncle snarled back. “The world gives them everything all the time.”

Bash scoffed. “They are sitting in a house with no parents and no servants, barely eating. How can you even say that?”

Malcolm spit. “You’ll see. They’ll bounce back better than ever. It’s what they do. It’s what their father did.”

Bash shook his head. “It’s time for you to leave.”

“No.” Malcolm pointed toward the house. “It’s time for them to leave my house.”

Bash was on Uncle Malcolm in a second. Before Isabella could blink, he’d bounded up the stairs and had Uncle Malcolm by the shirt collar.

Isabella heard their uncle’s back crash into the door.

Bash wanted to strangle the life from this man and watch the air leave his lungs. But he eased back the grip he had on the old letch’s throat. Not even a duke could kill a baron without just cause.

Though he might have argued his cause was fairly just.

But he hated when he allowed the violence to take over. “You’re lucky I’m a nice person,” he gritted out through his teeth.

The older man sneered back. “Well, I’m not. Get them out of my house.”

Hadn’t the man learned his lesson? Bash pushed him back into the door, pressing on his throat again. “They’ll spend the night right where they are at. I’m not asking.”

Lord Pennington tried to push him off. “It’s my house.”